THE STONE OF THE PHILOSOPHERS
99
S.-M.-Du equalized with So'Do'My
That transcends Short
0’ Face and Longnose
both:
This is the deepest
den of the Qliphoth.
Match theml
the Tree of Life in Eden Bower
Grows balanced perfectly from root to flower.”
-—This may be why the Reverend Mrs. Grundy
Called him a sodomite the other Sunday.
Good!
chuckled
Basil,
when
they
had
done
laughing.
If he'd
worked that
out
as
a boy, his
alleged
character
might
have forced
him to its own path.
When I was in Marrakesh,
they lynched
a poor old man because
their mosque had been defiled in
some
real or imaginary
way (with
which
he
had
in
any case
nothing
to
do, having
been
paralyzed
for years).
The
excuse was,
on the soles of his
feet
the
creases
formed the word Allah, so that he always trod upon the name of God!
They killed Burckhardt
for that, by the
way.
A pure invention
in
both instances.
I saw his feet, and they were just like anybody else’s,
only dirtier.
Poverty and paralysis
were his crimes, I
warrant ye, my masters!
Anyway,
it was a great joke, and I made a splendid
Arabian Tale
of it.
Read it!
was the chorus.
Which he did.
THE MOSQUE
BEWITCHED
AN aged sorcerer there dwelt within the town of Marrakesh
The fangs of Hell in life who felt twitching
his soul out through the
flesh.
Though not originally
had his moral ruin was complete:
His pious parents said he had the devil’s claw-marks
on his feet.