Note 523 — ALI NUR AL-DIN AND MIRIAM THE GIRDLE-GIRL.[376] (continued 2)

Arab. “Khák-bák,” an onomatopœia like our flip-flap and a host of similar words. This profaning a Christian Church which contained the relics of the Virgin would hugely delight the coffee-house habitués, and the Egyptians would be equally flattered to hear that the son of a Cairene merchant had made the conquest of a Frankish Princess Royal. That he was an arrant poltroon mattered very little, as his cowardice only set off his charms.