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Cheltenham and Willow Grove Turnpike Shares

Frankford Turnpike Shares

Chesnuthill and Springhouse Tavern Turnpike Shares

Chesapeake and Delaware Canal Shares

Course of Exchange. Bills on London, at 60 days, 164 per cent. on Amsterdam, 39 cents per guilder. on Hamburg, 32 cents per marc banco.

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uncertain

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OMAR AND FATIMA; OR, THE APOTHECARY OF ISPAHAN.

A Persian Tale.

Continued from page 10.

HAD it been for a wager of ten times the number of tomans that were in the till of Nadir, the sun and the sage could not have risen more punctually together. While the former, with its oblique rays, was gilding the turrets, the minerets, the triumphal arches, and all the variety of sublime objects which distinguished the imperial city of Ispahan, the latter, having taken his diurnal station, was, with the utmost composure, leaning over the balustrade before his shop; and while smoking a pipe of at least six feet long, contemplating the pavement of the bazar, on which nothing was to be discerned. It was not market-day, and consequently the pavement of the bazar was as smooth and unoccupied as a new shorn field.

When the sage had finished his pipe and his cogitations, which, whatsoever might have been their subject, terminated in wonder at what could have induced Tamira to sleep so much beyond her usual time, for now the gnomon of the dial cast its shade upon the figure

VOL. VIII. NO. XLVII.

indicating the seventh hour, and the trumpets from the minerets summoned him to prayers.

"Not accustomed to much indulgence," said Nadir, as he performed his ablutions, "poor Tamira is an instance that one gratification demands another; she feasted yesterday, she sleeps this morning."

Turning to the twelve hundred and thirty-first page of the Abridgment of the Philosopher of Zulpha's labours, we find that Nadir, who had shut his door, and hastened to the mosque, was mistaken in his conjectures respecting his housekeeper, for the vigilant Tamira had risen before either the sun or himself, and also that she had left the house. To conjecture where she was gone puzzled the sagacious apothecary at his return, and almost obliterated the remembrance of his quondam guest. All that he could rest upon was, that she, having some part of the toman left, had sallied forth to procure such necessaries as were wanted in the house.

Satisfied with this suggestion, he

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breakfasted upon some of the vesti ges of the preceding day's entertain ment.

Some persons came in, either for medicine, or to have some trifling operations performed. The day advanced. The sun was fast ascending to its meridian height. The shade of the gnomon of the dial had considerably passed the eleventh hour. The apothecary had a few, and but a very few, visits to make; politeness demanded that he should call upon his guest. Tamira had, in his absence, been used to act as his deputy; she was not to be found: what was to be done in this dilemma?

While he was wearying himself with conjecture, a slave entered, and put into his hand a note. Nadir, thinking that it was a prescription, went behind the counter, put on his spectacles, and read,

"Abud requests immediately to see his neighbour Nadir."

"Ah!" said the apothecary, "here is another martyr to intemperance. However, it is fortunate that I can visit the man as a patient to whose house I was going as a friend. Repletion," he continued, as he swallowed a piece of melon and three or four cakes," is what destroys us all. Well might the Arabian physician write the Golden Book of Abstinence. Well might the sages of Delhi recommend rice and water to the municipality of that luxurious city."

Nadir desired the slave to look to his shop while he waited upon his master, put a few medicines under his caftan, and sallied forth.

The house of Abud was in the north angle of the Meydan. "The illness of the master of this mansion," said he, as he entered, "seems to have had but little effect on his slaves, for I think that I never discerned them more cheerful. Where

is my friend Abud? In bed, I suppose," he continued.

"In bed," replied one of the attendants, "at noon! My master has been up these six hours."

"Ah!" said the apothecary, "I

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"I know that," he continued; "entertainments of that kind are pleasant, but wrong. Temperance, which is with mussulmans a religious duty, cannot be too strictly enforced. How were you taken ?" "yes;

"Taken!" said Abud. "Yes," said the apothecary, disordered stomach; the head affected; eructations; wind; bile; feverish symptoms. Now I will tell you what I will do for you. In the first place, I have brought an emetic."

"An emetic!" cried Abud.

"Yes! I have compressed it into as small a compass as possible: only a six ounce vial. When this has operated, you shall go to bed." "To bed!"

"Yes! I shall then administer these powders. After that

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"After that," said Abud, (6 yout will probably have nothing to do but to lay me out. Are you distracted, neighbour Nadir? Who told you that I was ill ?”

"Yourself! Did you not inform me so in your note? Who sends for an apothecary when in health? Did you not allow that I had guessed at your disorder? Are not the symptoms visible enough; that kind of wandering, fluctuating imbecility of mind which the vulgar term lightheadedness, and the learned

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"Hold! hold!" cried Abud; "if either the vulgar or the learned say that I am sick or light-headed, nay, was the great Eleazer and the whole college of Ispahan to concur, I would affirm and prove, that they were equally fools and blockheads. What should make me ill?”

"What made Gehan Gaur fall from his throne?" returned Nadir;

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