** General Yusuf is a nice-looking, pleasant, and
cheery little man, with a firesh complexion and dark
hair turning gray. He is as jolly and as pleased
with everybody as if he were a young nobody whom



Digitized by



Google



390 ENGLISH FEMALE ARTISTS,

it was quite a kindness to speak to. He is an Italian
or Maltese by birth, and was taken, with his father
and a young brother or sister, by pirates when he
was four or five years old. He does not know who
his father was, nor what became of him. The chil-
dren were sold in the slave-market at Algiers, and
Yusuf became the property of the Dey. He was
an extremely pretty boy, and was a great favourite,
and had a pleasant enough life. By-and-by the Dey
of Tunis came on a visit to the Dey of Algiers, and
when he was going away, he said to his host, * What
a pretty little boy youVe got there I ' whereupon the
Dey of Algiers presented the young Yusuf to his
guest. At Tunis he was as great a favourite as at
Algiers. When he was grown up the Dey sent him
with orders to one of his generals, who was trying
to put down an insurrection at a distance from the
capital. When Yusuf arrived at the seat of war, he
saw at once that the general was mismanaging every-
thing ; so he said, * Why don't you do so and so ? '
giving his own opinion of what should be done.
