Book Excerpt
said to himself. “I’m precious glad that young Harkaway warned me, after all. I might have got into some trouble if I had gone ashore without knowing this.””Stop,” said the captain. “Have you any thing to take his excellency as a present?”
This made the orphan feel somewhat nervous.
It tended to confirm what young Jack had said.
“It is, then, the custom to make presents?” he said.
“Yes.”
“What shall I give?”
“Any thing. That’s a very nice watch you wear.”
“Must I give that?”
“Yes. His excellency is sure to present you with a much richer one–that’s Turkish etiquette.”
This again corroborated Jack’s words.
Yet it was a far more pleasant way of putting it than Jack had thought fit to do.
Mr. Figgins only objected to a present of wives.
Any thing rich in the way of jewellery was quite another matter.
“On entering the presence, you have only to prostrate yourself three times; the third time you work it so that you
