Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/295

 Rh there he sat down, and was very sad. The king asked him what made him so sad. He said, "I shall never be happy until you kill that goatherd boy, and pull out his eyes, and put them in a cup, and bring them and show them to me." The king guessed this was the result of the old woman's trickery, so he sent his wazir to warn the goatherd to hide his son, and told him to kill a kid and take out its eyes, and bring them in a cup. The wazir went to the Baloch, who did as he was told; he killed a kid, and put its eyes in a cup, and took away his son and hid him. The wazir brought the eyes and showed them to the prince, and told him they were the eyes of the goatherd boy; and the prince rejoiced greatly.

One day, by chance, the prince went out to hunt on the river bank, and he saw a boat go by. In that boat a most beautiful woman was sitting. Her eyes met the prince's eyes, and they fell in love from that moment. For a little while the boat was quite close to the prince, and they continued gazing at each other. Then the river-way led away from that bank towards the other side, and the fair one placed her hand on her head; then again she put her hand on her eyes; a third time she put her hand on her other arm; thus she signalled to him. The prince returned home and was very sorrowful; and when the king asked him what was the matter, he said, "I have seen a woman in a boat, so beautiful that my heart is set on her. If I can get her, well; if not, I will kill myself" The king asked the wazir to explain the meaning of the signs which the woman had made to his son, but the wazir said he knew nothing of their meaning. The prince then cried out, "If that Baloch, my brother, were well again, I would forgive him everything; bring him to me!" The wazir brought the boy, who came to the prince, and said, "Are you ill; tell me what it is?" The prince told him how he had seen a woman passing in a boat, and described the signs she had made. Then the lad said, "I'll bring about a meeting between you; by those signs she told you