Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/534

522 get there. He went wandering round till he came to a garden, and in the garden he saw a bed, and bedding spread out upon it. The prince lay down on the bed and went to sleep. Now that bed belonged to Kismat Pari. She came up and saw a man sleeping on her bed. She woke him up, and said, "Who are you, sleeping on my bed?" The prince said: "I am the son of a king." Kismat Pari was delighted at hearing this, and said: "I made a vow that I would marry the man who came and lay down on my bed. Now I am very happy, because a king's son has come, and I will marry you." She went to her father and mother, and demanded that they should marry her to the prince at once. But they said: "We will not marry you to him, for these mortals have but a short life, while we Paris live for two thousand years." Kismat Pari said : "I made a vow I would marry no other; but her father replied, "But I say, and your mother says, that we will never give you to him." Kismat Pari said: "I am ready to marry him according to the law of the Kuran: it is not for you to stop me. Come with me, and let us go before the Prophet and obtain a judgment from him. If the Prophet permits me, I will marry him; and if he does not permit me, I will not marry him." Her father said: "Come, I will go with you." So Kismat Pari, and her father and mother, all started off and came before the Prophet's judgment-seat; and she stated her case, and her parents stated theirs. Just at that time a horse harnessed with golden trappings came to the prince and stood before him, and said: "Mount on my back, and I will show you a grand sight." The prince mounted, and the horse flew straight up to the Prophet's hall of judgment, and he saw Kismat Pari and her parents standing before the Prophet. Then the horse turned round and came back to the place he started from. The prince alighted and sat down on the bed. Looking up, he saw that the horse had gone, and a donkey ready saddled was standing in its place. The