Page:Sinbad the sailor & other stories from the Arabian nights.djvu/302

 the evening, when he felt weary and hungry. Dismissing the officials, he summoned a eunuch and desired food to be brought him. "It is prepared, O Prince of the Faithful!" replied the eunuch. And he led him into the banqueting chamber, where a sumptuous feast was spread. Ten slave-girls waited upon him and he ate with relish of the delicate viands they placed before him. When he had finished they led him to the drinking chamber and danced before him while he drank of the choicest and rarest wines.

"By Allah!" he said in his cups, "this is enchantment—naught but devilry, practised upon me by that guest of mine. Here, girl! why dost thou laugh?" The girl he had called came and kissed the ground before him. "O Prince of the Faithful," she said, "here in thy palace all is thine. I laughed for very gladness to be thy slave." And she whirled away again into the dance. Presently, however, she returned with a cup of wine and handed it to him. He drank, after which another came with another cup of wine, until the last was reached; and she, by order of the Khalifeh, had dropped a drugged lozenge into the cup. Ignorant of this, Abu-I-Hasan took it from her hand, and, saying to himself, "May Allah protect me from the Evil One!" drank the wine; and immediately on this he fell back senseless. The attendants then, in obedience to Er-Rashid's orders, took him back to his own house and laid him on his bed, still unconscious.

When he awoke from his stupor it was dark, and he called loudly for lights; but there was no answer. Where were the slave girls? Angrily he summoned one or two by name. Then it was that his mother, hearing him calling out in this way, came to his couch and asked what ailed him. Had he gone mad? "Barest thou address the Prince of 210