Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 1.djvu/280

258 with thee, till I have punished thee for eating ragout of cumin-seed, without washing thy hands!’ Then she cried out to the maids, who bound me; and she took a sharp razor and cut off my thumbs and toes, as ye have seen. Thereupon I swooned away and she sprinkled the severed parts with a powder which staunched the blood; and I said, ‘Never again will I eat of ragout of cumin-seed without washing my hands forty times with potash, forty times with galingale and forty times with soap!’ And she took of me an oath to that effect. So when the ragout was set before me, my colour changed and I said to myself, ‘It was this that was the cause of the cutting off of my thumbs and toes.’ And when ye forced me, I said, ‘I must needs fulfil the oath I have taken.’” “And what befell thee after this?” asked the others. “After this,” replied he, “her heart was appeased and I lay with her that night. We abode thus awhile, till she said to me, one day, ‘It befits not that we continue in the Khalif’s palace: for none ever came hither but thou, and thou wonst not in but by the grace of the Lady Zubeideh. Now she has given me fifty thousand dinars; so take this money and go out and buy us a commodious house.’ So I went forth and bought a handsome and spacious house, whither she transported all her goods and valuables.” Then (continued the controller) we ate and went away: and after, there happened to me with the hunchback that thou wottest of. This then is my story and peace be on thee.’ Quoth the King, ‘This story is not more agreeable than that of the hunchback: on the contrary, it is less so, and you must all be hanged.’ Then came forward the Jewish physician and kissing the earth, said, ‘O King of the age, I will tell thee a story more wonderful than that of the hunchback.’ ‘Tell on,’ answered the King; and the Jew said, ‘The strangest adventure that ever befell me was as follows: