Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 5.djvu/367

333 Quoth the merchant, “Hast thou asked at my house?” “O my lord,” answered she, “I did indeed go to thy house and ask; but they told me that the lady of the house had been divorced by her husband; so I asked no farther.” With this, the merchant turned to the young man and said, “Let the old woman go her way; for the veil is with me.” So saying, he brought it out from the shop and gave it to the darner before all the folk. Then he betook himself to the damsel and giving her some money, took her again to wife, after making abundance of excuses to her and asking pardon of God, because he knew not what the old woman had done. This then, O King,’ said the Vizier, ‘is an instance of the malice of women, and for another to the same purport, I have heard tell that THE KING’S SON AND THE AFRIT’S MISTRESS.

A certain king’s son was once walking alone for his pleasure, when he came to a green meadow, abounding in trees laden with fruit and birds singing on the branches, and a river running through it. The place pleased him; so he sat down there and taking out some conserves he had brought with him, began to eat. Presently, he espied a great smoke rising up to heaven and taking fright, climbed up into a tree and hid himself among the branches. Thence he saw an Afrit rise out of the midst of the stream, with a chest of marble, secured by a padlock, on his head. He set down the chest on the sward and opened it, and there came forth a damsel like the sun shining in the cloudless sky. He gazed on her awhile, then laid his head in her lap and fell asleep, whereupon she lifted up his head and laying it on the chest, rose and walked about.

Presently, she chanced to raise her eyes to the tree in