Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 7.djvu/53

35 Bedr, ‘I wondered to see the city void of people.’ Quoth the grocer, ‘O my son, come up into the shop, lest thou perish.’ So Bedr went up into the shop and sat down; whereupon the old man set food before him, saying, ‘O my son, come within the shop; glory be to Him who hath preserved thee from yonder she-devil!’

Bedr was sore affrighted at the grocer’s words; but he ate his fill and washed his hands; then turned to his host and said to him, ‘O my lord, what is the meaning of thy words? Verily, thou hast made me fearful of this city and its people.’ ‘Know, O my son,’ replied the old man, ‘that this is the City of the Magicians and its queen is a sorceress and a mighty enchantress, as she were a she-devil, crafty and perfidious exceedingly. All the horses and mules and asses thou sawest were once men and strangers, like unto thee; for whoever enters the city, being a young man like thyself, this misbelieving witch takes him and abides with him forty days, after which she enchants him, and he becomes a horse or a mule or an ass, of those thou sawest on the sea-shore. So, when they saw thee about to land, they feared lest she should enchant thee, even as she had enchanted them, and signed to thee, as who should say, “Do not land,—” of their solicitude for thee, lest she should do with thee like as she had done with them. She possessed herself of this city [and took it] from its people by sorcery and her name is Queen Lab, which, being interpreted, meaneth in Arabic, “The Sun.”’

When Bedr heard what the old man said, he was sore affrighted and trembled like a wind-shaken reed, saying in himself, ‘Hardly am I delivered from the affliction wherein I was by reason of sorcery, when fate casts me into yet sorrier case!’ And he fell a-musing over his case and that which had betided him. When the grocer