“Allah preserve us from affronting him!” whispered the caliph.

“When old Aboo died, I perceived, if I did not speedily turn my strength to some account, I should starve; so it struck me that there were no people more merry than the water-carriers, who supply for a few paras to the houses of this city the soft water of the river.  I resolved to become one, but instead of going backwards and forwards with a goatskin on my shoulders, I went down to the curriers, and selected the soft skin of the young ox which hangs above me, fitted it to my shoulders, and filling it at the river, marched up to the bazaar.  No sooner did I appear than all the water-carriers called out, ’That villain, Yussuf, is about to take away our bread.  May Shitan seize him.  Let us go to the cadi and complain.’  The cadi listened to their story, for they accused me of witchcraft, saying that no five men could lift the skin when it was full.  He sent one of his beeldars to summon me before him.  I had just filled my skin at the river, when the officer came from this distributor of bastinadoes.  I followed him to the court, laden as I was.  The crowd opened to let me pass, and I appeared before the cadi, who was much astonished at my showing so little inconvenience from such an enormous burthen.  ‘Oh!  Yussuf,’ cried he, ’hear and answer; thou art accused of witchcraft.’  ‘Who accuses me, O cadi?’ replied I, throwing down my skin of water.  Whereupon two hang-dogs stepped forward, and cried with loud voices, ‘Behold us here, O wise and just one.’  The cadi put one aside, and questioned the other, who swore on the book that the devil had given me a pig’s skin and had promised that as long as I served the followers of the Prophet out of the unclean vessel, he would enable me to carry as much as ten men.  The second witness confirmed this evidence; and added, that he heard me talking with the devil, who offered to turn himself into a yaboo, and carry water for me, which I had civilly declined, for what reason he knew not, as he did not hear the rest of the conversation.

“At this evidence, the cadi and mollahs who sat with him, turned up their eyes with horror, and proceeded to discuss the degree of punishment which so enormous a crime deserved, quite forgetting to ask me if I had anything to offer in my defence.  At last they settled that, as a commencement, I should receive five hundred bastinadoes on the soles of my feet, and if I lived, about as many more on my belly.  The cadi was about to pronounce his irrevocable fetva, when I took the liberty of interrupting this rapid course of justice.  ‘O cadi,’ said I, ’and ye, mollahs, whose beards drop wisdom, let your slave offer, at the footstool of justice, the precious proofs of innocence.’  ’Produce them quickly, then, thou wedded to Shitan and Jehanum,’ replied the cadi.  Whereupon I loosened the string which attached the mouth, and allowed all the water to run out of the skin.  I then turned the skin