his name.  He replied that his name was Ocean of Stories.  The king then inquired how many stories he knew, to which he answered that the name of Ocean had been conferred on him because he knew an endless number.  On being desired to relate one, he thus began:  “O King, there was a tank 36,000 miles in breadth, and 54,000 in length.  This was densely filled with lotus plants, and millions upon millions of birds with golden wings [called Hamsa] perched on those flowers.  One day a hurricane arose, accompanied with rain, which the birds were not able to endure, and they entered a cave under a rock, which was in the vicinity of the tank.”  The king asked what happened next, and he replied that one of the birds flew away.  The king again inquired what else occurred, and he answered:  “Another flew away”; and to every question of the king he continued to give the same answer.  At this the king felt ashamed, and, seeing it was impossible to outwit the man, he dismissed him with a handsome present.

   [36] Pedro Alfonso (the Spanish form of his adopted name) was
        originally a Jewish Rabbi, and was born in 1062, at
        Huesca, in the kingdom of Arragon.  He was reputed a man
        of very great learning, and on his being baptised (at
        the age of 44) was appointed by Alfonso XV, king of
        Castile and Leon, physician to the royal household.  His
        work, above referred to, is written in Latin, and has
        been translated into French, but not as yet into
        English.  An outline of the tales, by Douce, will be
        found prefixed to Ellis’ Early English Metrical
        Romances.

   [37] This is also the subject of one of the Fabliaux.—­In
        a form similar to the story in Alfonsus it is current
        among the Milanese, and a Sicilian version is as
        follows:  Once upon a time there was a prince who studied
        and racked his brains so much that he learned magic and
        the art of finding hidden treasures.  One day he
        discovered a treasure in Daisisa.  “O,” he says, “now I
        am going to get it out.”  But to get it out it was
        necessary that ten million million of ants should cross
        the river one by one in a bark made of the half-shell of
        a nut.  The prince puts the bark in the river, and makes
        the ants pass over—­one, two, three; and they are still
        doing it.  Here the story-teller pauses and says:  “We
        will finish the story when the ants have finished
        crossing the river.”—­Crane’s Italian Popular Tales,
        p. 156.