There was nothing indeed but a few small fish and a few beautiful rosy-red onions, but Halil had so much to say in praise of the repast, telling his guest where and how these fish were caught, and in what manner they ought to be fried so as to bring out the taste; how you could find out which of them had hard roes and which soft; what different sorts of flavours there are in the onion tribe, far more, indeed, than in the pine-apple; and then the pure fresh water too—­why the Koran from end to end is full of the praises of fresh pure water, and Halil knew all these passages by heart, and had no need to look in the holy book for them.  And then, too, he had so many interesting tales to tell of travellers who had lost their way in the desert and were dying for a drop of water, and how Allah had had compassion upon them and guided them to the springs of the oasis—­so that the guest was actually entrapped into imagining that he had just been partaking of the most magnificent banquet, and he enjoyed his meat and drink, and arose from his rush-carpet well satisfied with himself and with his host.

I’ll wager that Sultan Achmed, poor fellow! felt far less contented when he rose from his gorgeous and luxurious sofa, though the tables beside it were piled high with fruits and sweetmeats, and two hundred odalisks danced and sang around it.

“And now let us go to sleep!” said Halil Patrona to his guest.  “I know that slumber is the greatest of all the joys which Allah has bestowed upon mankind.  In our waking hours we belong to others, but the land of dreams is all our own.  If your dreams be good dreams, you rejoice that they are good, and if they be evil dreams, you rejoice that they are but dreams.  The night is nice and warm, you can sleep on the house-top, and if you pull your rope-ladder up after you, you need not fear that anybody will molest you.”

Janaki said “thank you!” to everything, and very readily clambered to the top of the roof.  There he found already prepared for him the carpet and the fur cushion on which he was to sleep.  Plainly these were the only cushion and carpet obtainable in the house, and the guest observing that these were the very things he had noticed in the room below, exclaimed to Halil Patrona: 

“Oh, humane Chorbadshi, you have given me your own carpet and pillow; on what will you sleep, pray?”

“Do not trouble your head about me, muzafir!  I will bring forth my second carpet and my second cushion and sleep on them.”

Janaki peeped through a chink in the roof, and observed how vigorously Halil Patrona performed his ablutions, and how next he went through his devotions with even greater conscientiousness than his ablutions, whereupon he produced a round trough, turned it upside down, laid it upon the rush-mat, placed his head upon the trough, and folding his arms across his breast, peacefully went to sleep in the Prophet.

The next morning, when Janaki awoke and descended to Halil, he gave him a piece of money which they call a golden denarius.