al-Hasan awoke at the last of the night and heard the symphony of lutes and tambourines and the sound of the flutes and the singing of the slave-girls, whereupon he opened his eyes and finding himself in the palace, with the hand-maids and eunuchs about him, exclaimed, “There is no Majesty and there is no Might save in Allah, the Glorious, the Great!  Come to my help this night which meseems more unlucky than the former!  Verily, I am fearful of the Madhouse and of that which I suffered therein the first time, and I doubt not but the Devil is come to me again, as before.  O Allah, my Lord, put thou Satan to shame!” Then he shut his eyes and laid his head in his sleeve, and fell to laughing softly and raising his head bytimes, but still found the apartment lighted and the girls singing.  Presently, one of the eunuchs sat down at his head and said to him, “Sit up, O Prince of True Believers, and look on thy palace and thy slave-girls.”  Said Abu al-Hasan, “Under the veil of Allah, am I in truth Commander of the Faithful, and dost thou not lie?  Yesterday I rode not forth neither ruled, but drank and slept, and this eunuch cometh to make me rise.”  Then he sat up and recalled to thought that which had betided him with his mother and how he had beaten her and entered the Bedlam, and he saw the marks of the beating, wherewith the Superintendent had beaten him, and was perplexed concerning his affair and pondered in himself, saying, “By Allah, I know not how my case is nor what is this that betideth me!” Then, gazing at the scene around him, he said privily, “All these are of the Jann in human shape, and I commit my case to Allah.”  Presently he turned to one of the damsels and said to her, “Who am I?” Quoth she, “Thou art the Commander of the Faithful;” and quoth he, “Thou liest, O calamity![FN#55] If I be indeed the Commander of the Faithful, bite my finger.”  So she came to him and bit it with all her might, and he said to her, “It doth suffice.”  Then he asked the Chief Eunuch, “Who am I?” and he answered, “Thou art the Commander of the Faithful.”  So he left him and returned to his wonderment:  then, turning to a little white slave, said to him, “Bite my ear;” and he bent his head low down to him and put his ear to his mouth.  Now the Mameluke was young and lacked sense; so he closed his teeth upon Abu al-Hasan’s ear with all his might, till he came near to sever it; and he knew not Arabic, so, as often as the Wag said to him, “It doth suffice,” he concluded that he said, “Bite like a vice,” and redoubled his bite and made his teeth meet in the ear, whilst the damsels were diverted from him with hearkening to the singing-girls, and Abu al-Hasan cried out for succour from the boy and the Caliph lost his sense for laughter.  Then he dealt the boy a cuff, and he let go his ear, whereupon all present fell down with laughter and said to the little Mameluke, “Art mad that thou bitest the Caliph’s ear on this wise?” And Abu al-Hasan cried to