it to thee when we have made a finish of our food.”  So, when they had ended eating and drinking, the young man asked his host for the story, and he said, “Know that in my youth I was the same as thou seest me in the matter of loathliness and foul favour; and I had brethren of the fairest of the folk; wherefore my father preferred them over me and used to show them kindness, to my exclusion, and made me serve in their stead, like as a master employeth slaves.  One day, a dromedary of his strayed from the herd of camels, and he said to me, ’Go thou forth in quest of her and return not but with her.’  I replied, ‘Send other than I of thy sons.’  But he would not consent to this and scolded me and insisted upon me, till the matter came to such a pass with him that he took a thongwhip and fell to beating me.  So I arose and saddling a riding-camel, mounted her and sallied forth at random, purposing to go out into the wolds and the wilds and return to him never more.  I fared on all my night and the next day and coming at eventide[FN#505] to the encampment of this my wife’s people, alighted down with and became the guest of her father, who was a Shaykh well stricken in years.  Now when it was the noon of night, I arose and went forth the tent at a call of nature, and none knew of my case save this woman.  The dogs followed me as a suspected stranger and ceased not worrying me[FN#506] till I fell on my back into a pit, wherein was water, a deep hollow and a steep; and a dog of those dogs fell in with me.  The woman, who was then a girl in the bloom of youth, full of strength and spirit, was moved to ruth on me, for the calamity whereinto I was fallen, and coming to me with a rope, said to me, ‘Catch hold of the rope,’ So I hent it and clung to it and she haled me up; but, when I was half-way up, I pulled her down and she fell with me into the pit; and there we abode three days, she and I and the hound.  When her people arose in the morning and did not see her, they sought her in the camp, but, finding her not and missing me also, never doubted but she had fled with me.[FN#507] Now she had four brothers, as they were Saker-hawks, and they took horse and dispersed in search of us.  When the day yellowed on the fourth dawn, the dog began to bark and the other hounds answered him and coming to the mouth of the pit, stood howling to him.  The Shaykh, my wife’s father, hearing the howling of the hounds, came up and standing at the brink of the hollow, looked in and beheld a marvel.  Now he was a brave man and a sensible, an elder experienced in affairs, so he fetched a cord and bringing forth the three, questioned us twain of our case.  I told him all that had betided and he fell a-pondering the affair.  Presently, her brothers returned, whereupon the old man acquainted them with the whole case and said to them, ’O my sons, know that your sister intended not aught but good, and if ye kill this man, ye will earn abiding shame and ye will wrong him, and wrong your own souls and eke your sister: