town.  It so fortuned as he was walking late one night, he found a country fellow dead drunk, snorting on a bulk; he caused his followers to bring him to his palace, and there stripping him of his old clothes, and attiring him after the court fashion, when he waked, he and they were all ready to attend upon his excellency, persuading him that he was some great duke.  The poor fellow, admiring how he came there, was served in state all the day long; after supper he saw them dance, heard musick, and the rest of those court-like pleasures; but late at night, when he was well-tipled, and again fast asleep they put on his old robes, and so conveyed him to the place where they first found him.  Now the fellow had not made them so good sport the day before, as he did when he returned to himself; all the jest was to see how he looked upon it.  In conclusion, after some little admiration, the poor man told his friends he had seen a vision, constantly beleeved it, would not otherwise be perswaded; and so the jest ended.”

I do not think that this is a story imported from the East:  the adventure is just as likely to have happened in Bruges as in Baghdad; but the exquisite humor of the Arabian tale is wanting--even Shakspeare’s Christopher Sly is not to be compared with honest Abu al-Hasan the Wag.

This story of the Sleeper and the Waker recalls the similar device practised by the Chief of the Assassins—­that formidable, murderous association, the terror of the Crusades—­on promising novices.  Von Hammer, in his “History of the Assassins,” end of Book iv., gives a graphic description of the charming gardens into which the novices were carried while insensible from hashish: 

In the center of the Persian as well as the Assyrian territory of the Assassins, that is to say, both at Alamut and Massiat, were situated, in a space surrounded by walls, splendid gardens—­true Eastern paradises.  There were flower-beds and thickets of fruit-trees, intersected by canals, shady walks, and verdant glades, where the sparkling stream bubbled at every step; bowers of roses and vineyards; luxurious halls and porcelain kiosks, adorned with Persian carpets and Grecian stuffs, where drinking-vessels of gold, silver, and crystal glittered on trays of the same costly materials; charming maidens and handsome boys of Muhammed’s Paradise, soft as the cushions on which they reposed, and intoxicating as the wine which they presented.  The music of the harp was mingled with the songs of birds, and the melodious tones of the songstress harmonized with the murmur of the brooks.  Everything breathed pleasure, rapture, and sensuality.  A youth, was deemed worthy by his strength and resolution to be initiated into the Assassin service, was invited to the table and conversation of the grand master, or grand prior; he was then intoxicated with hashish and carried into the garden, which on awaking he believed to be Paradise; everything around him, the houris in particular, contributing