him hither.”  Then the king sent for a clever merchant who knew Arabic eloquently and the language of Roum, and gave him goods for trading and sent him to Roum with the object of procuring the slave.  But the daughter of the Kaysar said privily to the merchant, “That slave is my son; I have, for a good reason, said to the king that he is a slave; so thou must bring him as a slave, and let it be thy duty to take care of him.”  In due course the merchant brought the youth to the king’s service; and when the king saw his fair face, and discovered in him many pleasing and varied accomplishments, he treated him with distinction and favour, and conferred on the merchant a robe of honour and gifts.  His mother saw him from afar, and was pleased with receiving a secret salutation from him.

One day the eking had gone to the chase, and the palace remained void of rivals; so the mother called in her son, kissed his fair face, and told him the tale of her great sorrow.  A chamberlain became aware of the secret and another suspicion fell upon him, and he said to himself, “The harem of the king is the sanctuary of security and the palace of protection.  If I speak not of this, I shall be guilty of treachery and shall have wrought unfaithfulness.”  When the king returned from the chase, the chamberlain related to him what he had seen, and the eking was angry and said, “This woman hath deceived me with words and deeds, and has brought hither her desire by craft and cunning.  This conjecture must be true, else why did she play such a trick?  And why did she hatch such a plot?  And why did she send the merchant?” Then the king, enraged, went into the harem, and the queen saw from his countenance that the occurrence of the night before had become known to him, and she said, “Be it not that I see the king angry?” He said, “How should I not be angry?  Thou, by craft and trickery, and intrigue, and plotting, hast brought thy desire from Roum—­what wantonness is this that thou hast done?” And then he thought to slay her, but he forbore, because of his great love for her.  But he ordered the chamberlain to carry the youth to some obscure place, and straightway sever his head from his body.  When the poor mother saw this, she well-nigh fell on her face, and her soul was near leaving her body.  But she knew that sorry would not avail, and so she restrained herself.

And when the chamberlain took the youth into his own house, he said to him, “O youth, knowest thou not that the harem of the king is the sanctuary of security?  What great treachery is this that thou hast perpetrated?” The youth replied, “That queen is my mother, and I am her true son.  Because of her natural delicacy, she said not to the king that she had a son by another husband.  And when yearning came over her, she contrived to bring me here from Roum; and while the king was engaged in the chase, maternal love stirred in her, and she called me to her and embraced me.”  On hearing