The end of the Six Hundred and Fifth Night.

Then said she:—­I have heard, O auspicious King, that the Caliph, surprised by the blind man’s words and deeds said, “I may not grant thy request nor will I minish the merit of my charity, by treating thee as thou wouldst have me entreat thee.”  Saying these words, he strove to get away from the blind man, but he who after his long experience expected this refusal of his benefactor, did his utmost to keep hold of him, and cried, “O my lord, forgive my audacity and my persistency; and I implore thee either give me a cuff on the ear, or take back thine alms, for I may not receive it save on that condition, without falsing a solemn oath I have sworn before the face of Allah; and, if thou knew the reason, thou wouldst accord with me that the penalty is light indeed.”  Then the Caliph not caring to be delayed any longer, yielded to the blind man’s importunity, and gave him a slight cuff:  whereupon he loosed him forthright and thanked him and blessed him.  When the Caliph and his Wazir, had walked some way from the blind man, the former exclaimed, “This blind beggar must assuredly have some right good cause for behaving himself in such manner to all who give him alms, and I would fain know it.  Do thou return to him and tell him who I am, and bid him fail not to appear at my palace about mid-afternoon prayer time that I may converse with him, and hear whatso he hath to say.”  Hereupon Ja’afar went back and bestowed alms on the blind man giving him another cuff on the ear and apprised him of the Caliph’s command, and returned forthright to his lord.  Presently, when the twain reached the town, they found in a square a vast crowd of folk gazing at a handsome youth and a well shaped, who was mounted on a mare which he rode at fullest speed round the open space, spurring and whipping the beast so cruelly that she was covered with sweat and blood.  Seeing this the Caliph, amazed at the youth’s brutality, stopped to ask the by-standers an they knew why he tortured and tormented the mare on such wise; but he could learn naught save that for some while past, every day at the same time, he had entreated her after the same fashion.  Hereat as they walked along, the Caliph bid his Wazir especially notice the place and order the young man to come without failing on the next day, at the hour appointed for the blind man.  But ere the Caliph reached his palace, he saw in a street, which he had not passed through for many months, a newly built mansion, which seemed to him the palace of some great lord of the land.  He asked the Wazir, an he knew its owner; and Ja’afar answered he did not but would make inquiry.  So he consulted a neighbour who told him that the house owner was one Khwajah Hasan surnamed Al-Habbal from his handicraft, rope-making; that he himself had seen the man at work in the days of his poverty, that he knew not how Fate and Fortune had befriended him, yet that the same Khwajah had gotten such exceeding