Quoth Dunyazad, “O sister mine, an thou be other than sleepy, tell us one of thy fair tales, so therewith we may cut short the waking hours of this our night,” and quoth Shahrazad:—­It hath reached me, O King of the Age, that the old woman went forth to work on her well-known ways, and she wandered about town to find a maiden for the Prince Zayn al-Asnam.  Whatever notable beauty she saw she would set before Mubarak; but each semblance as it was considered in the mirror showed exceedingly dark and dull, and the inspector would dismiss the girl.  This endured until the crone had brought to him all the damsels in Cairo, and not one was found whose reflection in the mirror showed clear-bright and whose honour was pure and clean, in fact such an one as described by the King of the Jann.  Herewith Mubarak, seeing that he had not found one in Cairo to please him, or who proved pure and unsullied as the King of the Jann had required, determined to visit Baghdad:  so they rose up and equipped them and set out and in due time they made the City of Peace where they hired them a mighty fine mansion amiddlemost the capital.  Here they settled themselves in such comfort and luxury that the Lords of the land would come daily to eat at their table, even the thirsty and those who went forth betimes,[FN#48] and what remained of the meat was distributed to the mesquin and the miserable; also every poor stranger lodging in the Mosques would come to the house and find a meal.  Therefore the bruit of them for generosity and liberality went abroad throughout the city and won for them notable name and the fairest of fame; nor did any ever speak of aught save the beneficence of Zayn al-Asnam and his generosity and his opulence.  Now there chanced to be in one of the cathedral-mosques and Imam,[FN#49] Abu Bakr hight, a ghostly man passing jealous and fulsome, who dwelt hard by the manion wherein the Prince and Mubarak abode; and he, when he heard of their lavish gifts and alms deeds, and honourable report, smitten by envy and malice and hatred, fell to devising how he might draw them into some calamity that might despoil the goods they enjoyed and destroy their lives, for it is the wont of envy to fall not save upon the fortunate.  So one day of the days, as he lingered in the Mosque after mid-afternoon prayer, he came forwards amidst the folk and cried, “O ye, my brethren of the Faith which is true and who bear testimony to the unity of the Deity, I would have you to weet that housed in this our quarter are two men which be strangers, and haply ye have heard of them how they lavish and waste immense sums of money, in fact moneys beyond measure, and for my part I cannot but suspect that they are cutpurses and brigands who commit robberies in their own country and who came hither to expend their spoils.”—­And Shahrazad was surprised by the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

         When it was the Five Hundred and Eighth Night,