When it was the Five Hundred and Twenty-sixth Night,

Quoth Dunyazad, “O sister mine, an thou be other than sleepy, do tell us some of thy pleasant tales,” whereupon Shahrazad replied, “With love and good will.”—­It hath reached me, O King of the Age, that the Maghrabi, the Magician, fell to teaching Alaeddin how he should descend into the Hoard and continued, “On reaching the saloon thou shalt there find a Lamp hanging from its ceiling; so mount the ladder and take that Lamp and place it in thy breast-pocket after pouring out its contents; nor fear evil from it for thy clothes because its contents are not common oil.[FN#91] And on return thou art allowed to pluck from the trees whatso thou pleasest, for all is thine so long as the Lamp is in thy hand.”  Now when the Moorman ended his charge to Alaeddin, he drew off a seal-ring[FN#92] and put it upon the lad’s forefinger saying, “O my son, verily this signet shall free thee from all hurt and fear which may threaten thee, but only on condition that thou bear in mind all I have told thee.[FN#93] So arise straightway and go down the stairs, strengthening thy purpose and girding the loins of resolution:  moreover fear not for thou art now a man and no longer a child.  And in shortest time, O my son, thou shalt win thee immense riches and thou shalt become the wealthiest of the world.”  Accordingly, Alaeddin arose and descended into the souterrain, where he found the four halls, each containing four jars of gold and these he passed by, as the Maroccan had bidden him, with the utmost care and caution.  Thence he fared into the garden and walked along its length until he entered the saloon, where he mounted the ladder and took the Lamp which he extinguished, pouring out the oil which was therein, and placed it in his breast-pocket.  Presently, descending the ladder he returned to the garden where he fell to gazing at the trees whereupon sat birds glorifying with loud voices their great Creator.  Now he had not observed them as he went in, but all these trees bare for fruitage costly gems; moreover each had its own kind of growth and jewels of its peculiar sort; and these were of every colour, green and white; yellow, red and other such brilliant hues and the radiance flashing from these gems paled the rays of the sun in forenoon sheen.  Furthermore the size of each stone so far surpassed description that no King of the Kings of the world owned a single gem equal to the larger sort nor could boast of even one half the size of the smaller kind of them.—­And Shahrazad was surprised by the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

     When it was the Five Hundred and Twenty-seventh Night,