me and the wight who cried, ’I am the owner of the calf’ is an accomplice of his.”  Thereupon all waxed furious and the Elder said to them, “Bear me home and give out that your Shakyh is deceased; after which do you bathe my body and carry me to the cemetery and bury me by night and next morning disinter me so that the owner of this calf may hear that I am dead and leave me in peace.  Indeed as long as I continue in this condition he will devise for me device after device and some day will come in to me and kill me downright.”  They did what their Shaykh bade them and began crying and keening and saying, “Verily our Chief is deceased,” so that the report was bruited abroad that the Shaykh of the Vagabonds had died.  But I, the owner of the calf, said to myself, “By Allah, an he be dead, they will assuredly make for him some mourning ceremony.”  Now when they had washed him and shrouded him and carried him out upon the bier, and were proceeding to the graveyard that they might bury him, and had reached half way to it, lo and behold!  I joined the funeral train and suddenly walking under the coffin with a sharp packing-needle[FN#337] in hand,—­And Shahrazad was surprised by the dawn of day and fell silent and ceased saying her permitted say.  Then quoth her sister Dunyazad, “How sweet is thy story, O sister mine, and how enjoyable and delectable.”  Quoth she, “And where is this compared with that I should relate to you on the coming night an the King suffer me to survive?” Now when it was the next night and that was

The Four Hundred and Forty-third Night,

Dunyazad said to her, “Allah upon thee, O my sister, an thou be other than sleepy, finish for us thy tale that we may cut short the watching of this our latter night!” She replied, “With love and good will!” It hath reached me, O auspicious King, the director, the right-guiding, lord of the rede which is benefiting and of deeds fair-seeming and worthy celebrating, that I walked under the bier packing-needle in hand, and thrust it into the Shaykh of the Vagabonds, whereat he cried out and sprang up and sat upright upon his shell.[FN#338] Now when the King heard this tale he laughed and was cheered and the Larrikin resumed:—­By Allah, when I thrust the needle into him and he sat upright in his coffin all the folk fell to wondering and cried, “Verily the dead hath come to life.”  Hereupon, O my lord, my fear waxed great and I said to myself, “All adventures are not like one another:  haply the crown[FN#339] will recognise me and slay me.”  So I went forth the city and came hither.  Cried the King, “Of a truth, this tale is marvellous;” when the second Larrikin exclaimed, “By Allah, O my lord, my tale is rarer and stranger than this, for indeed therein I did deeds worthy of the Jinn-mad and amongst the many tricks that came from my hand I died and was buried and I devised a device whereby they drew me from my tomb.”  Quoth the King, “Wallahi, if thy tale be more wondrous than that which forewent it I needs must reward thee with somewhat.  But now tell us of what betided thee.”  So the man began to relate the