me, “By Allah, O my son, I have a daughter but she is helpless.”  Quoth I, “I am content;” and quoth he, “An thou take her to wife after this description, ’tis on express condition that she be not removed from my house and thou also shalt pay her the first visit and cohabit with her in my home.”  I replied, “To hear is to obey;” being confident, O King of the Age, that she was the damsel who had visited my shop and whom I had seen with my own eyes.  Thereupon the Shaykh al-Islam married his daughter to me and I said in my mind, “By Allah, is it possible that I am become master of this damsel and shall enjoy to my full her beauty and loveliness?” But when night fell they led me in procession to the chamber of my bride; and when I beheld her I found her as hideous as her father had described her, a deformed cripple.  At that moment all manner of cares mounted my back and I was full of fury and groaned with grief from the core of my heart; but I could not say a word, for that I had accepted her to wife of my own free will and had declared myself contented in presence of her sire.  So I took seat silently in a corner of the room and my bride in another, because I could not bring myself to approach her, she being unfit for the carnal company of man and my soul could not accept cohabitation with her.  And at dawntide, O my lord the Sultan, I left the house and went to my shop which I opened according to custom and sat down with my head dizzy like one drunken without wine; when lo! there appeared before me the young lady who had caused happen to me that mishap.  She came up and salam’d to me but I arose with sullenness and abused her and cried, “Wherefore, O my lady, hast thou put upon me such a piece of work?” She replied, “O miserable,[FN#109] recollect such a day when I brought thee a letter and thou after reading it didst come down from thy shop and didst seize me and didst trounce me and didst drive me away.”  I replied, “O my lady, prithee pardon me for I am a true penitent;” and I ceased not to soften her with soothing[FN#110] words and promised her all weal if she would but forgive me.  At last she deigned excuse me and said, “There is no harm for thee; and, as I have netted thee, so will I unmesh thee.”  I replied, “Allah!  Allah![FN#111] O my lady, I am under thy safeguard;” and she rejoined, “Hie thee to the Agha of the Janakilah,[FN#112] the gypsies, give him fifty piastres and say him, ’We desire thee to furnish us with a father and a mother and cousins and kith and kin, and do thou charge them to say of me, This is our cousin and our blood relation.’  Then let him send them all to the house of the Shaykh al-Islam and repair thither himself together with his followers, a party of drummers and a parcel of pipers.  When they enter his house and the Shaykh shall perceive them and exclaim, ‘What’s this we’ve here?’ let the Agha reply, ’O my lord, we be kinsmen with thy son-in-law and we are come to gladden his marriage with thy daughter and to make merry with