out his gear and, having baited the hook, made a cast into the moonlit square, taking station in the shadow of the walls where he believed the river bank to be.  Then he bobbed[FN#225] with his hook and line and kept gazing at the waters, when behold! a big dog sniffed the bait and coming up to it swallowed the hook till it stuck in his gullet.[FN#226] The beast feeling it prick his throttle yelped with pain and made more noise every minute, rushing about to the right and the left:  so the line was shaken in the man’s hand and he drew it in, but by so doing the hook pierced deeper and the brute howled all the louder; and it was pull Bhang-eater and pull cur.  But the man dared not draw near the moonlight, holding it to be the river, so he tucked up his gown to his hip-bones, and as the dog pulled more lustily he said in his mind, “By Allah this must be a mighty big fish and I believe it to be a ravenous."[FN#227] Then he gripped the line firmly and haled it in but the dog had the better of him and dragged him to the very marge of the moonlight; so the fisherman waxed afraid and began to cry, “Alack!  Alack!  Alack![FN#228] To my rescue ye braves![FN#229] Help me for a monster of the deep would drown me!  Yallah, hurry ye, my fine fellows, hasten to my aid!” Now at that hour people were enjoying the sweets of sleep and when they heard these unseasonable outcries they flocked about him from every side and accosting him asked, “What is it?  What maketh thee cry aloud at such an hour?  What hath befallen thee?” He answered, “Save me, otherwise a river-monster will cause me fall into the stream and be drowned.”  Then, finding him tucked up to the hips, the folk approached him and enquired, “Where is the stream of which thou speakest?” and he replied, “Yonder’s the river; be ye all blind?” Thereat they understood that he spoke of the moonbeams, whose sheen was dispread upon earth, deeming it a river-surface, and they told him this; but he would not credit them and cried, “So ye also desire to drown me; be off from me! our Lord will send me other than you to lend me good aid at this hour of need.”  They replied, “O well-born one, this be moonshine;” but he rejoined, “Away from me, ye low fellows,[FN#230] ye dogs!” Then derided him and the angrier he grew the more they laughed, till at last they said one to other, “Let us leave him and wend our ways,” and they quitted him in such condition—­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 and tasteful is thy tale, O sister mine, and enjoyable and delectable!” Quoth she, “And where is this compared with that I would relate to you on the coming night an the Sovran suffer me to survive?” Now when it was the next night and that was

The Three Hundred and Ninety-fourth Night,