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 when the King entered the closet leading Mohammed by the hand he said to him, “Do thou, O Shaykh, tell us a tale.”  “By Allah, O our lord,” quoth the other, “I know naught of stories.”  Whereupon the Sultan rejoined, “If so it be, I will relate to thee, O Shaykh Mohammed, an adventure of my own and ’tis as follows:—­Once upon a time a man went forth his town and he made companionship with another upon the way, and each one of them bore with him a bag of meal and a flask of water.”  On this wise the Sultan continued recounting to him the real history of Mohsin and Musa the Malignant, till at the end of the tale he said, “And Musa, after gouging out both eyes of Mohsin for the sake of a single scone, thrust him into a well designing to drown him therein, but Allah Almighty preserved his life and brought him forth the pit and our Lord favoured him and restored to him his two eyes and empowered him over the kingdom and thus did he become Sovran and Sultan.  Now the prosperity of that Shaykh Mohsin was from the well whereinto Musa had thrust him.”  Presently he added, “An this tale be soothfast, then am I Mohsin and thou art Musa the Malignant.  I am able at this moment to slay thee but I will spare thee and moreover counsel thee as follows:—­Do thou go to the well and haply Almighty Allah shall thereby grant to thee some good, for that the root of my fair fortune was from that same pit.”  Now when the first third of the night had sped, Musa arose and repaired to the pit and descended therein when behold, the same two Jinnis had forgathered beside the wellmouth at that same hour and were seated together conversing each with other.  Quoth the first, “What is thy case this day?” and quoth the second, “By Allah, O my brother, my condition is ill-conditioned ever since a certain night when we met in this place and talked together.  And so it hath continued until the present time, for that I have been unable to approach the city wherein dwelleth the Sultan’s daughter:  and someone that was in the well must have overheard us whilst we knew naught of him and he must have acted according to our words and slaughtered the black cock; after which I have been unable to near her abode.”  Quoth the other, “By Allah, O my brother, thou hast spoken sooth; but our ill-constraint is from this well.”  Hereupon the Jinni put forth his hand about the pit[FN#454] and finding Musa the Misdoer snatched him up and seizing him between his palms tore his body into four pieces and cast away the quarters in some desert stead.  And this (said Shahrazad) is the award of whoso betrayeth his fellow man.  And they also relate the adventure of