and mother to build a palace in the midst of the river, and to lay her there on a bed.  Thither she took the prince, who turned the body about, saw the splinter, drew it out, and the girl awoke.  He remained with her forty days, when he went down to the door, where he found the wazir waiting, and they entered the garden.  There they found roses and jasmines, and the prince said, “The jasmines are as white as Sittoukan, and the roses are like her cheeks; if you did not approve, I would still remain with her, were it only for three days.”  He went up again for three days, and when he next visited the wazir, they saw a carob-tree, and the prince said, “Remember, wazir, the carob-tree is like the eyebrows of Sittoukan, and if you would not let me, I would still remain with her, were it only for three days.”  Three days later, they saw a fountain, when the prince observed that it was like the form of Sittoukan, and he returned.  But this time, she was curious to know why he always went and returned, and he found her watching behind the door, so he spat on her saying, “If you did not love men, you would not hide behind doors”; and he left her.  She wandered into the garden in her grief, where she found the ring of empire, which she rubbed, and the ring said, “At your orders, what do you ask for ?” She asked for increased beauty, and a palace beside that of the prince.  The prince fell in love with her, and sent his mother to propose for her hand.  The mother took two pieces of royal brocade as a present, which the young lady ordered a slave in her hearing to cut up for dusters.  Then the mother brought her an emerald collar worth four thousand diners, when she ordered it to be threshed, and thrown to the pigeons.  The old lady acknowledged herself beaten, and asked Sittoukan if she wished to marry or not.  The latter demanded that the prince should be wrapped in seven shrouds, and carried to the palace which she indicated, as if he were dead.  Then she went and took off the shrouds one after another, and when she came to the seventh, she spat on him, saying, “If you did not love women, you would not be wrapped in seven shrouds.”  Then he said, “Is it you?” and he bit his finger till he bit it off, and they remained together.

IX.—­Histoire du musician ambulant et de son fils.

This travelling musician was so poor that when his wife was confined, he went out to beg for their immediate necessities, and found a hen lying on the ground with an egg under her.  He met a Jew to whom he sold the egg for twenty mahboubs.  The hen laid an egg every day, which the Jew bought for twenty mahboubs, and the musician became rich and opened a merchant’s shop.  When his son was grown, he built a school for him at his own expense, where poor children were taught to read.  Then the musician set out on pilgrimage, charging his wife not to let the Jew trick her out of the hen.  A fortnight afterwards, the Jew called, and persuaded the woman to sell him the hen for a