like the drone of a bee to hear, and as a roll of water, nothing distinguishable.  After that she sought for an unguent of a red colour, and smeared it on a part of the floor by the corner of the room, and wrote on it in silver fluid a word that was the word ‘Eblis,’ and over that likewise she droned awhile.  Presently she arose with a white-heated face, the sweat on her brow, and said to Shibli Bagarag and Feshnavat hurriedly and in a harsh tone, ’How? have ye fear?’

They answered, ‘Our faith is in Allah, our confidence in thee.’

Said she then, ’I summon the Genie I hold in bondage.  He will be wrathful; but ye are secure from him.  He’s this moment in the farthest region of earth, doing ill, as is his wont, and the wont of the stock of Eblis.’

So the Vizier said, ’He’ll be no true helper, this Genie, and I care not for his company.’

She answered, ’O my father! leave thou that to me.  What says the poet?—­

         “It is the sapiency of fools,
          To shrink from handling evil tools."’

Now, while she was speaking, she suddenly inclined her ear as to a distant noise; but they heard nothing.  Then, after again listening, she cried in a sharp voice, ’Ho! muffle your mouths with both hands, and stir not from the ring of the circles, as ye value life and its blessings.’

So they did as she bade them, and watched her curiously.  Lo! she swathed the upper and lower part of her face in linen, leaving the lips and eyes exposed; and she took water from an ewer, and sprinkled it on her head, and on her arms and her feet, muttering incantations.  Then she listened a third time, and stooped to the floor, and put her lips to it, and called the name, ‘Karaz!’ And she called this name seven times loudly, sneezing between whiles.  Then, as it were in answer to her summons, there was a deep growl of thunder, and the palace rocked, tottering; and the air became smoky and full of curling vapours.  Presently they were aware of the cry of a Cat, and its miaulings; and the patch of red unguent on the floor parted and they beheld a tawny Cat with an arched back.  So Noorna bin Noorka frowned fiercely at the Cat, and cried, ’This is thy shape, O Karaz; change! for it serves not the purpose.’

The Cat changed, and was a Leopard with glowing yellow eyes, crouched for the spring.  So Noorna bin Noorka stamped, and cried again, ’This is thy shape, O Karaz; change! for it serves not the purpose.’

And the Leopard changed, and was a Serpent with many folds, sleek, curled, venomous, hissing.

Noorna bin Noorka cried in wrath, ’This is thy shape, O Karaz; change! or thou’lt be no other till Eblis is accepted in Paradise.’

And the Serpent vanished.  Lo! in its place a Genie of terrible aspect, black as a solitary tree seared by lightning; his forehead ridged and cloven with red streaks; his hair and ears reddened; his eyes like two hollow pits dug by the shepherd for the wolf, and the wolf in them.  He shouted, ‘What work is it now, thou accursed traitress?’