The blush with which their folly they confess
     Is the first prize of his supreme success.

Even Bootlbac, the drum-beater, drummed in homage to him, and the four Kings were they that were loudest in their revilings of the spouse of Kadza, and most obsequious in praises of the Master.  The King of the City was fain to propitiate his people by a voluntary resignation of his throne to Shibli Bagarag, and that King took well to heart the wisdom of the sage, when he says: 

     Power, on Illusion based, o’ertoppeth all;
     The more disastrous is its certain fall!

Surely Shibli Bagarag returned the Sword to the Sons of Aklis, flashing it in midnight air, and they, with the others, did reverence to his achievement.  They were now released from the toil of sharpening the Sword a half-cycle of years, to wander in delight on the fair surface of the flowery earth, breathing its roses, wooing its brides; for the mastery of an Event lasteth among men the space of one cycle of years, and after that a fresh Illusion springeth to befool mankind, and the Seven must expend the concluding half-cycle in preparing the edge of the Sword for a new mastery.  As the poet declareth in his scorn: 

     Some doubt Eternity:  from life begun,
     Has folly ceased within them, sire to son? 
     So, ever fresh Illusions will arise
     And lord creation, until men are wise.

And he adds: 

     That is a distant period; so prepare
     To fight the false, O youths, and never spare! 
     For who would live in chronicles renowned
     Must combat folly, or as fool be crowned.

Now, for the Kings of Shiraz and of Gaf, Shibli Bagarag entertained them in honour; but the King of Oolb he disgraced and stripped of his robes, to invest Baba Mustapha in those royal emblems—­a punishment to the treachery of the King of Oolb, as is said by Aboo Eznol: 

     When nations with opposing forces, rash,
      Shatter each other, thou that wouldst have stood
      Apart to profit by the monstrous feud,
     Thou art the surest victim of the crash.

     Take colours of whichever side thou wilt,
      And stedfastly thyself in battle range;
      Yet, having taken, shouldst thou dare to change,
     Suspicion hunts thee as a thing of guilt.

Baba Mustapha, was pronounced Sovereign of Oolb, amid the acclamations of the guard encamped under the command of Ravaloke, without the walls.

No less did Shibli Bagarag honour the benefactor of Noorna, making him chief of his armies; and he, with his own hand, bestowed on the good old warrior the dress of honour presented to him by the Seven Sons, charactered with all the mysteries of Aklis, a marvel lost to men in the failure to master the Illusion now dominating earth.