When the youth saw this, he marvelled at that which his father had done and said, ‘This is a sorry treasure.’  Then he went forth and fell to eating and drinking with the folk, till nothing was left him and he abode two days without tasting food, at the end of which time he took a handkerchief and selling it for two dirhems, bought bread and milk with the price and left it on the shelf [and went out.  Whilst he was gone,] a dog came and took the bread and spoiled the milk, and when the man returned and saw this, he buffeted his face and went forth, distraught, at a venture.  Presently, he met a friend of his, to whom he discovered his case, and the other said to him, ’Art thou not ashamed to talk thus?  How hast thou wasted all this wealth and now comest telling lies and saying, “The dog hath mounted on the shelf,” and talking nonsense?’ And he reviled him.

So the youth returned to his house, and indeed the world was grown black in his eyes and he said, ‘My father said sooth.’  Then he opened the chamber door and piling up the bricks under his feet, put the rope about his neck and kicked away the bricks and swung himself off; whereupon the rope gave way with him [and he fell] to the ground and the ceiling clove in sunder and there poured down on him wealth galore, So he knew that his father meant to discipline[FN#226] him by means of this and invoked God’s mercy on him.  Then he got him again that which he had sold of lands and houses and what not else and became once more in good case.  Moreover, his friends returned to him and he entertained them some days.

Then said he to them one day, ’There was with us bread and the locusts ate it; so we put in its place a stone, a cubit long and the like broad, and the locusts came and gnawed away the stone, because of the smell of the bread.’  Quoth one of his friends (and it was he who had given him the lie concerning the dog and the bread and milk), ’Marvel not at this, for mice do more than that.’  And he said, ’Go to your houses.  In the days of my poverty, I was a liar [when I told you] of the dog’s climbing upon the shelf and eating the bread and spoiling the milk; and to-day, for that I am rich again, I say sooth [when I tell you] that locusts devoured a stone a cubit long and a cubit broad.’  They were confounded at his speech and departed from him; and the youth’s good flourished and his case was amended.[FN#227] Nor,” added the vizier,"is this stranger or more extraordinary than the story of the king’s son who fell in love with the picture.”

Quoth the king, “Belike, if I hear this story, I shall gain wisdom from it; so I will not hasten in the slaying of this vizier, nor will I put him to death before the thirty days have expired.”  Then he gave him leave to withdraw, and he went away to his own house.

The Sixth Night of the Month

When the day departed and the evening came, the king sat in his privy chamber and summoned the vizier, who presented himself to him and he questioned him of the story.  So the vizier said, “Know, O august king, that