is thy dwelling?’ The youth sighed and answered, ‘I am a stranger;’ and the eunuch said, ‘From what land art thou and who is thy father?’ Quoth the other, ‘I am from such a land,’ and the eunuch ceased not to question him and he to answer him, till he was certified of him and knew him.  So he rose and embraced him and kissed him and wept over his case.  Moreover, he told him that he was going about in quest of him and informed him that he was come privily from the king his mother’s husband and that his mother would be content [to know] that he was alive and well, though she saw him not.

Then he re-entered the village and buying the prince a horse, mounted him thereon and they ceased not going, till they came to the frontier of their own country, where there fell robbers upon them by the way and took all that was with them and pinioned them; after which they cast them into a pit hard by the road and went away and left them to die there, and indeed they had cast many folk into that pit and they had died.

The eunuch fell a-weeping in the pit and the youth said to him, ‘What is this weeping and what shall it profit here?’ Quoth the eunuch, ’I weep not for fear of death, but of pity for thee and the sorriness of thy case and because of thy mother’s heart and for that which thou hast suffered of horrors and that thy death should be this abject death, after the endurance of all manner stresses.’  But the youth said, ’That which hath betided me was forewrit to me and that which is written none hath power to efface; and if my term be advanced, none may avail to defer it.’[FN#136] Then they passed that night and the following day and the next night and the next day [in the pit], till they were weak with hunger and came near upon death and could but groan feebly.

Now it befell, by the ordinance of God the Most High and His providence, that Caesar, king of the Greeks, the husband of Melik Shah’s mother Shah Khatoun, [went forth to the chase that day].  He started a head of game, he and his company, and chased it, till they came up with it by that pit, whereupon one of them lighted down from his horse, to slaughter it, hard by the mouth of the pit.  He heard a sound of low moaning from the bottom of the pit} so he arose and mounting his horse, waited till the troops were assembled.  Then he acquainted the king with this and he bade one of his servants [descend into the pit].  So the man descended and brought out the youth [and the eunuch], aswoon.

They cut their bonds and poured wine into their gullets, till they came to themselves, when the king looked at the eunuch and recognizing him, said, ‘Harkye, such an one!’ ’Yes, O my lord the king,’ replied the man and prostrated himself to him; whereat the king marvelled with an exceeding wonder and said to him, ’How earnest thou to this place and what hath befallen thee?” Quoth the eunuch, ’I went and took out the treasure and brought it hither; but the [evil] eye was behind me and I unknowing.  So the thieves took us alone here and seized the money and cast us into this pit, so we might die of hunger, even as they had done with other than we; but God the Most High sent thee, in pity to us.’