Mherejaun, sultan of Hind, was many years without any progeny, and immersed in melancholy at the thought of his kingdom’s passsing to another family.  One evening, while indulging his gloomy thoughts, he dropped into a doze, from which he was roused by a voice exclaiming, “Sultan, thy wife this night shall conceive.  If she bears a son, he will increase the glory of thy house; but if a daughter, she will occasion thee disgrace and misfortune.”  In due time the favourite sultana was delivered of a daughter, to the great mortification of the parents, who would have destroyed her had not her infant smiles diverted their anger.  She was brought up in the strictest privacy, and at the end of twelve years the sultan had her conveyed to a strong citadel erected in the middle of a deep lake, hoping in such a confinement to prevent her from fulfilling the prediction which had been made concerning her.  Nothing could excel the magnificence of her abode, where she was left only with female attendants of the highest accomplishments, but no male was allowed to approach even the borders of the lake, except when supplies were conveyed for the use of its fair inhabitants, who were then restricted to their apartments.  The gate of the citadel was entrusted to the care of an old lady, the princess’s nurse.  For three years the fair Aleefa lived happy in her splendid prison, but the decree of fate was not to be overcome, and an event predestined by heaven overturned the cautious project of sultan Mherejaun.

Eusuff, a dissipated young prince, son to the sultan of Sind, having offended his father, fled from his court, and with a few attendants reached the borders of the lake, in his way to seek an asylum in the territories of Mherejaun.  Curious to know who inhabited the citadel in the midst of it, he swam over the lake, and landed at the gate, which he found shut, but no one answered his loudest call for admission.  Upon this he wrote a note, requesting compassion to a helpless stranger, and having fixed it to an arrow, shot it over the battlements.  It luckily for him fell at the feet of the princess, then walking in one of the courts of her palace.  She prevailed upon her nurse to open the gate, and at sight of Eusuff fell in love with him, as he did with her.  He was admitted, and the tenderest interviews took place between them.  Joy and pleasure prevailed in the citadel, while the piince’s attendants remained, expecting his return, on the banks of the lake.

After some time, sultan Sohul wishing to be reconciled to his son, and having learnt the route he had taken, dispatched his nephew named Yiah to assure him of forgiveness, and invite him to return to Sind.  Yiah arriving at the lake, was informed by Eusuff’s attendants that the prince had entered the citadel, since which they had not seen or heard anything of him.  Yiah, upon this, penned a note expressive of the sultan’s forgiveness, and his wish to see the prince, which he fixed to an arrow and shot