he must be dead, though it is difficult to see how she could have acted differently under the circumstances. Al-Mahsin is reported as saying that Hakim went out, and that after sending back Nesim and his squire, he had as companions only a page and a young slave: at the time he was filled with apprehensions as he knew from his horoscope that the night was one of great peril to him. When he was on Mokattam he said: “We belong to God and return to him”: then clapping his hands together he added, “Thou hast appeared then, O dismal sign,” referring to the star whose appearance he took as the warning of his death. Going along the hillside he met ten men of the B. Qorra who had a request to make to him, and said that they had often waited in vain at his palace door. Hakim orders them to be paid 10,000 pieces of silver from the treasury, and directs his page to go with them and draw the money for them. They objected that it might be that the Khalif was angry with them for interrupting his walk, and that perhaps the order in the page’s hand might privately direct that they were to be put to punishment, so they requested that he would also give them a safe conduct, and this the Khalif gave. Hakim and the young slave then go on and enter a valley where the two men sent by Yusuf are lying in ambush. They came out and fell upon him just as the day was dawning. At their appearance he cried out, “Wretches, what do you want?” They cut off his two arms, open his stomach, and tear out the entrails, and wrap the body in a robe. They then slew the slave, cut the traces of the ass, and carried off the body to Yusuf. He took it to the Princess, who made presents to him and to the two murderers. She then sent for the wazir, revealed to him what had happened, and made him promise secrecy. She persuaded him to write to ʿAbdu r-Rahim at Damascus, and at the same time sent an officer named ʿAli b. Dawud to Ferma to seize ʿAbdu r-Rahim on his way to Egypt and carry him to Tannis; and also she sent instructions to the governor of Tannis. Next day it was observed that Hakim did not return. Abu Arus would not allow the gates of Kahira to be opened, stating that the Khalif had ordered them to be closed the day before, and no search was made until the following day. The Princess had conferences with the chiefs of the Katama tribe and other leading persons and, with the help of lavish presents, induced them to recognise Hakim’s son as his successor, although they had already given formal recognition to ʿAbdu r-Rahim. On the seventh day she dressed the child in rich robes and sent for Yusuf, whom she declared to be ustad or guardian. Then the child was taken out in state, the wazir proclaimed him as Khalif, and he was generally recognised.