Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand and One Nights — Volume 3 (of 6) Part 2
General
Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand and One Nights — Volume 3 (of 6) Part 2
Fairy tales; Tales -- Arab countries
sent off two slave-boys who had run alongside of us to search for
provender. One of them found a jar of bran in the shop of a corn-dealer
and paying for the provision brought it, together with the jar, under
promise that on the morrow he would carry back the vessel. Then he began
to take out the bran by handfuls in the dark and to set it before the
horses,——And as the morn began to dawn Shahrazad held her peace till
The end of the Six Hundred and Twenty-fourth Night.
Then said she:——I have heard, O auspicious king, that Hasan al-Habbal
thus continued his story:—So as the slave-boy took out the bran by
handfuls and set it before the horses, suddenly his hand came upon a
piece of cloth wherein was somewhat heavy. He brought it to me even as
he found it and said, “See, is not this cloth the very one of whose loss
thou hast ofttimes spoken to us?” I took it and wondering with great
wonder knew it was the self-same piece of stuff wherein I had tied up
the hundred and fourscore and ten Ashrafis before hiding them in the jar
of bran. Then said I to my friends, “O my lords, it hath pleased
Almighty Allah, ere we parted, I and you, to bear me witness of my words
and to stablish that I told you naught save whatso was very sooth.” And
I resumed, addressing Sa’di, “See here the other sum of money, that is,
the hundred and ninety Ashrafis which thou gavest me and which I tied up
in this very piece of cloth I now recognise.” Then I sent for the
earthen jar that they might see it, and also bade carry it to my wife
that she also might bear witness, an it be or be not the very bran jar
which she gave in exchange for fuller’s earth. Anon she sent us word and
said, “Yea verily I know it well. ’Tis the same jar which I had filled
with bran.” Accordingly Sa’di owned that he was wrong and said to Sa’d,
“Now I know that thou speakest truth, and am convinced that wealth
cometh not by wealth; but only by the grace of Almighty Allah doth a
poor man become a rich man.” And he begged pardon for his mistrust and
unbelief. We accepted his excuses whereupon we retired to rest and early
on the morrow my two friends bade me adieu and journeyed homewards with
full persuasion that I had done no wrong and had not squandered the
moneys they had given me.—Now when the Caliph Harun al-Rashid had heard
the story of Khwajah Hasan to the end, he said, “I have known thee of
old by fair report of thee from the folk who, one and all, declare that
thou art a good man and true. Moreover the self-same diamond whereby
thou hast attained to so great riches is now in my treasury; so I would
fain send for Sa’di forthright that he may see it with his own eyes, and
weet for certain that not by means of money do men become or rich or
poor.” The Prince of True Believers said moreover to Khwajah Hasan
al-Habbal, “Go now and tell thy tale to my treasurer that he may take it
down in writing for an everlasting memorial, and place the writ in the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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