The ship set sail, and after a very long and successful navigation, we landed at Balsora; from thence I went to Bagdad, where the first thing I did was to acquit myself of my commission. Scheherazade stopt because day appeared, and next night proceeded thus: EIGHTY-EIGHTH NIGHT. I took the king of Serendib’s letter, continued Sindbad, and went to present myself at the gate of the commander of the faithful, followed by the beautiful slave, and such of my own family as carried the presents. I gave an account of the reason of my coming, and was immediately conducted to the throne of the caliph. I made my reverence by prostration, and after a short speech, gave him the letter and present. When he had read what the king of Serendib wrote to him, he asked me if that prince was really so rich and potent as he had said in his letter? I prostrated myself a second time, and rising again, Commander of the faithful, said I, I can assure your majesty he doth not exceed the truth on that head. I am witness of it. There is nothing more capable of raising a man’s admiration than the magnificence of his palace. When the prince appears in public, he has a throne fixed on the back of an elephant, and marches betwixt two ranks of his ministers, favourites, and other people of his court; before him, upon the same elephant, an officer carries a golden lance in his hand; and behind the throne there is another, who stands upright, with a column of gold, on the top of which there is an emerald half a foot long, and an inch thick; before him march a guard of a thousand men, clad in cloth of gold and silk, and mounted on elephants richly caparisoned. While the king is on his march, the officer who is before him on the same elephant, cries, from time to time, with a loud voice, Behold the great monarch, the potent and redoubtable sultan of the Indies, whose palace is covered with a hundred thousand rubies, and who possesses twenty thousand crowns of diamonds. Behold the crowned monarch greater than the great Solima [49] and the great Mihrage. [50] After he had pronounced those words, the officer behind the throne cries in his turn, This monarch, so great and so powerful, must die, must die, must die. And the officer before replies, Praise be to him who lives for ever. Farther, the king of Serendib is so just, that there are no judges in his dominions. His people have no need of them. They understand and observe justice exactly of themselves. The caliph was much pleased with my discourse. The wisdom of that king, said he, appears in his letter, and after what you tell me, I must confess, that his wisdom is worthy of his people, and his people deserve so wise a prince. Having spoken thus, he dismissed me, and sent me home with a rich present. Sindbad left off speaking, and his company retired, Hindbad having first received a hundred sequins; and next day they returned to hear the relation of his seventh and last voyage, as follows: