When the merchant saw that the genie was going to cut off his head, he cried out aloud, and said to him, For heaven’s sake, hold your hand! Allow me one word: be so good as to grant me some respite; allow me but time to bid my wife and children adieu, and to divide my estate among them by will, that they may not go to law with one another, after my death; and when I have done so, I will come back to the same place, and submit to whatever you shall please to order concerning me. But, says the genie, if I grant you the time you demand, I doubt you will never return. If you will believe my oath, answers the merchant, I swear by all that is sacred that I will come and meet you here without fail. What time do you demand then? replies the genie. I ask a year, says the merchant; I cannot have less to order my affairs, and to prepare myself to die without regret. But I promise you, that this day twelvemonths I will return under those trees, to put myself into your hands. Do you take heaven to be witness to this promise? says the genie. I do, answers the merchant, and repeat it, and you may rely upon my oath. Upon this, the genie left him near the fountain, and disappeared. The merchant, being recovered from his fright, mounted his horse, and set forward on his journey; and as he was glad, on the one hand, that he had escaped so great a danger, so he was mortally sorry, on the other, when he thought on his fatal oath. When he came home, his wife and children received him with all the demonstrations of perfect joy; but he, instead of making them suitable returns, fell to weeping bitterly; from whence they readily conjectured that something extraordinary had befallen him. His wife asked the reason of his excessive grief and tears: We are all overjoyed, says she, at your return, but you frighten us to see you in this condition; pray tell us the cause of your sorrow. Alas! replies the husband, the cause of it is, that I have but a year to live; and then he told what had passed between him and the genie, and that he had given him his oath to return at the end of the year, to receive death from his hands. When they had heard this sad news, they all began to lament heartily. His wife made a pitiful outcry, beat her face, and tore her hair. The children, all in tears, made the house resound with their groans: and the father, not being able to overcome nature, mingled his tears with theirs; so that, in a word, it was the most affecting spectacle that any man could behold. Next morning, the merchant applied himself to put his affairs in order, and, first of all, to pay his debts. He made presents to his friends; gave great alms to the poor; set his slaves of both sexes at liberty; divided his estate among his children; appointed guardians for such of them as were not come of age; and, restoring to his wife all that was due to her by contract of marriage, he gave her, over and above, all that he could do by law.