Arabs -- Folklore; Fairy tales; Fairy tales -- Arab countries; Folklore -- Arab countries; Tales -- Arab countries
cups, and drink each other's health:" at the same time she presented to
him the cup which was in her hand, and held out her hand to receive his.
He hastened to make the exchange with the more pleasure, because he
looked upon this favour as a token of conquest over the princess, which
raised his rapture to the highest pitch. Before he drank, he said to
her, with the cup in his hand: "Indeed, princess, we Africans are not so
refined in the art of love as you Chinese: and your instructing me in a
lesson I was ignorant of, informs me how sensible I ought to be of the
favour done me. I shall never, lovely princess, forget my recovering, by
drinking out of your cup, that life, which your cruelty, had it
continued, must have made me despair of."
The princess, who began to be tired with his declarations, interrupted
him and said: "Let us drink first, and then say what you will
afterward:" at the same time she set the cup to her lips, while the
African magician, who was eager to get his wine off first, drank up the
very last drop. In finishing it, he leaned his head back to show his
eagerness, and remained some time in that state. The princess kept the
cup at her lips till she saw his eyes turn in his head, when he fell
backward lifeless on the sofa. The princess had no occasion to order the
private door to be opened to Aladdin; for her women were so disposed
from the great hall to the foot of the staircase, that the word was no
sooner given that the magician was fallen, than the door was immediately
opened. As soon as Aladdin entered the hall, he saw the magician
stretched backward on the sofa. The princess rose from her seat, and ran
overjoyed to embrace him; but he stopped her and said: "Princess, it is
not yet time; let me be left alone a moment, while I endeavour to
transport you back to China as speedily as you were brought from
thence." When the princess, her women and eunuchs, were gone out of the
hall, Aladdin shut the door, and, going directly to the dead body of the
magician, opened his vest, took out the lamp which was carefully
wrapped up, as the princess had told him, and unfolding and rubbing it,
the genie immediately appeared. "Genie," said Aladdin, "I have called to
command thee, on the part of thy good mistress, this lamp, to transport
this palace instantly into China, to the place from whence it was
brought hither." The genie bowed his head in token of obedience, and
disappeared. Immediately the palace was transported into China, and its
removal was only felt by two little shocks, the one when it was lifted
up, the other when it was set down, and both in a very short interval of
time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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