The Thousand and One Nights, Vol. I.: Commonly Called the Arabian Nights' Entertainments
General
The Thousand and One Nights, Vol. I.: Commonly Called the Arabian Nights' Entertainments
Fairy tales; Tales -- Arab countries
fire, casting fire from his mouth, and fire and smoke from his eyes and
nostrils: the King's daughter also became as a vast body of fire; and we
would have plunged into the water from fear of our being burnt and
destroyed; but suddenly the 'Efreet cried out from within the fire, and
came towards us upon the leewán,[III_69] blowing fire at our faces.
The lady, however, overtook him, and blew fire in like manner in his
face; and some sparks struck us both from her and from him: her sparks
did us no harm; but one from him struck me in my eye, and destroyed it,
I being still in the form of an ape; and a spark from him reached the
face of the King, and burned the lower half, with his beard and mouth,
and struck out his lower teeth: another spark also fell upon the breast
of the eunuch; who was burnt, and died immediately. We expected
destruction, and gave up all hope of preserving our lives; but while we
were in this state, a voice exclaimed, God is most great! God is most
great! He hath conquered and aided, and abandoned the denier of the
faith of Moḥammad, the chief of mankind![III_70]--The person from
whom this voice proceeded was the King's daughter: she had burnt the
'Efreet; and when we looked towards him, we perceived that he had become
a heap of ashes.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
The lady then came to us, and said, Bring me a cup of water:--and when
it was brought to her, she pronounced over it some words which we
understood not, and, sprinkling me with it, said, Be restored, by
virtue of the name of the Truth, and by virtue of the most great name of
God, to thy original form!--whereupon I became a man as I was at first,
excepting that my eye was destroyed. After this, she cried out, The
fire! the fire! O my father, I shall no longer live, for I am
predestined to be killed. Had he been a human being, I had killed him at
the first of the encounter. I experienced no difficulty till the
scattering of the grains of the pomegranate, when I picked them up
excepting the one in which was the life of the Jinnee: had I picked up
that, he had instantly died; but I saw it not, as fate and destiny had
appointed; and suddenly he came upon me, and a fierce contest ensued
between us under the earth, and in the air, and in the water; and every
time that he tried against me a new mode, I employed against him one
more potent, until he tried against me the mode of fire; and rarely does
one escape against whom the mode of fire is employed. Destiny, however,
aided me, so that I burned him first; but I exhorted him previously to
embrace the faith of El-Islám. Now I die; and may God supply my place to
you.--Having thus said, she ceased not to pray for relief from the fire;
and lo, a spark ascended to her breast, and thence to her face; and when
it reached her face, she wept, and exclaimed, I testify that there is no
deity but God, and I testify that Moḥammad is God's Apostle!--We then
looked towards her, and saw that she had become a heap of ashes by the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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