So Selim the Fisherman put on the ring, and then went his way about his
own business.
That night, as he came home carrying his nets over his shoulder, whom
should he meet but the little old man in gray, with the white beard and
the black cap on his head and the long staff in his hand.
“Is your name Selim?” said the little man, just as he had done to Selim
the Baker.
“Yes,” said Selim; “it is.”
“And do you wear a gold ring with a red stone?” said the little old man,
just as he had said before.
“Yes,” said Selim; “I do.”
“Then come with me,” said the little old man, “and I will show you the
wonder of the world.”
Selim the Fisherman remembered all that Selim the Baker had told him,
and he took no two thoughts as to what to do. Down he tumbled his nets,
and away he went after the other as fast as his legs could carry him.
Here they went and there they went, up crooked streets and lanes and
down by-ways and alley-ways, until at last they came to the same garden
to which Selim the Baker had been brought. Then the old man knocked at
the gate three times and cried out in a loud voice, “Open! Open! Open to
Selim who wears the Ring of Luck!”
Then the gate opened, and in they went. Fine as it all was, Selim
the Fisherman cared to look neither to the right nor to the left, but
straight after the old man he went, until at last they came to the
seaside and the boat and the four-and-twenty oarsmen dressed like
princes and the black slaves with the perfumed torches.
Here the old man entered the boat and Selim after him, and away they
sailed.
To make a long story short, everything happened to Selim the Fisherman
just as it had happened to Selim the Baker. At dawn of day they came to
the island and the city built on the mountain. And the palaces were just
as white and beautiful, and the gardens and orchards just as fresh and
blooming as though they had not all tumbled down and sunk under the
water a week before, almost carrying poor Selim the Baker with them.
There were the people dressed in silks and satins and jewels, just as
Selim the Baker had found them, and they shouted and hurrahed for Selim
the Fisherman just as they had shouted and hurrahed for the other.
There were the princes and the nobles and the white horse, and Selim the
Fisherman got on his back and rode up to a dazzling snow-white palace,
and they put a crown on his head and made a king of him, just as they
had made a king of Selim the Baker.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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