Children -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Children's stories; Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Fairy tales; Fantasy literature
“It shall be done,” said the young man, and then they all went
away, as the others had done the day before.
The next morning when the Demon appeared the Tailor was ready for
him. “Build me,” said he, “such and such a palace in such and such
a place.”
And the Demon said, “It shall be done.” He smote his hands
together, and instantly there came a cloud of mist that covered and
hid the spot where the palace was to be built. Out from the cloud
there came such a banging and hammering and clapping and clattering
as the people of that town never heard before. Then when evening
had come the cloud arose, and there, where the king had pointed
out, stood a splendid palace as white as snow, with roofs and domes
of gold and silver. As the king stood looking and wondering at this
sight, there came five hundred young men riding, and one in the
midst of all who wore a golden crown on his head, and upon his body
a long robe stiff with diamonds and pearls. “We come,” said he,
“from the Tailor of Tailors, and Master of Masters, and One Greater
than a King, to ask you to let him have your daughter for his wife.”
“Tell him to come!” cried the king, in admiration, “for the
princess is his.”
The next morning when the Demon came he found the Tailor dancing
and shouting for joy. “The princess is mine!” he cried, “so make me
ready for her.”
“It shall be done,” said the Demon, and thereupon he began to make
the Tailor ready for his wedding. He brought him to a marble bath
of water, in which he washed away all that was coarse and ugly,
and from which the little man came forth as beautiful as the sun.
Then the Demon clad him in the finest linen, and covered him with
clothes such as even the emperor of India never wore. Then he smote
his hands together, and the wall of the tailor-shop opened as it
had done twice before, and there came forth forty slaves clad in
crimson, and bearing bowls full of money in their hands. After them
came two leading a horse as white as snow, with a saddle of gold
studded with diamonds and rubies and emeralds and sapphires. After
came a bodyguard of twenty warriors clad in gold armor. Then the
Tailor mounted his horse and rode away to the king’s palace, and
as he rode the slaves scattered the money amongst the crowd, who
scrambled for it and cheered the Tailor to the skies.
* * * * *
That night the princess and the Tailor were married, and all the
town was lit with bonfires and fireworks. The two rode away in the
midst of a great crowd of nobles and courtiers to the palace which
the Demon had built for the Tailor; and, as the princess gazed upon
him, she thought that she had never beheld so noble and handsome a
man as her husband. So she and the Tailor were the happiest couple
in the world.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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