صفحة 489 من 1116

We entreated them kindly and honourably and a quarter of the

night had not passed ere three grave and respectable merchants

from Mosul joined us and told us their adventures. We sat talking

with them but on one condition which they violated, whereupon we

treated them as sorted with their breach of promise, and made

them repeat the account they had given of themselves. They did

our bidding and we forgave their offence; so they departed from

us and this morning we were unexpectedly summoned to thy

presence. And such is our story! The Caliph wondered at her words

and bade the tale be recorded and chronicled and laid up in his

muniment-chambers.-And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and

ceased saying her permitted say.

When it was the Nineteenth Night,