fancied he was asleep, and lay down to sleep herself also.
Next morning when she awoke she bade the youth prepare for death, as his last hour had come. "Nay," replied he, "not to thee do I owe an account of myself; let us both come before the Padishah."
Then they led him before the father of the damsel, but he said he would only tell them what had happened in the night if they called all the people of the town together. "In that way I shall find my brother, perhaps," thought he. So the town-crier called all the people together, and the youth stood on a high daïs beside the Padishah and the Sultana, and began to tell them the whole story, from the efrit's buckler to the Peri king. "Believe him not, my lord Padishah and father; he lies, my lord father and Padishah!" stammered the damsel; whereupon the youth drew from his pocket the diamond twig, the twig of gems, the golden slipper, the precious spoons and forks. Then he went on to tell them of the death of the black Peri, when all at once he caught sight of his elder brother, whom he had been searching for so long. He had now neither eyes nor ears for anything else, but leaping off the daïs, he forced his way on and on through the crowd to his brother, till they both came together.
Then the elder brother told their story, while the
