THE FORTY PRINCES AND THE SEVEN-HEADED DRAGON
There was once upon a time a Padishah, and this
Padishah had forty sons. All day long they disported
themselves in the forest, snaring birds and
hunting beasts, but when the youngest of them was
fourteen years old their father wished to marry them.
So he sent for them all and told them his desire.
"We will marry," said the forty brothers, "but only
when we find forty sisters who are the daughters of
the same father and the same mother." Then the
Padishah searched the whole realm through to find
forty such sisters, but though he found families of
thirty-nine sisters, families of forty sisters he could
never find.
"Let the fortieth of you take another wife," said the Padishah to his sons. But the forty brothers would not agree thereto, and they begged their father to allow them to go and search if haply they might
