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fell to extolling the Maugrabin’s bounty and saying to him, “O my brother-in-law, I might not suffice [to thy deserts,] though I thanked thee all my life long and praised thee for the good thou hast done with my son.” “O wife of my brother,” answered he, “this is no manner of kindness in me,[1] for that this is my son and it behoveth me stand in the stead of my brother his father; so be thou easy.” Quoth she, “I pray God, by the glory of the ancients[2] and the moderns, that He let thee [live] and continue thee, O my brother-in-law, and prolong me thy life, so thou mayst be [as] a wing[3] to this orphan boy; and he shall still be under thine obedience and thy commandment and shall do nought but that which thou biddest him.” “O wife of my brother,” rejoined the Maugrabin, “Alaeddin is a man of understanding and [the son of] decent folk, and my hope is in God that he will follow in his father’s footsteps and be the solace of thine eyes;[4] but it irketh me that, to-morrow being Friday, I cannot open him a shop. It being congregation day, all the merchants will go out after prayers to the gardens and pleasaunces; but, God willing, on Saturday,
