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seeing I gave it him not. Wherefore, O my mother, it behoveth us keep this lamp and guard it with all care, for that this is our support and this it is shall enrich us; and it behoveth us show it not unto any. On like wise, as for the ring, it may not be that I should put it off from my finger, forasmuch as, but for this ring, thou hadst not seen me again on life; nay, I had died under the earth within the treasure; so how can I put it off from my hand and who knoweth what may happen to me in time to come of error or calamity or shift of the shifts of mischance, from which the ring might deliver me? However, of regard for thy wish, I will lay up the lamp and let thee not see it henceforth.” When his mother heard his words and pondered them, she saw them to be just and true and said to him, “O my son, do what thou wilt. For my part, I wish never to see them nor ever again to behold that loathsome aspect[1] which I saw [but now].”
Alaeddin[2] and his mother abode two days eating of the food which the genie had brought, and when it was finished and he knew that there was left them nothing to eat, he arose and taking a platter of those which the slave had brought on the tray (now they were of fine gold, but
