he gave them a feast, to bring them and his pretended nephew together.
This entertainment lasted till night, when Aladdin would have taken leave of his uncle to go home; the magician would not let him go by himself, but conducted him to his mother who bestowed a thousand blessings upon the magician.
Early the next morning, the magician called again for Aladdin, and said he would take him to spend that day in the country, and on the next he would purchase the shop. He led him out at one of the gates of the city, to some magnificent palaces, to each of which belonged beautiful gardens, into which anybody might enter. At every building he came to, he asked Aladdin if he did not think it fine; the youth agreed crying out at each new one they saw, “Here is a finer house, uncle, than any we have yet seen.” By this artifice, the cunning magician led Aladdin some way into the country.
The magician next pulled from his girdle a package of cakes and fruit, and during this short repast he exhorted his nephew to leave off bad company, and to seek that of wise and prudent men, to improve by their conversation; “For,” said he, “you will soon be at man’s estate, and you cannot too early begin to imitate their example.” When they had eaten as much as they liked, they got up, and pursued their walk through gardens separated from one another only by small ditches, which marked out the limits without interrupting
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