set no particular mark on the house, examining it instead so carefully that it was impossible for him to mistake it.
Well satisfied with his attempt, and informed of what he wanted to know, he came to the cave, where the troop waited for him, and said, “Now, comrades, nothing can prevent our full revenge, as I am certain of the house; and I have thought how to put it into execution, but if any one can form a better expedient, let him communicate it.” He then told them his contrivance; and as they approved of it, ordered them to go into the villages about, and buy nineteen mules, with thirty-eight large leather jars, one full of oil, and the others empty.
In two or three days’ time the robbers had purchased the mules and jars, and as the mouths of the jars were rather too narrow for his purpose, the captain caused them to be widened, and after having put one of his men into each, with the weapons which he thought fit, leaving open the seam which had been undone to give them room to breathe, he rubbed the jars on the outside with oil from the full vessel.
Things being thus prepared, when the nineteen mules were loaded with thirty-seven robbers in jars, and the jar of oil, the captain, as their driver, set out with them, and reached the town by the dusk of the evening, as he had intended. He led them through the streets, till he came to Ali Baba’s house whom he found sitting at the door after supper to take a little fresh air. He stopped his mules, saying, “I have brought
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