herself as usual, and when she rose up again, the sultan asked her what she wanted. 'Sir,' said she, 'I come to represent to your majesty, in the name of my son Aladdin, that the three months, at the end of which you ordered me to come again, are expired; and to beg you to remember your promise.'
The sultan had little thought of hearing any more of a marriage which he imagined would be very disagreeable to the princess, when he considered cnly the meanness and poverty of Aladdin's mother, and this summons for him to be as good as his word was somewhat embarrassing to him; he declined giving an answer till he had consulted his vizier.
The grand vizier freely told the sultan his thoughts on the matter, and said to him, 'In my opinion, sir, there is one certain way for your majesty to avoid so unequal a match without giving Aladdin any cause of complaint; which is, to set so high a value upon the princess, that were he never so rich, he could not come up to it. This is the only way to make him desist from so bold, not to say rash, an undertaking.'
The sultan, approving of the grand vizier's advice, turned about to Aladdin's mother, and after some reflection, said to her, 'Good woman, it is true sultans ought to be as good as their word, and I am ready to keep mine, by making your son happy by his marriage with the princess my daughter. But as I cannot marry her without some valuable present from your son, you may tell him, I will fulfil my promise as soon as he shall send me forty basins of massy gold, brim-full of the same things you have already made me a present of, and carried by the like number of black slaves, who shall be led by as many young and handsome white slaves, all dressed magnificently. On these conditions I am ready to bestow the princess my daughter on him; therefore, good woman, go and tell him so, and I will wait till you bring me his answer.'
Aladdin's mother prostrated herself a second time before the sultan's throne, and retired. On her way home she laughed to herself at her son's foolish imagination, 'Where,' said she, 'can he get so many large gold basins, and enough of that coloured glass to fill them? Must he go again to that subterranean abode, the
