“At the prospect of much further wealth the fishermen were at once convinced: they sang in the lightness of their hearts, and for three days and three nights we sped down the Gulf, passing bleak mountains and deserted rocky promontories, until upon the fourth day we came to a town the like of which I had never seen.
“ ‘Shall we land here?’ said I.
“ ‘No,’ said the fishermen, ‘for it is in a manner within the caliph’s dominions, and perhaps that accursed tax of which you spoke will be levied here also.’
“ ‘You know better than I,’ replied I thoughtfully, standing for a moment in affected perplexity. ‘Let me, however, land in your little boat. I have a passion for new places. I will come out to you again after the hour of the midday prayers, while you stand in the offing.’
“To this arrangement they readily consented. I rowed to the land, and when I had reached the shore I was pleased to see my fearful hosts quite three miles out upon the hot and shimmering sea. Gazing at them, I hope with charity, and certainly with interest, I pushed the little boat adrift (for I had no reason to return to those poor people) and made my way inland. I disposed of my jewellery at prices neither low nor high with local merchants. I preserved the old fellow’s golden brooch, which I imagined (for I am a trifle weak and superstitious) might bring me good fortune, and when all my transactions were accomplished I counted my total capital, and found myself in possession of no less than 1,500 dinars. The cold of the evening had come by the time my accounts were settled and the strings of my pouch were drawn. I set myself under an arbour where a delicious fountain played in the light of the setting sun, which shone over the waters of the sea, and drinking some local beverage the name of which I knew not, but the taste and effect of which were equally pleasing, I reflected upon my increase of fortune.
“ ‘You left home, Mahmoud,’ said I to myself, ‘with one hundred dinars, of which your excellent and careful father deprived himself rather than see you face the world unarmed, or himself receive the bastinado. You have been gone from home a week; you are perhaps some 800 miles from your native city; your capital has been multiplied fifteen-fold, and so far you may look with an eager courage towards the further adventures of your life, for very clearly the Mercy of Allah is upon you.’ ”
At this moment a nasal hooting from the neighbourhood turret warned the company to turn their thoughts to heaven. The boys, who had sat fascinated by their uncle’s recital, knew that the end of their entertainment had come. The third son of the surgeon was therefore impatient to exclaim (as he hurriedly did): “But, dear uncle, though we see that a certain chance favoured you, and not only your native talents, yet we do not perceive how all this led to any main road to fortune.”
“My boy,” said the merchant Mahmoud, pensively stroking his beard and gazing vacuously over the heads of the youngsters. “I do not pretend to unfold you any such plan. Have I not told you that did such a plan exist all would be in possession of it? I am but retailing you in my humble fashion the steps by which one merchant in this city has been raised by the infinite goodness of the Merciful (His named be adored!) from poverty to riches. … But the call for prayer has already been heard and we must part. Upon this same day of next week, shortly after the last of the public executions has been bungled, you shall again come and hear me recite the next chapter of my varied career.”
II
Al-Durar, or “The Pearls”
A week later, at the hour of public executions and beheadings, the seven boys were again assembled cross-legged at the feet of their revered uncle, who, when he had refreshed them with cold water, and himself with a curious concoction of fermented barley, addressed them as follows:
“You will remember, my lads, how I was left cut off from my dear home and from all companions, in a strange country, and with no more than 1,500 dinars with which to face the world. This sum may seem to you large, but I can assure you that to the operations of commerce” (and here the merchant yawned) “it is but a drop in the ocean; and I had already so far advanced during one brief week in my character of financier that I gloomily considered how small a sum that 1,500 was wherewith to meet the cunning, the gluttony, and the avarice of this great world. But a brief sleep (which I took under a baobab tree to save the cost of lodging) refreshed at once my body and my intelligence, and with the next morning I was ready to meet the world.”
Here the merchant coughed slightly, and addressing his nephews said: “You have doubtless been instructed at school upon the nature of the baobab?”
“We have,” replied his nephews, and they recited in chorus the descriptions which they had been taught by heart from the textbooks of their academy.
“I am pleased,” replied their uncle, smiling, “to discover you thus informed. You will appreciate how ample a roof
