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[Illustration: FRONTISPIECE

“A certain Cham of Tartary going a progress with his nobles, was met by
a Dervise, who cried with a loud voice,”—“Whoever will give me a hundred
pieces of gold, I will give him a piece of advice.”——Page 13.]




                             ORIENTAL TALES,
                                 FOR THE
                        _ENTERTAINMENT OF YOUTH_:

                            SELECTED FROM THE
                      MOST EMINENT ENGLISH WRITERS.

                                _LONDON_:
                     PRINTED AND SOLD BY R. HARRILD,
                       _No. 20, Great Eastcheap_.
                                  1814




ORIENTAL TALES.




THE MERCHANT AND HIS SONS.


A certain merchant had two sons, the eldest of whom was of so bad a
disposition as to behave with great hatred and ill-nature towards the
younger, who was of a temper more mild and gentle. It happened that the
old gentleman, after having acquired a large estate by his trade, left it
by his will to his eldest son, together with all his ships and stock in
merchandize, desiring him to continue in the business, and support his
brother.

The father was no sooner dead than the elder began to shew his ill-will
to his brother. He desired him to leave his house, and, without giving
him any thing for his support, turned him loose into the wide world. The
young man was much dejected with this treatment; but, considering that
in his father’s life-time he had acquired some knowledge of business, he
applied to a neighbouring merchant, offering to serve him in the way of
trade.

The merchant received him into his house, and finding from long
experience that he was prudent, virtuous, and diligent in his business,
gave him his daughter and only child in marriage, and, when he died,
bequeathed to him his whole fortune. The young man, after the death of
his father-in-law, retired with his wife into a distant part of the
country, where he purchased a fine estate, with a splendid dwelling; and
there he lived with great credit and reputation.

The elder brother, after the father’s death, for some time had great
success in trade. At length, however, a violent storm tore to pieces many
of his ships, which were coming home richly laden. About the same time
some persons failing, who had much of their money in his hands, he was
reduced to great want. To complete his misfortunes, the little which he
had left at home was consumed by a sudden fire, which burnt his house,
and every thing in it; so that he was brought into a state of beggary.

In this forlorn condition, he had no other resource to keep himself from
starving than to wander up and down the country, imploring the assistance
of well-disposed persons. It happened one day, that having travelled many
miles, and obtained but little relief, he saw a gentleman walking in the
fields, not far from a fine seat. To this gentleman he addressed himself,
and having laid before him his misfortunes and his present necessitous
condition, he earnestly entreated him to grant him some assistance. The
gentleman, who happened to be no other than his own brother, did not
at first know him; but after some discourse with him, he perceived who
he was. At first, however, he did not make it appear that he had any
knowledge of him, but brought him home, and ordered his servants to take
care of him, and furnish him for that night with lodgings and victuals.

In the mean time he resolved to discover himself to his brother next
morning, and offer him a constant habitation in his house, after he had
got the consent of his wife to the proposal. Accordingly, next morning,
he ordered the poor man to be sent for. When he was come into his
presence, he asked if he knew him. The poor man answered, he did not. I
am, said he, bursting into tears, your only brother! and immediately fell
on his neck, and embraced him with great tenderness. The elder, quite
astonished at this accident, fell to the ground, and began to make many
excuses, and to beg pardon for his former cruel behaviour. To whom the
other answered, “Brother, let us forget those things; I heartily forgive
you all that is past; you need not range up and down the world; you shall
be welcome to live with me.” He readily accepted the proposal, and they
lived together with great comfort and happiness till death.




STORY OF MENCIUS.


As Mencius, the philosopher, was travelling in pursuit of wisdom,
night overtook him at the foot of a gloomy mountain, remote from the
habitations of men. Here, as he was straying, (while rain and thunder
conspired to make solitude still more hideous) he perceived a hermit’s
cell, and approaching, asked for shelter. “Enter,” cries the hermit in a
severe tone; “men deserve not to be obliged; but it would be imitating
their ingratitude to treat them as they deserve. Come in: examples of
vice may sometimes strengthen us in the ways of virtue.”

After a frugal meal, which consisted of roots and tea, Mencius could not
repress his curiosity to know why the hermit had retired from mankind,
whose actions taught the truest lessons of wisdom. “Mention not the
name of man,” cried the hermit with indignation; “here let me live
retired from a base ungrateful world; here, in the forest I shall find
no flatterers. The lion is an open enemy, and the dog a faithful friend;
but man, base man, can poison the bowl, and smile when he presents it.”
“You have then been used ill by mankind?” interrupted the philosopher
drily. “Yes,” replied the hermit; “on mankind I have exhausted my whole
fortune; and this staff, that cup, and those roots, are all that I have
in return.”—“Did you bestow your fortune among them, or did you only
lend it?” returned Mencius. “I bestowed it, undoubtedly,” replied the
other; “for where were the merit of being a money lender?”—“Did they
ever own that they received your benefits?” still adds the philosopher.
“A thousand times,” cries the hermit; “they every day loaded me with
professions of gratitude for favours received, and solicitations for
future ones.”—“If, then, (says Mencius smiling) you did not lend
your fortune in order to have it returned, it is injustice to accuse
them of ingratitude; they owned themselves obliged; you expected no
more; and they certainly earn a favour who stoop to acknowledge the
obligation.”—The hermit was struck with the reply; and, surveying
his guest with emotion, “I have heard of the great Mencius, and thou
certainly art the man. I am now fourscore years old, but still a child
in wisdom; take me back to the world, and educate me as one of the most
ignorant, and youngest, of thy disciples.”




THE STORY OF SCHACABAC.


Schacabac being reduced to great poverty, and having eat nothing for two
days together, made a visit to a noble Barmecide, in Persia, who was very
hospitable, but withal a great humourist.—The Barmecide was sitting at
his table, that seemed ready covered for an entertainment. Upon hearing
Schacabac’s complaint, he desired him to sit down and fall on. He then
gave him an empty plate, and asked him how he liked his rice-soup.
Schacabac, who was a man of wit, and resolved to comply with the
Barmecide in all his humours, told him it was admirable, and at the same
time, in imitation of the other, lifted up the empty spoon to his mouth
with great pleasure. The Barmecide then asked him if he ever saw whiter
bread? Schacabac, who saw neither bread nor meat, If I did not like it,
you may be sure, says he, I should not eat so heartily of it. You oblige
me mightily, replied the Barmecide, pray let me help you to this leg of
goose. Schacabac reached out his plate, and received nothing on it with
great chearfulness. As he was eating very heartily of this imaginary
goose, and crying up the sauce to the skies, the Barmecide desired him to
keep a corner of his stomach for a roasted lamb, fed with pistachio-nuts,
and after having called for it, as though it had really been served up,
Here is a dish, says he, that you will see at nobody’s table but my own.
Schacabac was wonderfully delighted with the taste of it, which is like
nothing, says he, I ever eat before. Several other nice dishes were
served up in idea, which both of them commended, and feasted on after the
same manner. This was followed by an invisible desert, no part of which
delighted Schacabac so much as a certain lozenge, which the Barmecide
told him was a sweet-meat of his own invention. Schacabac at length,
being courteously reproached by the Barmecide, that he had no stomach,
and that he eat nothing, and at the same time being tired with moving his
jaws up and down to no purpose, desired to be excused, for that really
he was so full that he could not eat a bit more. Come, then, says the
Barmecide, the cloth shall be removed, and you shall taste of my wines,
which I may say, without vanity, are the best in Persia. He then filled
both their glasses out of an empty decanter. Schacabac would have excused
himself from drinking so much at once, because he said he was a little
quarrelsome in his liquor; however, being prest to it, he pretended
to take it off, having before-hand praised the colour, and afterwards
the flavour. Being plied with two or three other imaginary bumpers of
different wines equally delicious, and a little vexed with this fantastic
treat, he pretended to grow fluttered, and gave the Barmecide a good
box on the ear; but immediately recovering himself, Sir, says he, I beg
ten thousand pardons, but I told you before, that it was my misfortune
to be quarrelsome in my drink. The Barmecide could not but smile at the
humour of his guest, and instead of being angry with him, I find, says
he, thou art a complaisant fellow, and deservest to be entertained in my
house. Since thou canst accommodate thyself to my humour, we will now
eat together in good earnest. Upon which calling for his supper, the
rice-soup, the goose, the pistachio-lamb, the several other nice dishes,
with the desert, the lozenges, and all the variety of Persian wines, were
served up successively one after another; and Schacabac was feasted, in
reality, with those very things which he had before been entertained
within imagination.




HAMET AND RASCHID.


When the plains of India were burnt up by a long continuance of drought,
Hamet and Raschid, two neighbouring shepherds, faint with thirst, stood
at the common boundary of their grounds, with their flocks and herds
panting round them, and in extremity of distress prayed for water.
On a sudden the air was becalmed, the birds ceased to chirp, and the
flocks to bleat. They turned their eyes every way, and saw a being of
mighty stature advancing through the valley, whom they knew upon his
nearer approach to be the Genius of Distribution. In one hand he held
the sheaves of plenty, and in the other, the sabre of destruction.
The shepherds stood trembling, and would have retired before him; but
he called to them with a voice gentle as the breeze that plays in the
evening among the spices of Sabæa: “Fly not from your benefactor,
children of the dust! I am come to offer you gifts, which only your own
folly can make vain. You here pray for water, and water I will bestow;
let me know with how much you will be satisfied: speak not rashly;
consider, that of whatever can be enjoyed by the body, excess is no less
dangerous than scarcity. When you remember the pain of thirst, do not
forget the danger of suffocation. Now, Hamet, tell me your request.”

“O Being, kind and beneficent,” says Hamet, “let thine eye pardon my
confusion. I entreat a little brook, which in summer shall never be dry,
and in winter never overflow.” “It is granted,” replies the Genius; and
immediately he opened the ground with his sabre, and a fountain bubbling
up under their feet, scattered its rills over the meadows; the flowers
renewed their fragrance, the trees spread a greener foilage, and the
flocks and herds quenched their thirst.

Then turning to Raschid, the Genius invited him likewise to offer his
petition. “I request,” says Raschid, “that thou wilt turn the Ganges
through my grounds, with all his waters, and all their inhabitants.”
Hamet was struck with the greatness of his neighbour’s sentiments, and
secretly repined in his heart, that he had not made the same petition
before him; when the Genius spoke, “Rash man, be not insatiable!
remember, to thee that is nothing which thou canst not use; and how are
thy wants greater than the wants of Hamet?” Raschid repeated his desire,
and pleased himself with the mean appearance that Hamet would make in the
presence of the proprietor of the Ganges. The Genius then retired towards
the river, and the two shepherds stood waiting the event. As Raschid was
looking with contempt upon his neighbour, on a sudden was heard the roar
of torrents, and they found by the mighty stream that the mounds of the
Ganges were broken. The flood rolled forward into the lands of Raschid,
his plantations were torn up, his flocks overwhelmed, he was swept away
before it, and a crocodile devoured him.




THE CHAM AND THE DERVISE.


A certain Cham of Tartary going a progress with his nobles, was met by
a Dervise, who cried with a loud voice, _whoever will give me a hundred
pieces of gold, I will give him a piece of advice_. The Cham ordered him
the sum: upon which the Dervise said, _begin nothing of which thou hast
not well considered the end_.

The courtiers upon hearing this plain sentence, smiled, and said with
a sneer, “The dervise is well paid for his maxim.” But the king was so
well satisfied with the answer, that he ordered it to be written in
golden letters in several places of his palace, and engraved on all his
plate. Not long after, the king’s surgeon was bribed to kill him with a
poisoned lancet at the time he let him blood. One day, when the king’s
arm was bound, and the fatal lancet in the surgeon’s hand, he read on
the bason, _begin nothing of which thou hast not well considered the
end_. He immediately started, and let the lancet fall out of his hand.
The king observed his confusion, and enquired the reason: the surgeon
fell prostrate, confessed the whole affair, and was pardoned, and the
conspirators died. The Cham, turning to his courtiers who heard the
advice with contempt, told them, “that counsel could not be too much
valued, which had saved a king’s life.”




THE STORY OF OMAR.


Omar, the hermit of the mountain Aubukabis, which rises on the east of
Mecca, and overlooks the city, found one evening a man sitting pensive
and alone, within a few paces of his cell. Omar regarded him with
attention, and perceived that his looks were wild and haggard, and that
his body was feeble and emaciated: the man also seemed to gaze stedfastly
on Omar; but such was the abstraction of his mind, that his eye did not
immediately take cognizance of its object. In the moment of recollection
he started as from a dream, he covered his face in confusion, and bowed
himself to the ground.—“Son of affliction,” said Omar, “who art thou,
and what is thy distress?” “My name,” replied the stranger, “is Hassan,
and I am a native of this city: the Angel of adversity has laid his hand
upon me; and the wretch whom thine eye compassionates, thou canst not
deliver.” “To deliver thee,” said Omar, “belongs to Him only, from whom
we should receive with humility both good and evil; yet hide not thy life
from me; for the burthen which I cannot remove, I may at least enable
thee to sustain.” Hassan fixed his eyes upon the ground, and remained
some time silent; then fetching a deep sigh, he looked up at the hermit,
and thus complied with his request.

It is now six years since our mighty lord the Calif Almalic, whose
memory be blessed, first came privately to worship in the temple of the
holy city. The blessings which he petitioned of the Prophet, as the
Prophet’s vicegerent, he was diligent to dispense; in the intervals of
his devotion, therefore, he went about the city, relieving distress,
and restraining oppression: the widow smiled under his protection, and
the weakness of age and infancy was sustained by his bounty. I, who
dreaded no evil but sickness, and expected no good beyond the reward of
my labour, was singing at my work, when Almalic entered my dwelling.
He looked round with a smile of complacency; perceiving that though
it was mean, it was neat, and that though I was poor, I appeared to
be content. As his habit was that of a pilgrim, I hastened to receive
him with such hospitality as was in my power; and my cheerfulness was
rather increased than restrained by his presence. After he had accepted
some coffee, he asked me many questions; and though by my answers I
always endeavoured to excite him to mirth, yet I perceived that he grew
thoughtful, and eyed me with a placid but fixed attention. I suspected
that he had some knowledge of me, and therefore inquired his country and
his name. “Hassan,” said he, “I have raised thy curiosity, and it shall
be satisfied: he who now talks with thee is Almalic, the sovereign of
the faithful, whose seat is the throne of Medina, and whose commission
is from above.” These words struck me dumb with astonishment, though I
had some doubt of their truth: but Almalic, throwing back his garment,
discovered the peculiarity of his vest, and put the royal signet upon his
finger. I then started up, and was about to prostrate myself before him,
but he prevented me: “Hassan,” said he, “forbear; thou art greater than
I, and from thee I have at once derived humility and wisdom.” I answered,
“Mock not thy servant, who is but as a worm before thee; life and death
are in thy hand, and happiness and misery are the daughters of thy
will.” “Hassan,” he replied, “I can no otherwise give life or happiness
than by not taking them away: thou art thyself beyond the reach of my
bounty, and possessed of felicity which I can neither communicate nor
obtain.—My influence over others fills my bosom with perpetual solicitude
and anxiety; and yet my influence over others extends only to their
vices, whether I would reward or punish. By the bow-string, I can repress
violence and fraud; and by the delegation of my power, I can transfer the
insatiable wishes of avarice and ambition from one object to another;
but with respect to virtue, I am impotent: if I could reward it, I would
reward it in thee. Thou art content, and hast therefore neither avarice
nor ambition: to exalt thee, would destroy the simplicity of thy life,
and diminish that happiness which I have no power either to increase
or continue.” He then rose up, and, commanding me not to disclose his
secret, departed.

As soon as I recovered from the confusion and astonishment in which the
Calif left me, I began to regret that my behaviour had intercepted his
bounty; and accused of folly, that cheerfulness which was the concomitant
of poverty and labour. I now repined at the obscurity of my station,
which my former insensibility had perpetuated: I neglected my labour,
because I despised the reward; I spent the day in idleness, forming
romantic projects to recover the advantages which I had lost; and at
night, instead of losing myself in that sweet and refreshing sleep, from
which I used to rise with new health, cheerfulness, and vigour, I dreamt
of splendid habits and a numerous retinue, of gardens, palaces, eunuchs,
and women, and waked only to regret the illusions that had vanished. My
health was at length impaired by the inquietude of my mind; I sold all
my moveables for subsistence: and reserved only a mattrass, upon which I
sometimes lay from one night to another.




THE STORY OF OMAR.

(CONCLUDED.)


In the first moon of the following year, the Calif came again to Mecca,
with the same secrecy, and for the same purposes. He was willing once
more to see the man, whom he considered as deriving felicity from
himself. But he found me, not singing at my work, ruddy with health, and
vivid with cheerfulness; but pale and dejected, sitting on the ground,
and chewing opium, which contributed to substitute the phantoms of
imagination for the realities of greatness. He entered with a kind of
joyful impatience in his countenance, which, the moment he beheld me, was
changed to a mixture of wonder and pity. I had often wished for another
opportunity to address the Calif; yet I was confounded at his presence,
and throwing myself at his feet, I laid my hand upon my head, and was
speechless. “Hassan,” said he, “what canst thou have lost, whose wealth
was the labour of thy own hand; and what can have made thee sad, the
spring of whose joy was in thy own bosom?—What evil has befallen thee?
Speak, and if I can remove it, thou art happy.” I was now encouraged
to look up, and I replied, “Let my Lord forgive the presumption of his
servant, who rather than utter a falsehood, would be dumb for ever. I am
become wretched by the loss of that which I never possessed: thou hast
raised wishes which indeed I am not worthy thou shouldst satisfy: but why
should it be thought, that he who was happy in obscurity and indigence,
would not have been rendered more happy by eminence and wealth?”

When I had finished this speech, Almalic stood some moments in suspense,
and I continued prostrate before him. “Hassan,” said he, “I perceive, not
with indignation but regret, that I mistook thy character; I now discover
avarice and ambition in thy heart, which lay torpid only because their
objects were too remote to rouse them. I cannot, therefore, invest thee
with authority, because I would not subject my people to oppression; and
because I would not be compelled to punish thee for crimes which I first
enabled thee to commit.

“But as I have taken from thee that which I cannot restore, I will
at least gratify the wishes that I excited, lest thy heart accuse me
of injustice, and thou continue still a stranger to thyself. Arise,
therefore, and follow me.” I sprung from the ground as it were with
the wing of an eagle; I kissed the hem of his garment in an extasy of
gratitude and joy; and when I went from my house, my heart leaped as
if it had escaped from the den of a lion. I followed Almalic to the
caravansary in which he lodged; and after he had fulfilled his vows, he
took me with him to Medina. He gave me an apartment in the seraglio; I
was attended by his own servants; my provisions were sent from his own
table; and I received every week a sum from his treasury, which exceeded
the most romantic of my expectations. But I soon discovered, that no
dainty was so tasteful, as the food to which labour procured an appetite;
no slumbers so sweet as those which weariness invited; and no time so
well enjoyed, as that in which diligence is expecting its reward. I
remembered these enjoyments with regret; and while I was sighing in the
midst of superfluities, which though they encumbered life, yet I could
not give up, they were suddenly taken away.

Almalic, in the midst of the glory of his kingdom, and in the full vigour
of his life, expired suddenly in the bath; such, thou knowest, was the
destiny which the Almighty had written upon his head.

His son Aububeker, who succeeded to the throne, was incensed against
me, by some who regarded me at once with contempt and envy: he suddenly
withdrew my pension, and commanded that I should be expelled the
palace; a command which my enemies executed with so much rigour, that
within twelve hours I found myself in the streets of Medina, indigent
and friendless, exposed to hunger and derision, with all the habits of
luxury, and all the sensibility of pride. O! let not thy heart despise
me, thou whom experience hast not taught, that it is misery to lose that
which it is not happiness to possess. O! that for me, this lesson had not
been written on the tablets of Providence! I have travelled from Medina
to Mecca: but I cannot fly from myself. How different are the states in
which I have been placed! The remembrance of both is bitter; for the
pleasures of neither can return. Hassan, having thus ended his story,
smote his hands together, and looking upwards, burst into tears.

Omar, having waited till this agony was past, went to him, and taking him
by the hand, “My son,” said he, “more is yet in thy power than Almalic
could give, or Aububeker take away. The lesson of thy life the Prophet
has in mercy appointed me to explain.

“Thou wast once content with poverty and labour, only because they were
become habitual, and ease and affluence were placed beyond thy hope; for
when ease and affluence approached thee, thou wast content with poverty
and labour no more. That which then became the object, was also the bound
of thy hope; and he, whose utmost hope is disappointed, must inevitably
be wretched. If thy supreme desire had been the delights of Paradise, and
thou hadst believed that by the tenor of thy life these delights had been
secured, as more could not have been given thee, thou wouldst not have
regretted that less was not offered. The content which was once enjoyed
was but the lethargy of the soul; and the distress which is now suffered,
will but quicken it to action. Depart, therefore, and be thankful for all
things: put thy trust in Him, who alone can gratify the wish of reason,
and satisfy the soul with good: fix thy hope upon that portion, in
comparison of which the world is as the drop of the bucket, and the dust
of the balance. Return, my son, to thy labour; thy food shall be again
tasteful, and thy rest shall be sweet: to thy content also will be added
stability, when it depends not upon that which is possessed upon earth,
but upon that which is expected in Heaven.”

Hassan, upon whose mind the Angel of instruction impressed the counsel of
Omar, hastened to prostrate himself in the temple of the Prophet. Peace
dawned upon his mind like the radiance of the morning: he returned to his
labour with cheerfulness; his devotion became fervent and habitual: and
the latter days of Hassan were happier than the first.




STORY OF A DERVISE.


A Dervise, travelling through Tartary, went into the king’s palace by
mistake, as thinking it to be a public inn, or caravansary. Having
looked about him for some time, he entered into a long gallery, where he
laid down his wallet, and spread his carpet, in order to repose himself
upon it, after the manner of the eastern nations.

He had not been long in this posture before he was discovered by some
of the guards, who asked him what was his business in that place? The
dervise told them that he intended to take up his night’s lodging in that
caravansary. The guards told him, in a very angry manner, that the house
he was in was not a caravansary, but the king’s palace. It happened that
the king himself passed through the gallery during this debate; and,
smiling at the mistake of the dervise, asked him how he could possibly be
so dull as not to distinguish a palace from a caravansary.

Sir, says the dervise, give me leave to ask your majesty a question or
two. Who were the persons that lodged in this house when it was first
built? The king replied, his ancestors. And who, says the dervise, was
the last person that lodged here? The king replied, his father. And who
is it, says the dervise, that lodges here at present? The king told him
that it was himself. And who, says the dervise, will be here after you?
The king answered, the young prince his son. “Ah, Sir,” said the dervise,
“a house that changes its inhabitants so often, and receives such a
perpetual succession of guests, is not a palace, but a caravansary.”




OMAR’S PLAN OF LIFE.


Omar, the son of Hassan, had passed seventy-five years in honour and
prosperity. The favour of three successive califs had filled his house
with gold and silver; and whenever he appeared, the benedictions of the
people proclaimed his passage.

Terrestrial happiness is of short continuance. The brightness of the
flame is wasting its fuel; the fragrant flower is passing away in its own
odours. The vigour of Omar began to fail, the curls of beauty fell from
his head, strength departed from his hands, and agility from his feet.
He gave back to the calif the keys of trust, and the seals of secrecy;
and sought no other pleasure for the remains of life than the converse of
the wise, and the gratitude of the good.

The powers of his mind were yet unimpaired. His chamber was filled by
visitants, eager to catch the dictates of experience, and officious to
pay the tribute of admiration. Caled, the son of the viceroy of Egypt,
entered every day early, and retired late. He was beautiful and eloquent;
Omar admired his wit and loved his docility. Tell me, said Caled, thou
to whose voice nations have listened, and whose wisdom is known to the
extremities of Asia, tell me how I may resemble Omar the prudent. The
arts by which you have gained power and preserved it, are to you no
longer necessary or useful; impart to me the secret of your conduct, and
teach me the plan upon which your wisdom has built your fortune.

Young man, said Omar, it is of little use to form plans of life. When
I took my first survey of the world, in my twentieth year, having
considered the various conditions of mankind, in the hour of solicitude,
I said thus to myself, leaning against a cedar which spread its branches
over my head: Seventy years are allowed to man; I have yet fifty
remaining: ten years I will allot to the attainment of knowledge, and ten
I will pass in foreign countries; I shall be learned, and therefore shall
be honoured; every city will shout at my arrival, and every student will
solicit my friendship. Twenty years thus passed will store my mind with
images which I shall be busy through the rest of my life in combining and
comparing. I shall revel in inexhaustible accumulations of intellectual
riches; I shall find new pleasures for every moment, and shall never more
be weary of myself. I will, however, not deviate too far from the beaten
track of life, but will try what can be found in female delicacy. I will
marry a wife beautiful as the Houries, and wise as Zobeide; with her I
will live twenty years within the suburbs of Bagdat, in every pleasure
that wealth can purchase, and fancy can invent. I will then retire to a
rural dwelling, pass my last days in obscurity and contemplation, and lie
silently down on the bed of death. Through my life it shall be my settled
resolution, that I will never depend upon the smile of princes; that I
will never stand exposed to the artifices of courts: I will never pant
for public honours, nor disturb my quiet with affairs of state. Such was
my scheme of life, which I impressed indelibly upon my memory.

The first part of my ensuing time was to be spent in search of knowledge;
and I know not how I was diverted from my design. I had no visible
impediments without, nor any ungovernable passions within. I regarded
knowledge as the highest honour and the most engaging pleasure; yet day
stole upon day, and month glided after month, till I found that seven
years of the first ten had vanished, and left nothing behind them. I now
postponed my purpose of travelling; for why should I go abroad while so
much remained to be learned at home? I immured myself for four years, and
studied the laws of the empire. The fame of my skill reached the judges;
I was found able to speak upon doubtful questions, and was commanded to
stand at the footstool of the calif. I was heard with attention, I was
consulted with confidence, and the love of praise fastened on my heart.

I still wished to see distant countries, listened with rapture to the
relations of travellers, and resolved some time to ask my dismission,
that I might feast my soul with novelty; but my presence was always
necessary, and the stream of business hurried me along. Sometimes I was
afraid lest I should be charged with ingratitude; but I still proposed to
travel, and therefore would not confine myself by marriage.

In my fiftieth year I began to suspect that the time of travelling was
past, and thought it best to lay hold on the felicity yet in my power,
and indulge myself in domestic pleasures. But at fifty no man easily
finds a woman beautiful as the Houries, and wise as Zobeide. I inquired
and rejected, consulted and deliberated, till the sixty-second year made
me ashamed of gazing upon girls. I had now nothing left but retirement,
and for retirement I never found a time, till disease forced me from
public employment.

Such was my scheme, and such has been its consequence. With an insatiable
thirst for knowledge, I trifled away the years of improvement; with a
restless desire of seeing different countries, I have always resided in
the same city; with the highest expectation of connubial felicity, I
have lived unmarried; and with unalterable resolutions of contemplative
retirement, I am going to die within the walls of Bagdat.




THE BASKET MAKER.


In the midst of that vast ocean, commonly called the South-Sea, lie the
islands of Solomon. In the centre of these lies one not only distant from
the rest, which are immensely scattered round it, but also larger beyond
proportion. An ancestor of the prince, who now reigns absolute in this
central island, has, through a long descent of ages, entailed the name of
Solomon’s Islands on the whole, by the effect of that wisdom wherewith he
polished the manners of his people.

A descendant of one of the great men of this happy island, becoming a
gentleman to so improved a degree as to despise the good qualities
which had originally ennobled his family, thought of nothing but how to
support and distinguish his dignity by the pride of an ignorant mind,
and a disposition abandoned to pleasure. He had a house on the sea-side,
where he spent great part of his time in hunting and fishing; but found
himself at a loss in pursuit of those important diversions, by means of
a long slip of marsh land, overgrown with high reeds, that lay between
his house and the sea. Resolving, at length, that it became not a man
of his quality to submit to a restraint in his pleasures, for the ease
and convenience of an obstinate mechanic; and having often endeavoured,
in vain, to buy out the owner, who was an honest poor basket-maker, and
whose livelihood depended on working up the flags of those reeds, in a
manner peculiar to himself, the gentleman took advantage of a very high
wind, and commanded his servants to burn down the barrier.

The basket-maker, who saw himself undone, complained of the oppression in
terms more suited to his sense of the injury, than the respect due to
the rank of the offender; and the reward this imprudence procured him,
was the additional injustice of blows and reproaches, and all kinds of
insult and indignity.

There was but one way to a remedy, and he took it: for going to the
capital, with the marks of his hard usage upon him, he threw himself
at the feet of the king, and procured a citation for his oppressor’s
appearance; who, confessing the charge, proceeded to justify his
behaviour by the poor man’s unmindfulness of the submission due from the
vulgar to gentlemen of rank and distinction.

“But pray,” replied the king, “what distinction of rank had the
grand-father of your father, when, being a cleaver of wood in the palace
of my ancestors, he was raised from among those vulgar you speak of with
such contempt, in reward for an instance he gave of his courage and
loyalty in defence of his master? Yet his distinction was nobler than
yours: it was the distinction of soul, not of birth; the superiority of
worth, not of fortune! I am sorry I have a gentleman in my kingdom who
is base enough to be ignorant that ease and distinction of fortune were
bestowed on him but to this end, that, being at rest from all cares of
providing for himself, he might apply his heart, head, and hand, for the
public advantage of others.”

Here the king, discontinuing his speech, fixed an eye of indignation on a
sullen resentment of mien which he observed in the haughty offender, who
muttered out his dislike of the encouragement this way of thinking must
give to the commonality, who, he said, were to be considered as persons
of no consequence, in comparison of men who were born to be honoured.
“Where reflection is wanting,” replied the king, with a smile of disdain,
“men must find their defects in the pain of their sufferings. Yanhuma,”
added he, turning to a captain of his gallies, “strip the injured and the
injurer; and, conveying them to one of the most barbarous and remote of
the islands, set them ashore in the night, and leave them both to their
fortune.”

The place in which they were landed was a marsh; under cover of those
flags the gentleman was in hopes of concealing himself, and giving the
slip to his companion, whom he thought it a disgrace to be found with:
but the lights in the galley having giving an alarm to the savages, a
considerable body of them came down, and discovered in the morning the
two strangers in their hiding-place. Setting up a dismal yell, they
surrounded them; and advancing nearer and nearer with a kind of clubs,
seemed determined to dispatch them, without sense of hospitality or mercy.

Here the gentleman began to discover that the superiority of his blood
was imaginary; for between the consciousness of shame and cold, under
the nakedness he had never been used to; a fear of the event from the
fierceness of the savages approach; and the want of an idea whereby to
soften or divert their asperity, he fell behind the poor sharer of his
calamity, and with an unsinewed, apprehensive, unmanly sneakingness of
mien, gave up the post of honour, and made a leader of the very man whom
he had thought it a disgrace to consider as a companion.

The basket-maker on the contrary, to whom the poverty of his condition
had made nakedness habitual, to whom a life of pain and mortification
represented death as not dreadful, and whose remembrance of his skill in
arts, of which these savages were ignorant, gave him hopes of becoming
safe, from demonstrating that he could be useful, moved with bolder and
more open freedom; and having plucked a handful of the flags, sat down
without emotion, and making signs that he would shew them something
worthy of their attention, fell to work with smiles and noddings; while
the savages drew near, and gazed with expectation of the consequence.

It was not long before he had wreathed a kind of coronet of pretty
workmanship; and rising with respect and fearfulness, approached the
savage who appeared the chief, and placed it gently on his head; whose
figure, under this new ornament, so charmed and struck his followers,
that they all threw down their clubs, and formed a dance of welcome and
congratulation round the author of so prized a favour.

There was not one but shewed the marks of his impatience to be as
fine as the captain: so the poor basket-maker had his hands full of
employment: and the savages, observing one quite idle, while the other
was so busy in their service, took up arms in behalf of natural justice,
and began to lay on arguments in favour of their purpose.

The basket-maker’s pity now effaced the remembrance of his sufferings; so
he arose and rescued his oppressor, by making signs that he was ignorant
of the art; but might, if they thought fit, be usefully employed in
waiting on the work, and fetching flags to his supply, as fast as he
should want them.

This proposition luckily fell in with a desire the savages expressed to
keep themselves at leisure, that they might crowd round, and mark the
progress of a work they took such pleasure in. They left the gentleman
therefore to his duty in the basket-maker’s service; and considered
him, from that time forward, as one who was, and ought to be treated as
inferior to their benefactor.

Men, women, and children, from all corners of the island, came in droves
for coronets; and, setting the gentleman to work to gather boughs and
poles, made a fine hut to lodge the basket-maker; and brought down daily
from the country such provisions as they lived upon themselves, taking
care to offer the imagined servant nothing till his master had done
eating.

Three months reflection, in this mortified condition, gave a new and just
turn to our gentleman’s improved ideas; insomuch that, lying weeping
and awake one night, he thus confessed his sentiments in favour of the
basket-maker. “I have been to blame, and wanted judgment to distinguish
between accident and excellence. When I should have measured nature,
I but looked to vanity. The preference which fortune gives, is empty
and imaginary; and I perceive, too late, that only things of use are
naturally honourable. I am ashamed, when I compare my malice, to remember
your humanity; but if the gods should please to call me to a repossession
of my rank and happiness, I would divide all with you, in atonement for
my justly punished arrogance.”

He promised, and performed his promise: for the king, soon after, sent
the captain who had landed them with presents to the savages, and ordered
him to bring both back again. And it continues to this day a custom in
that island, to degrade all gentlemen who cannot give a better reason for
their pride, than they were born to do nothing: and the word for this due
punishment is, send him to the basket-maker.




THE STORY OF ALMET.


Almet, the dervise, who watched the sacred lamp in the sepulchre of the
Prophet, as he one day rose up from the devotions of the morning, which
he had performed at the gate of the temple, with his body turned towards
the east, and his forehead on the earth, saw before him a man in splendid
apparel, attended by a long retinue, who gazed stedfastly at him, with a
look of mournful complacence, and seemed desirous to speak, but unwilling
to offend.

The Dervise, after a short silence, advanced, and saluting him with the
calm dignity which independence confers upon humility, requested that he
would reveal his purpose.

“Almet,” said the stranger, “thou seest before thee a man whom the hand
of prosperity has overwhelmed with wretchedness. Whatever I once desired
as the means of happiness, I now possess; but I am not yet happy, and
therefore I despair. I regret the lapse of time, because it glides away
without enjoyment; and as I expect nothing in the future but the vanities
of the past, I do not wish that the future should arrive. Yet I tremble
lest it should be cut off; and my heart sinks when I anticipate the
moment in which eternity shall close over the vacuity of my life, like
the sea upon the path of a ship, and leave no traces of my existence more
durable than the furrow which remains after the waves have united. If
in the treasures of thy wisdom there is any precept to obtain felicity,
vouchsafe it to me: for this purpose am I come; a purpose which yet I
feared to reveal, lest, like all the former, it should be disappointed.”

Almet listened, with looks of astonishment and pity, to this complaint of
a being, in whom reason was known to be a pledge of immortality; but the
serenity of his countenance soon returned; and stretching out his hand
towards heaven, “Stranger,” said he, “the knowledge which I have received
from the Prophet, I will communicate to thee.

“As I was sitting one evening at the porch of the temple, pensive and
alone, mine eye wandered among the multitude that was scattered before
me; and while I remarked the weariness and solicitude which was visible
in every countenance, I was suddenly struck with a sense of their
condition. ‘Wretched mortals,’ said I, ‘to what purpose are you busy?
Do the linens of Egypt, and the silks of Persia, bestow felicity on
those who wear them, equal to the wretchedness of yonder slaves, whom I
see leading the camels that bring them? Is the fineness of the texture,
or the splendour of the tints, regarded with delight by those to whom
custom has rendered them familiar? or can the power of habit render
others insensible of pain, who live only to traverse the desart; a
scene of dreadful uniformity, where a barren level is bounded only by
the horizon; where no change of prospect, or variety of images, relieves
the traveller from a sense of toil and danger, of whirlwinds which in
a moment may bury him in the sand, and of thirst, which the wealthy
have given half their possessions to allay? Do those on whom hereditary
diamonds sparkle with unregarded lustre, gain from the possession what is
lost by the wretch who seeks them in the mine; who lives excluded from
the common bounties of nature; to whom even the vicissitude of day and
night is not known; who sighs in perpetual darkness, and whose life is
one alternative of insensibility and labour? If those are not happy who
possess, in proportion as those are wretched who bestow, how vain a dream
is the life of man! and if there is, indeed, such difference in the value
of existence, how shall we acquit of partiality the hand by which this
difference has been made?”

While my thoughts thus multiplied, and my heart burned within me, I
became sensible of a sudden influence from above. The streets and the
crowds of Mecca disappeared; I found myself sitting on the declivity of
a mountain, and perceived at my right hand an angel, whom I knew to be
Azoran, the minister of reproof. When I saw him I was afraid. I cast
mine eye upon the ground, and was about to deprecate his anger, when he
commanded me to be silent. “Almet,” said he, “thou has devoted thy life
to meditation, that thy counsel might deliver ignorance from the mazes of
error, and deter presumption from the precipice of guilt; but the book
of nature thou hast read without understanding: it is again open before
thee: look up, consider it, and be wise.”

I looked up, and beheld an inclosure, beautiful as the gardens of
Paradise, but of a small extent. Through the middle there was a green
walk; at the end a wild desart; and beyond, impenetrable darkness. The
walk was shaded with trees of every kind, that were covered at once with
blossoms and fruit; innumerable birds were singing in the branches; the
grass was intermingled with flowers, which impregnated the breeze with
fragrance, and painted the path with beauty; on one side flowed a gentle,
transparent stream, which was just heard to murmur over the golden sands
that sparkled at the bottom; and on the other were walks and bowers,
fountains, grottoes, and cascades, which diversified the scene with
endless variety, but did not conceal the bounds.




THE STORY OF ALMET, CONCLUDED.


While I was gazing in a transport of delight and wonder on this
enchanting spot, I perceived a man stealing along the walk with a
thoughtful and deliberate pace; his eyes were fixed upon the earth, and
his arms crossed on his bosom; he sometimes started, as if a sudden pang
had seized him; his countenance expressed solicitude and terror; he
looked round with a sigh, and having gazed a moment on the desart that
lay before him, he seemed as if he wished to stop, but was impelled
forwards by some invisible power; his features however soon settled again
in a calm melancholy; his eye was again fixed on the ground; and he
went on as before, with apparent reluctance, but without emotion. I was
struck with his appearance; and turning hastily to the angel, was about
to enquire what could produce such infelicity in a being surrounded with
every object that could gratify every sense; but he prevented my request:
“The book of nature,” said he, “is before thee; look up, consider it, and
be wise.” I looked, and beheld a valley between two mountains that were
craggy and barren; on the path there was no verdure, and the mountains
afforded no shade; the sun burned in the zenith, and every spring was
dried up; but the valley terminated in a country that was pleasant and
fertile, shaded with woods, and adorned with buildings. At a second
view, I discovered a man in this valley, meagre indeed and naked, but
his countenance was cheerful, and his deportment active; he kept his eye
fixed upon the country before him, and looked as if he would have run,
but that he was restrained, as the other had been impelled, by some
secret influence: sometimes, indeed, I perceived a sudden impression of
pain, and sometimes he stepped short, as if his foot was pierced by the
asperities of the way; but the sprightliness of his countenance instantly
returned, and he pressed forward without appearance of repining or
complaint.

I turned again towards the angel, impatient to enquire from what secret
source happiness was derived, in a situation so different from that in
which it might have been expected: but he again prevented my requested:
“Almet,” said he, “remember what thou hast seen, and let this memorial be
written upon the tablets of thy heart. Remember, Almet, that the world
in which thou art placed, is but the road to another; and that happiness
depends not upon the path, but the end; the value of this period of thy
existence is fixed by hope and fear. The wretch who wished to linger in
the garden, who looked round upon its limits with terror, was destitute
of hope, and was perpetually tormented by the dread of losing that which
yet he did not enjoy; the song of the birds had been repeated till it
was not heard, and the flowers had so often recurred, that their beauty
was not seen; the river glided by unnoticed; and he feared to lift his
eye to the prospect, lest he should behold the waste that circumscribed
it. But he that toiled through the valley was happy, because he looked
forward with hope. Thus to the sojourner upon earth it is of little
moment whether the path he treads be strewed with flowers or with thorns,
if he perceives himself to approach these regions, in comparison of which
the thorns and the flowers of this wilderness lose their distinction, and
are both alike impotent to give pleasure or pain.

“What then has Eternal Wisdom unequally distributed? That which can make
every station happy, and without which every station must be wretched, is
acquired by virtue, and virtue is possible to all. Remember, Almet, the
vision which thou hast seen; and let my words be written on the tablet of
thy heart, that thou mayest direct the wanderer to happiness, and justify
God to men.”

While the voice of Azoran was yet sounding in my ear, the prospect
vanished from before me, and I found myself again sitting at the porch of
the temple. The sun was gone down, the multitude was retired to rest, and
the solemn quiet of midnight concurred with the resolution of my doubts
to complete the tranquillity of my mind.

Such, my son, was the vision which the Prophet vouchsafed me, not for my
sake only, but for thine. Thou hast sought felicity in temporal things;
and, therefore, thou art disappointed. Let not instruction be lost upon
thee, as the seal of Mahomet in the well of Aris: but go thy way, let
thy flock clothe the naked, and thy table feed the hungry; deliver the
poor from oppression, and let thy conversation be Above. Thus shalt
thou “rejoice in Hope,” and look forward to the end of life as the
consummation of thy felicity.

Almet, in whose breast devotion kindled as he spake, returned into the
temple, and the stranger departed in peace.




THE STORY OF GELALEDDIN OF BASSORA.


In the time when Bassora was considered as the school of Asia, and
flourished by the reputation of its professors, and the confluence of its
students, among the students that listened round the chair of Albumazar
was Gelaleddin, a native of Taurus, in Persia, a young man, amiable in
his manners, and beautiful in his form, of boundless curiosity, incessant
diligence, and irresistible genius, of quick apprehension and tenacious
memory, accurate without narrowness, and eager for novelty without
inconstancy.

No sooner did Gelaleddin appear at Bassora, than his virtues and
abilities raised him to distinction. He passed from class to class rather
admired than envied by those whom the rapidity of his progress left
behind; he was consulted by his fellow-students as an oraculous guide,
and admitted as a competent auditor to the conference of the sages.

After a few years, having passed through all the exercises of probation,
Gelaleddin was invited to a professor’s seat, and intreated to increase
the splendour of Bassora. Gelaleddin affected to deliberate on the
proposal, with which, before he considered it, he resolved to comply;
and next morning retired to a garden planted for the recreation of the
students, and entering a solitary walk, began to meditate upon his future
life.

“If I am thus eminent,” said he, “in the regions of literature, I shall
be yet more conspicuous in any other place: If I should now devote myself
to study and retirement, I must pass my life in silence, unacquainted
with the delights of wealth, the influence of power, the pomp of
greatness, and the charms of elegance, with all that man envies and
desires, with all that keeps the world in motion, by the hope of gaining
or the fear of losing it. I will, therefore, depart to Tauris, where
the Persian monarch resides in all the splendour of absolute dominion:
my reputation will fly before me, my arrival will be congratulated by
my kinsmen and friends; I shall see the eyes of those who predicted my
greatness sparkling with exultation, and the faces of those that once
despised me clouded with envy, or counterfeiting kindness by artificial
smiles. I will show my wisdom by my discourse, and my moderation by my
silence; I will instruct the modest with easy gentleness, and repress
the ostentatious by seasonable superciliousness. My apartments will be
crowded by the inquisite and the vain, by those that honour and those
that rival me; my name will soon reach the court; I shall stand before
the throne of the emperor; the judges of the law will confess my wisdom,
and the nobles will contend to heap gifts upon me. If I shall find
that my merit, like that of others, excites malignity, or feel myself
tottering on the seat of elevation, I may at last retire to academical
obscurity, and become, in my lowest state, a professor of Bassora.”

Having thus settled his determination, he declared to his friends his
design of visiting Tauris, and saw with more pleasure than he ventured to
express, the regret with which he was dismissed. He could not bear to
delay the honours to which he was destined, and therefore hastened away,
and in a short time entered the capital of Persia. He was immediately
immersed in the crowd, and passed unobserved to his father’s house. He
entered, and was received, though not unkindly, yet without any excess
of fondness, or exclamations of rapture. His father had, in his absence,
suffered many losses, and Gelaleddin was considered as an additional
burthen to a fallen family.

When he recovered from his surprise, he began to display his
acquisitions, and practised all the arts of narration and disquisition;
but the poor have no leisure to be pleased with eloquence; they heard
his arguments without reflection, and his pleasantries without a smile.
He then applied himself singly to his brothers and sisters, but found
them all chained down by invariable attention to their own fortunes,
and insensible of any other excellence than that which could bring some
remedy for indigence.

It was now known in the neighbourhood that Gelaleddin was returned, and
he sat for some days in expectation that the learned would visit him for
consultation, or the great for entertainment. But who would be pleased
or instructed in the mansions of poverty? He then frequented places of
public resort, and endeavoured to attract notice by the copiousness of
his talk. The sprightly were silenced, and went away to censure in some
other place his arrogance and his pedantry; and the dull listened quietly
for a while, and then wondered why any man should take pains to obtain so
much knowledge which would never do him good.

He next solicited the viziers for employment, not doubting but his
service would be eagerly accepted. He was told by one, that there was no
vacancy in his office; by another, that his merit was above any patronage
but that of the emperor; by a third, that he would not forget him; and
by the chief vizier, that he did not think, literature of any great use
in public business. He was sometimes admitted to their tables, where he
exerted his wit and diffused his knowledge; but he observed, that where,
by endeavour or accident, he had remarkably excelled, he was seldom
invited a second time.

He now returned to Bassora, wearied and disgusted, but confident of
resuming his former rank, and revelling again in satiety of praise. But
he who had been neglected at Tauris, was not much regarded at Bassora; he
was considered as a fugitive, who returned only because he could live in
no other place; his companions found that they had formerly over-rated
his abilities, and he lived long without notice or esteem.




STORY OF ORTOGRUL OF BASRA.


As Ortogrul of Basra was one day wandering along the streets of Bagdat,
musing on the varieties of merchandize which the shops offered to his
view, and observing the different occupations which busied the multitudes
on every side, he was awakened from the tranquility of meditation by a
crowd that obstructed his passage. He raised his eyes, and saw the chief
vizier, who having returned from the divan, was entering his palace.

Ortogrul mingled with the attendants, and being supposed to have some
petition for the vizier, was permitted to enter. He surveyed the
spaciousness of the apartments, admired the walks hung with golden
tapestry, and the floors covered with silken carpets, and despised the
simple neatness of his own little habitation.

Surely, said he to himself, this palace is that seat of happiness where
pleasure succeeds to pleasure, and discontent and sorrow can have no
admission. Whatever nature has provided for the delight of sense, is
here spread forth to be enjoyed. What can mortals hope or imagine which
the master of this palace has not obtained. The dishes of luxury cover
his table, the voice of harmony lulls him in his bowers; he breathes
the fragrance of the groves of Java, and sleeps upon the down of the
cygnets of the Ganges. He speaks, and his mandate is obeyed; he wishes,
and his wish is gratified; all whom he sees obey him; and all whom he
hears flatter him. How different, Ortogrul, is thy condition, who art
doomed to the perpetual torments of unsatisfied desire, and who hast no
amusement in thy power that can withhold thee from thy own reflections!
They tell thee that thou art wise, but what does wisdom avail with
poverty? None will flatter the poor, and the wise have very little power
of flattering themselves. That man is surely the most wretched of the
sons of wretchedness who lives with his own faults and follies always
before him, and who has none to reconcile him to himself by praise and
veneration. I have long sought content, and have not found it; I will
from this moment endeavour to be rich.

Full of his new resolution, he shut himself in his chamber for six
months, to deliberate how he should grow rich; he sometimes proposed to
offer himself as a counsellor to one of the kings of India, and sometimes
resolved to dig for diamonds in the mines of Golconda. One day, after
some hours passed in violent fluctuation of opinion, sleep insensibly
seized him in his chair; he dreamed that he was ranging a desart country,
in search of some one that might teach him to grow rich! and as he
stood on the top of a hill shaded with cypress, in doubt whither to
direct his steps, his father appeared on a sudden standing before him.
“Ortogrul,” said the old man, “I know thy perplexity; listen to thy
father, turn thine eye on the opposite mountain.” Ortogrul looked, and
saw a torrent tumbling down the rocks, roaring with the noise of thunder,
and scattering its foam on the impending woods. “Now,” said his father,
“behold the valley that lies between the hills.” Ortogrul looked, and
espied a little well, out of which issued a small rivulet. “Tell me now,”
said his father, “dost thou wish for sudden affluence, that may pour
upon thee like the mountain torrent, or for a slow and gradual increase,
resembling the rill gliding from the well?” “Let me be quickly rich,”
said Ortogrul; “let the golden stream be quick and violent.” “Look round
thee,” said his father, “once again.” Ortogrul looked, and perceived the
channel of the torrent dry and dusty; but following the rivulet from the
well, he traced it to a wide lake, which the supply, slow and constant,
kept always full. He waked, and determined to grow rich by silent profit,
and persevering industry.

Having sold his patrimony, he engaged in merchandize, and in twenty years
purchased lands, on which he raised a house, equal in sumptuousness to
that of the vizier, to which he invited all the ministers of pleasure,
expecting to enjoy all the felicity which he imagined riches able to
afford. Leisure soon made him weary of himself, and he longed to be
persuaded that he was great and happy. He was courteous and liberal; he
gave all that approached him hopes of pleasing him, and all who should
please him hopes of being rewarded. Every art of praise was tried, and
every source of adulatory fiction was exhausted. Ortogrul heard his
flatters without delight, because he found himself unable to believe
them. His own heart told him its frailties, his own understanding
reproached him with his faults. “How long,” said he, with a deep sigh,
“have I been labouring in vain to amass wealth, which at last is
useless. Let no man hereafter wish to be rich, who is already too wise
to be flattered.”




THE STORY OF ALNASCHAR.


It is a precept oftentimes inculcated, that we should not entertain an
hope of any thing in life which lies at a great distance from us. The
shortness and uncertainty of our time here, makes such a kind of hope
unreasonable and absurd. The grave lies unseen between us and the object
which we reach after: where one man lives to enjoy the good he has in
view, ten thousand are cut off in the pursuit of it.

Men of warm imaginations and towering thoughts are apt to overlook the
goods of fortune which are near them, for something that glitters in the
sight at a distance; to neglect solid and substantial happiness, for what
is showy and superficial; and to contemn that good that lies within their
reach, for that which they are not capable of attaining. Hope calculates
its schemes for a long and durable life; presses forward to imaginary
points of bliss; and grasps at impossibilities; and consequently very
often insnares men into beggary, ruin, and dishonour.

What I have here said, may serve as a moral to an Arabian fable, which
I find translated into French by Monsieur Galland. The fable has in it
such a wild, but natural symplicity, that I question not but my reader
will be as much pleased with it as I have been, and that he will consider
himself, if he reflects on the several amusements of hope which have
sometimes passed in his mind, as a near relation to the Persian Glass-man.

Alnaschar, says the fable, was a very idle fellow, that never would
set his hand to any business during his father’s life. When his father
died, he left him to the value of an hundred drachmas in Persian money.
Alnaschar, in order to make the best of it, laid it out in glasses,
bottles, and the finest earthenware. These he piled up in a large open
basket, and having made choice of a very little shop, placed the basket
at his feet, and leaned his back upon the wall, in expectation of
customers. As he sat in this posture, with his eyes upon the basket, he
fell into a most amusing train of thought, and was overheard by one of
his neighbours, as he talked to himself in the following manner:

“This basket,” says he, “cost me, at the wholesale merchant’s, an hundred
drachmas, which is all I have in the world. I shall quickly make two
hundred of it, by selling it in retail. These two hundred drachmas will
in a very little while rise to four hundred, which of course will amount
in time to four thousand. Four thousand drachmas cannot fail of making
eight thousand. As soon as by this means I am master of ten thousand, I
will lay aside my trade of a glass-man, and turn jeweller. I shall then
deal in diamonds, pearls, and all sorts of rich stones. When I have got
together as much wealth as I can well desire, I will make a purchase of
the finest house I can find, with lands, slaves, eunuchs, and horses. I
shall then begin to enjoy myself, and make a noise in the world. I will
not, however, stop there, but still continue my traffic, until I have
got together an hundred thousand drachmas. When I have thus made myself
master of an hundred thousand drachmas, I shall naturally set myself on
the footing of a prince, and will demand the grand vizier’s daughter in
marriage, after having represented to that minister the information which
I have received of the beauty, wit, discretion, and other high qualities
which his daughter possesses. I will let him know at the same time, that
it is my intention to make him a present of a thousand pieces of gold,
on our marriage night. As soon as I have married the grand vizier’s
daughter, I will buy her twelve black eunuchs, the youngest and best
that can be bought for money. I must afterwards make my father-in-law a
visit, with a great train of equipage. And when I am placed at his right
hand, which he will do of course, if it be only to honour his daughter,
I will give him the thousand pieces of gold which I promised him, and
afterwards, to his great surprise, will present him with another purse
of the same value, with some short speech, as, ‘Sir, you see I am a man
of my word; I always give more than I promise.’

“When I have brought the princess to my house, I shall take a particular
care to breed her in a due respect to me, before I give the reins to love
and dalliance. To this end I shall confine her to her own apartment, make
her a short visit, and talk but little to her. Her women will represent
to me that she is inconsolable by reason of my unkindness, and beg me,
with tears, to caress her, and let her sit down by me; but I shall still
remain inexorable, and will turn my back upon her all the first night.
Her mother will then come and bring her daughter to me, as I am seated
upon my sofa. The daughter, with tears in her eyes, will fling herself
at my feet, and beg of me to receive her into my favour. Then will I, to
imprint in her a thorough veneration for my person, draw up my legs and
spurn her from me with my foot, in such a manner that she shall fall
down several paces from the sofa.”

Alnaschar was entirely swallowed up in this chimerical vision, and could
not forbear acting with his foot what he had in his thoughts; so that
unluckily striking his basket of brittle ware, which was the foundation
of all his grandeur, he kicked his glasses to a great distance from him
into the street, and broke them into ten thousand pieces.




THE STORY OF CARAZAN.


Carazan, the merchant of Bagdat, was eminent throughout all the East
for his avarice and his wealth: his origin was obscure, as that of the
spark, which by the collision of steel and adamant, is struck out of
darkness; and the patient labour of persevering diligence alone had made
him rich. It was remembered, that when he was indigent, he was thought to
be generous; and he was still acknowledged to be inexorably just. But
whether in his dealings with men he discovered a perfidy which tempted
him to put his trust in gold, or whether in proportion as he accumulated
wealth he discovered his own importance to increase, Carazan prized it
more as he used it less; he gradually lost the inclination to do good, as
he acquired the power; and as the hand of time scattered snow upon his
head, the freezing influence extended to his bosom.

But though the door of Carazan was never opened by hospitality, nor his
hand by compassion, yet fear led him constantly to the mosque at the
stated hours of prayer; he performed all the rites of devotion with the
most scrupulous punctuality, and had thrice paid his vows at the temple
of the Prophet. That devotion which arises from the love of God, and
necessarily includes the love of man, as it connects gratitude with
beneficence, and exalts that which was moral to divine, confers new
dignity upon goodness, and is the object not only of affection but of
reverence. On the contrary, the devotion of the selfish, whether it be
thought to avert the punishment which every one wishes to be inflicted,
or to insure it by the complication of hypocrisy with guilt, never
fails to excite indignation and abhorrence. Carazan, therefore, when he
had locked his door, and turning round with a look of circumspective
suspicion proceeded to the mosque, was followed by every eye with silent
malignity: the poor suspended their supplication when he passed by; and
though he was known by every man, no one saluted him.

Such had long been the life of Carazan, and such was the character
which he had acquired, when notice was given by proclamation, that he
was removed to a magnificent building in the centre of the city, that
his table should be spread for the public, and that the stranger should
be welcome to his bed, the multitude soon rushed like a torrent to his
door, where they beheld him distributing bread to the hungry, and apparel
to the naked, his eye softened with compassion, and his cheek glowing
with delight. Every one gazed with astonishment at the prodigy; and the
murmur of innumerable voices increasing like the sound of approaching
thunder, Carazan beckoned with his hand; attention suspended the tumult
in a moment, and he thus gratified the curiosity which had procured him
audience.

To him who touches the mountains and they smoke, the Almighty and the
Most Merciful, be everlasting honour! he has ordained sleep to be the
minister of instruction, and his visions have reproved me in the night.
As I was sitting alone in my Haram, with my lamp burning before me,
computing the product of my merchandize, and exulting in the increase of
my wealth, I fell into a deep sleep, and the hand of him who dwells in
the third heaven was upon me. I beheld the angel of death coming forward
like a whirlwind, and he smote me before I could deprecate the blow. At
the same moment I felt myself lifted from the ground, and transported
with astonishing rapidity through the regions of the air.—The earth was
contracted to an atom beneath; and the stars glowed round me with a
lustre that obscured the sun. The gate of Paradise was new in sight; and
I was intercepted by a sudden brightness which no human eye could behold:
the irrevocable sentence was now to be pronounced; my day of probation
was past: and from the evil of my life nothing could be taken away, nor
could any thing be added to the good. When I reflected that my lot for
eternity was cast, which not all the powers of nature could reverse, my
confidence totally forsook me; and while I stood trembling and silent,
covered with confusion, and chilled with horror, I was thus addressed by
the radiance that flamed before me:—

“Carazan, thy worship has not been accepted, because it was not prompted
by love of God: neither can thy righteousness be rewarded, because it was
not produced by love of man: for thy own sake only hast thou rendered
to every man his due; and thou hast approached the Almighty only for
thyself. Thou hast not looked up with gratitude, nor around thee with
kindness. Around thee, thou hast indeed beheld vice and folly; but if
vice and folly could justify thy parsimony, would they not condemn the
bounty of heaven? If not upon the foolish and the vicious, where shall
the sun diffuse his light, or the clouds distil the dew? Where shall the
lips of the spring breathe fragrance, or the hand of autumn diffuse
plenty? Remember, Carazan, that thou hast shut compassion from thine
heart, and grasped thy treasures with a hand of iron: thou hast lived for
thyself; and, therefore, henceforth for ever thou shalt subsist alone.
From the light of heaven, and from the society of all beings shalt thou
be driven; solitude shall protract the lingering hours of eternity, and
darkness aggravate the horrors of despair.” At this moment I was driven
by some secret and irresistible power through the glowing system of
creation, and passed innumerable worlds in a moment. As I approached
the verge of nature, I perceived the shadows of total and boundless
vacuity deepen before me, a dreadful region of eternal silence, solitude,
and darkness! Unutterable horror seized me at the prospect, and this
exclamation burst from me with all the vehemence of desire: “O! that I
had been doomed for ever to the common receptacle of impenitence and
guilt! there society would have alleviated the torment of despair, and
the rage of fire could not have excluded the comfort of light. Or, if I
had been condemned to reside in a comet, that would return but once in
a thousand years to their regions of light and life; the hope of these
periods, however distant, would cheer men in the dread interval of cold
and darkness, and the vicissitude would divide eternity into time.” While
this thought passed over my mind, I lost sight of the remotest star, and
the last glimmering of light was quenched in utter darkness. The agonies
of despair every moment increased, as every moment augmented my distance
from the last habitable world. I reflected with intolerable anguish, that
when ten thousand thousand years had carried me beyond the reach of all
but that power who fills infinitude, I should still look forward into an
immense abyss of darkness, through which I should still drive without
succour and without society, farther and farther still, for ever and for
ever. I then stretched out my hand towards the regions of existence, with
an emotion that awaked me. Thus have I been taught to estimate society,
like every other blessing, by its loss. My heart is warmed to liberality;
and I am zealous to communicate the happiness which I feel, to those from
whom it is derived; for the society of one wretch, whom in the pride
of prosperity I would have spurned from my door, would, in the dreadful
solitude to which I was condemned, have been more highly prized than the
gold of Afric, or the gems of Golconda.

At this reflection upon his dream, Carazan became suddenly silent, and
looked upward in ecstacy of gratitude and devotion. The multitude were
struck at once with the precept and example; and the Caliph, to whom the
event was related, that he might be liberal beyond the power of gold,
commanded it to be recorded for the benefit of posterity.




THE STORY OF ALMAMOULIN.


In the reign of Jenghiz Khan, conqueror of the East, in the city of
Samarcand, lived Nouradin the merchant, renowned throughout all the
regions of India for the extent of his commerce, and the integrity of
his dealings. His warehouses were filled with all the commodities of
the remotest nations; every rarity of nature, every curiosity of art,
whatever was useful, hastened to his hand. The streets were crowded with
his carriages; the sea was covered with his ships; the streams of Oxus
were wearied with conveyance, and every breeze of the sky wafted wealth
to Nouradin.

At length Nouradin felt himself seized with a slow malady; he called to
him Almamoulin, his only son; and, dismissing his attendants, “My son,”
says he, “behold here the weakness and fragility of man; look backward
a few days, thy father was great and happy. Now, Almamoulin, look upon
me withering and prostrate; look upon me, and attend. My purpose was,
after ten months more spent in commerce, to have withdrawn my wealth to
a safer country; to have given seven years to delight and festivity, and
the remaining part of my days to solitude and repentence; but the hand of
death is upon me; I am now leaving the produce of my toil, which it must
be thy business to enjoy with wisdom.”—The thought of leaving his wealth,
filled Nouradin with such grief, that he fell into convulsions, became
delirious, and expired.

Almamoulin, who loved his father, was touched a while with honest
sorrow, and sat two hours in profound meditation, without perusing the
paper which he held in his hand. He then retired to his own chamber,
as overborn with affliction, and there read the inventory of his new
possessions, which swelled his heart with such transports, that he no
longer lamented his father’s death.

He was now sufficiently composed to order a funeral of modest
magnificence, suitable at once to the rank of Nouradin’s profession, and
the reputation of his wealth. The two next nights he spent in visiting
the tower and the caverns, and found the treasures greater to his eye
than to his imagination.

Almamoulin had been bred to the practice of exact frugality, and had
often looked with envy on the finery and expences of other young men: he
therefore believed, that happiness was now in his power, since he could
obtain all of which he had hitherto been accustomed to regret the want.

He immediately procured a splendid equipage, dressed his servants in rich
embroidery, and covered his horses with golden caparisons. He showered
down silver on the populace, and suffered their acclamations to swell him
with insolence. The nobles saw him with anger, the wise men of the state
combined against him, the leaders of armies threatened his destruction.
Almamoulin was informed of his danger: he put on the robe of mourning in
the presence of his enemies, and appeased them with gold, and gems, and
supplication.

He then sought to strengthen himself, by an alliance with the princes of
Tartary, and offered the price of kingdoms for a wife of noble birth. His
suit was generally rejected, and his presents refused; but a princess of
Astracan once condescended to admit him to her presence. She received him
sitting on a throne, attired in the robe of royalty, and shining with the
jewels of Golconda; command sparkled in her eyes, and dignity towered on
her forehead. Almamoulin approached and trembled. She saw his confusion,
and disdained him: How, says she, dares the wretch hope my obedience,
who thus shrinks at my glance? Retire, and enjoy thy riches in sordid
ostentation; thou wast born to be wealthy, but never canst be great.

He then contracted his desires to more private and domestic pleasures.
He built palaces, he laid out gardens, he changed the face of the land,
he transplanted forests, he levelled mountains, opened prospects into
distant regions, poured fountains from the tops of turrets, and rolled
rivers through new channels.

These amusements pleased him for a time; but languor and weariness soon
invaded him.

He therefore returned to Samarcand, and set open his doors to those whom
idleness sends out in search of pleasure. His tables were always covered
with delicacies; wines of every vintage sparkled in his bowels, and
his lamps scattered perfumes. The sound of the flute, and the voice of
the singer, chased away sadness; every hour was crowded with pleasure;
and the day ended and began with feasts and dances, and revelry and
merriment. Almamoulin cried out, “I have at last found the use of riches:
I am surrounded by companions, who view my greatness without envy; and I
enjoy at once the raptures of popularity, and the safety of an obscure
station.—What trouble can he feel, whom all are studious to please, that
they may be repaid with pleasure? What danger can he dread, to whom every
man is a friend?”

Such were the thoughts of Almamoulin, as he looked down from a gallery
upon the gay assembly, regaling at his expence; but in the midst of this
soliloquy, an officer of justice entered the house, and in the form of
legal citation, summoned Almamoulin to appear before the emperor. The
guests stood awhile aghast, then stole imperceptibly away, and he was
led off without a single voice to witness his integrity. He now found
one of his most frequent visitors accusing him of treason, in hopes of
sharing his confiscation; yet, unpatronized, and unsupported, he cleared
himself by the openness of innocence, and the consistence of truth; he
was dismissed with honour, and his accuser perished in prison.

Almamoulin now perceived with how little reason he had hoped for justice
or fidelity from those who live only to gratify their senses; and being
now weary with vain experiments upon life, and fruitless researches
after felicity, he had recourse to a sage, who, after spending his
youth in travel and observation, had retired from all human cares, to
a small habitation, on the banks of Oxus, where he conversed only with
such as solicited his counsel. “Brother,” said the philosopher, “thou
hast suffered thy reason to be deluded by idle hopes, and fallacious
appearances. Having long looked with desire upon riches, thou hast
taught thyself to think them more valuable than nature designed them,
and to expect from them what, as experience has now taught thee, they
cannot give. That they do not confer wisdom, thou mayest be convinced
by considering at how dear a price they tempted thee, upon thy first
entrance into the world, to purchase the empty sound of vulgar
acclamation. That they cannot bestow fortitude or magnanimity, that
man may be certain, who stood trembling at Astracan before a being not
naturally superior to himself. That they will not supply unexhausted
pleasure, the recollection of forsaken palaces, and neglected gardens,
will easily inform thee. That they rarely purchase friends, thou didst
soon discover, when thou wert left to stand thy trial uncountenanced and
alone. Yet think not riches useless; there are purposes to which a wise
man may be delighted to apply them: they may, by a rational distribution
to those who want them, ease the pains of helpless disease, still the
throbs of restless anxiety, relieve innocence from oppression, and raise
imbecility to chearfulness and vigour. This they will enable thee to
perform, and this will afford the only happiness ordained for our present
state, the confidence of divine favour, and the hope of future reward.”




THE STORY OF BOZALDAB.


Bozaldab, Calif of Egypt, had dwelt securely for many years in the silken
pavilions of pleasure, and had every morning anointed his head with
the oil of gladness, when his only son Aboram, for whom he had crowded
his treasuries with gold, extended his dominions with conquests, and
secured them with impregnable fortresses, was suddenly wounded, as he was
hunting, with an arrow from an unknown hand, and expired in the field.

Bozaldab, in the distraction of grief and despair, refused to return
to his palace, and retired to the gloomiest grotto in the neighbouring
mountain: he there rolled himself on the dust, tore away the hairs
of his hoary beard, and dashed the cup of consolation that Patience
offered him to the ground. He suffered not his minstrels to approach his
presence; but listened to the melancholy birds of midnight, that flit
through the solitary vaults and echoing chambers of the Pyramids. “Can
that God be benevolent,” he cried, “who thus wounds the soul, as from an
ambush, with unexpected sorrows, and crushes his creatures in a moment
with irremediable calamity? Ye lying Imans, prate to us no more of the
justness and the kindness of an all-directing and all-loving Providence!
He, whom ye pretend reigns in heaven, is so far from protecting the sons
of men, that he perpetually delights to blast the sweetest flowerets in
the garden of Hope; and like a malignant giant to beat down the strongest
towers of happiness with the iron mace of his anger. If this Being
possessed the goodness and the power with which flattering priests have
invested him, he would doubtless be inclined and enabled to banish those
evils which render the world a dungeon of distress, a vale of vanity and
woe.—I will continue in it no longer!”

At that moment he furiously raised his hand, which Despair had armed with
a dagger, to strike deep into his bosom; when suddenly thick flashes of
lightning shot through the cavern, and a being of more than human beauty
and magnitude, arrayed in azure robes, crowned with amaranth, and waving
a branch of palm in his right hand, arrested the arm of the trembling and
astonished Calif, and said with a majestic smile, “Follow me to the top
of this mountain.”

“Look from hence,” said the awful conductor; “I am Caloc, the Angel of
Peace; Look from hence into the valley.”

Bozaldab opened his eyes and beheld a barren, a sultry, and solitary
island, in the midst of which sat a pale, meagre, and ghastly figure:
it was a merchant just perishing with famine, and lamenting that he
could find neither wild berries, nor a single spring in this forlorn
and uninhabited desert; and begging the protection of heaven against
the tigers that would now certainly destroy him, since he had consumed
the last fuel he had collected to make nightly fires to affright them.
He then cast a casket of jewels on the sand, as trifles of no use; and
crept, feeble and trembling, to an eminence, where he was accustomed to
sit to watch the setting sun, and to give signal to any ship that might
haply approach the island.

“Inhabitant of heaven,” cried Bozaldab, “suffer not this wretch to perish
by the fury of wild beasts!”

“Peace,” said the angel, “and observe.”

He looked again, and behold a vessel arrived at the desolate isle. What
words can paint the rapture of the starving merchant, when the captain
offered to transport him to his native country, if he would reward
him with half the jewels of his casket? No sooner had this pityless
commander received the stipulated sum, than he held a consultation with
his crew, and they agreed to seize the remaining jewels, and leave the
unhappy exile in the same helpless and lamentable condition in which they
discovered him. He wept and trembled, intreated and implored in vain.




THE STORY OF BOZALDAB.

(CONCLUDED.)


“Will Heaven permit such injustice to be practised?” exclaimed Bozaldab.
“Look again,” said the angel, “and behold the very ship in which,
short-sighted as thou art, thou wishedst the merchant might embark,
dashed in pieces on a rock: dost thou not hear the cries of the sinking
sailors? Presume not to direct the Governor of the Universe in his
disposal of events. The man whom thou hast pitied shall be taken from
this dreary solitude, but not by the method thou wouldst prescribe. His
vice was avarice, by which he became not only abominable, but wretched;
he fancied some mighty charm in wealth, which, like the wand of Abdiel,
would gratify every wish and obviate every fear. This wealth he has now
been taught not only to despise but abhor: he cast his jewels upon the
sand, and confessed them to be useless; he offered part of them to the
mariners, and perceived them to be pernicious: he has now learnt, that
they are useful or vain, good or evil, only by the situation and temper
of the possessor. Happy is he whom distress has taught wisdom! But turn
thine eyes to another and more interesting scene.”

The Calif instantly beheld a magnificent palace, adorned with the statues
of his ancestors wrought in jasper; the ivory doors of which, turning
on hinges of the gold of Golconda, discovered a throne of diamonds,
surrounded with the Rajas of fifty nations, and with ambassadors in
various habits, and of different complexions; on which sat Aboram, the
much-lamented son of Bozaldab, and by his side a princess fairer than a
Houri.

“Gracious Alla!—it is my son,” cried the Calif—“O let me hold him to
my heart!” “Thou canst not grasp an unsubstantial vision,” replied the
angel: “I have now shewn thee what would have been the destiny of thy
son, had he continued longer on the earth.” “And why,” returned Bozaldab,
“was he not permitted to continue? Why was not I suffered to be a witness
of so much felicity and power?” “Consider the sequel,” replied he that
dwells in the fifth heaven. Bozaldab looked earnestly, and saw the
countenance of his son, on which he had been used to behold the placid
simplicity and the vivid blushes of health, now distorted with rage, and
now fixed in the insensibility of drunkenness: it was again animated with
disdain, it became pale with apprehension, and appeared to be withered by
intemperance; his hands were stained with blood, and he trembled by turns
with fury and terror. The palace so lately shining with oriental pomp,
changed suddenly into the cell of a dungeon, where his son lay stretched
out on the cold pavement, gagged and bound, with his eyes put out. Soon
after he perceived the favourite Sultana, who before was seated by his
side, enter with a bowl of poison, which she compelled Aboram to drink,
and afterwards married the successor to his throne.

“Happy,” said Caloc, “is he whom Providence has by the angel of death
snatched from guilt! from whom that power is withheld, which, if he had
possessed, would have accumulated upon himself yet greater misery than it
could bring upon others.”

“It is enough,” cried Bozaldab; “I adore the inscrutable schemes of
omniscience!—From what dreadful evil has my son been rescued by a
death, which I rashly bewailed as unfortunate and premature; a death
of innocence and peace, which has blessed his memory upon earth, and
transmitted his spirit to the skies!”

“Cast away the dagger,” replied the heavenly messenger, “which thou wast
preparing to plunge into thine own heart. Exchange complaint for silence,
and doubt for adoration. Can a mortal look down, without giddiness and
stupifaction, in the vast abyss of Eternal Wisdom? Can a mind that sees
not infinitely, perfectly comprehend any thing among an infinity of
objects mutually relative? Can the channels, which thou commandest to be
cut to receive the annual inundations of the Nile, contain the waters
of the ocean? Remember, that perfect happiness cannot be conferred on
a creature; for perfect happiness is an attribute as incommunicable as
perfect power and eternity.”

The Angel, while he was speaking thus, stretched out his pinions to fly
back to the Empyreum; and the flutter of his wings was like the rushing
of a cataract.




THE STORY OF OBIDAH.


Obidah, the son of Abensina, left the caravansera early in the morning,
and pursued his journey through the plains of Indostan. He was fresh and
vigourous with rest; he was animated with hope; he was incited by desire;
he walked swiftly forward over the vallies, and saw the hills gradually
rising before him. As he passed along, his ears were delighted with the
morning song of the bird of Paradise; he was fanned by the last flutters
of the sinking breeze, and sprinkled with dew by groves of spices: he
sometimes contemplated the towering height of the oak, monarch of the
hills; and sometimes caught the gentle fragrance of the primrose, eldest
daughter of the spring: all his senses were gratified, and all care was
banished from his heart.

Thus he went on till the sun approached his meridian, and the increasing
heat preyed upon his strength; he then looked round about him for some
more commodious path. He saw, on his right hand, a grove that seemed
to wave its shades as a sign of invitation; he entered it, and found
the coolness and verdure irresistibly pleasant. He did not however,
forget whither he was travelling, but found a narrow way, bordered with
flowers, which appeared to have the same direction with the main road,
and was pleased that, by this happy experiment, he had found means to
unite pleasure with business, and gain the rewards of diligence without
suffering its fatigues. He therefore still continued to walk for a time,
without the least remission of his ardour, except that he was sometimes
tempted to stop by the music of the birds, whom the heat had assembled
in the shade, and sometimes amused himself with plucking the flowers
that covered the banks on either side, or the fruits that hung upon
the branches. At last the green path began to decline from its first
tendency, and to wind among hills and thickets, cooled with fountains,
and murmuring with waterfalls. Here Obidah paused for a time, and began
to consider whether it were longer safe to forsake the known and common
track; but remembering that the heat was now in its greatest violence,
and that the plain was dusty and uneven, he resolved to pursue the new
path, which he supposed only to make a few meanders, in compliance with
the varieties of the ground, and to end at last in the common road.

Having thus calmed his solicitude, he renewed his pace, though he
suspected that he was not gaining ground. This uneasiness of his mind
inclined him to lay hold on every new object, and give way to every
sensation that might sooth and divert him. He listened to every echo,
he mounted every hill for a fresh prospect, he turned aside to every
cascade, and pleased himself with tracing the course of a gentle river
that rolled among the trees, and watered a large region with innumerable
circumvolutions. In these amusements the hours passed away unaccounted,
his deviations had perplexed his memory, and he knew not towards what
point to travel. He stood pensive and confused, afraid to go forward lest
he should go wrong, yet conscious that the time of loitering was now
past. While he was thus tortured with uncertainty, the sky was overspread
with clouds, the day vanished from before him, and a sudden tempest
gathered round his head. He was now roused by his danger to a quick and
painful remembrance of his folly; he now saw how happiness is lost when
ease is consulted; he lamented the unmanly impatience that prompted him
to seek shelter in the grove, and despised the petty curiosity that led
him on from trifle to trifle. While he was thus reflecting, the air grew
blacker, and a clap of thunder broke his meditation.

He now resolved to do what remained yet in his power, to tread back the
ground which he had passed, and try to find some issue where the wood
might open into the plain. He prostrated himself on the ground, and
commended his life to the Lord of Nature. He rose with confidence and
tranquillity, and pressed on with his sabre in hand, for the beasts of
the desart were in motion, and on every hand were mingled howls of rage
and fear, and savage expiration; all the horrors of darkness and solitude
surrounded him; the winds roared in the woods, and the torrents tumbled
from the hills.

    Work’d into sudden rage by wint’ry show’rs,
    Down the steep hill the roaring torrent pours;
    The mountain shepherd hears the distant noise.

Thus forlorn and distressed, he wandered through the wild, without
knowing whither he was going, or whether he was every moment drawing
nearer to safety or to destruction. At length not fear but labour began
to overcome him; his breath grew short, and his knees trembled, and he
was on the point of lying down in resignation to his fate, when he beheld
through the branches the glimmer of a taper. He advanced towards the
light, and finding that it proceeded from the cottage of a hermit, he
called humbly at the door, and obtained admission. The old man set before
him such provisions as he had collected for himself, on which Obidah fed
with eagerness and gratitude.

When the repast was over, “Tell me,” said the hermit, “by what chance
thou hast been brought hither; I have been now twenty years an inhabitant
of the wilderness, in which I never saw a man before.” Obidah then
related the occurrences of his journey, without any concealment or
palliation.

“Son,” said the hermit, “let the errors and follies, the dangers and
escapes, of this day, sink deep into thy heart. Remember, my son, that
human life is the journey of a day: we rise in the morning of youth,
full of vigour, and full of expectation; we set forward with spirit and
hope, with gaiety and with diligence, and travel on awhile in the strait
road of piety towards the mansions of rest. In a short time we remit our
fervour, and endeavour to find some mitigation of our duty, and some
more easy means of obtaining the same end. We then relax our vigour, and
resolve no longer to be terrified with crimes at a distance, but rely
upon our own constancy, and venture to approach what we resolve never
to touch. We thus enter the bowers of ease, and repose in the shades of
security. Here the heart softens, and vigilance subsides; we are then
willing to inquire whether another advance cannot be made, and whether we
may not at least turn our eyes upon the gardens of pleasure. We approach
them with scruple and hesitation; we enter them, but enter timorous and
trembling, and always hope to pass through them without losing the road
of virtue, which we, for awhile, keep in our sight, and to which we
propose to return. But temptation succeeds temptation, and one compliance
prepares us for another; we in time lose the happiness of innocence, and
solace our disquiet with sensual gratifications. By degrees we let fall
the remembrance of our original intention, and quit the only adequate
object of rational desire. We entangle ourselves in business, immerge
ourselves in luxury, and rove through the labyrinths of inconstancy, till
the darkness of old age begins to invade us, and disease and anxiety
obstruct our way. We then look back upon our lives with horror, with
sorrow, with repentance; and wish, but too often vainly wish, that we had
not forsaken the ways of virtue. Happy are they, my son, who shall learn
from thy example not to despair, but shall remember, that though the day
is past, and their strength is wasted, there yet remains one effort to
be made; that reformation is never hopeless, nor sincere endeavours ever
unassisted; that the wanderer may at length return after all his errors,
and that he who implores strength and courage from above, shall find
danger and difficulty give way before him. Go now, my son, to thy repose,
commit thyself to the care of Omnipotence, and when the morning calls
again to toil, begin anew thy journey and thy life.”




INGRATITUDE PUNISHED.


A Dervise, venerable by his age, fell ill in the house of a woman who
had been long a widow, and lived in extreme poverty in the suburbs of
Balsora. He was so touched with the care and zeal with which she had
assisted him, that at his departure he said to her, “I have remarked that
you have wherewith to subsist alone, but that you have not subsistence
enough to share it with your only son, the young Abdallah. If you will
trust him to my care, I will endeavour to acknowledge, in his person,
the obligations I have to you for your care of me.” The good woman
received this proposal with joy; and the Dervise departed with the young
man, advertising her, that they must perform a journey which would last
nearly two years. As they travelled he kept him in affluence, gave him
excellent instructions, cured him of a dangerous disease with which he
was attacked; in fine, he took the same care of him as if he had been his
own son. Abdallah a hundred times testified his gratitude to him for all
his bounties; but the old man always answered, “My son, it is by actions
that gratitude is proved; we shall see in a proper time and place,
whether you are so grateful as you pretend.”

One day, as they continued their travels, they found themselves in a
solitary place, and the Dervise said to Abdallah, “My son, we are now at
the end of our journey; I shall employ my prayers to obtain from Heaven,
that the earth may open and make an entrance wide enough to permit
thee to descend into a place where thou wilt find one of the greatest
treasures that the earth incloses into her bowels. Hast thou courage to
descend into this subterraneous vault?” continued he. Abdallah swore
to him, he might depend upon his obedience and zeal. Then the Dervise
lighted a small fire, into which he cast a perfume; he read and prayed
for some moments, after which the earth opened, and the Dervise said to
him—“Thou mayest now enter, my dear Abdallah, remember that it is in
thy power to do me a great service; and that this is, perhaps, the only
opportunity thou canst ever have of testifying to me that thou art not
ungrateful: Do not let thyself be dazzled by all the riches thou wilt
find there; think only of seizing upon an iron candlestick with twelve
branches, which thou wilt find close to a door; that is absolutely
necessary to me; come up immediately, and bring it to me.” Abdallah
promised every thing, and descended boldly into the vault. But forgetting
what had been expressly recommended to him, whilst he was filling his
vest and bosom with gold and jewels, which this subterraneous vault
inclosed in prodigious heaps, the opening by which he entered closed of
itself. He had, however, presence of mind enough to seize on the iron
candlestick, which the Dervise had so strongly recommended to him; and
though the situation he was in was very terrible, he did not abandon
himself to despair; and thinking only in what manner he should get out
of a place which might become his grave, he apprehended that the vault
had closed only because he had not followed the order of the Dervise;
he recalled to his memory the care and goodness he had loaded him with;
reproached himself with his ingratitude, and finished his meditation by
humbling himself before God. At length, after much pains and inquietude,
he was fortunate enough to find a narrow passage which led him out
of this obscure cave; though it was not till he had followed it a
considerable way, that he perceived a small opening covered with briars
and thorns, through which he returned to the light of the sun. He looked
on all sides, to see if he could perceive the Dervise, but in vain; he
designed to deliver him the iron candlestick he so much wished for, and
formed a design of quitting him, being rich enough with what he had taken
out of the cavern, to live in affluence without his assistance.

Not perceiving the Dervise, nor remembering any of the places through
which he had passed, he went on as fortune had directed him, and was
extremely astonished to find himself opposite to his mother’s house,
which he imagined he was at a great distance from him. She immediately
enquired after the holy Dervise. Abdallah told her frankly what had
happened to him, and the danger he had run to satisfy his unreasonable
desires; he afterwards shewed her the riches with which he was loaded.
His mother concluded, upon the sight of them, that the Dervise only
designed to make trial of his courage and obedience, and that they ought
to make use of the happiness which fortune had presented to them; adding,
that doubtless such was the intention of the holy Dervise. Whilst they
contemplated upon these treasures with avidity; whilst they were dazzled
with the lustre of them, and formed a thousand projects in consequence of
them, they all vanished away before their eyes. It was then that Abdallah
sincerely reproached himself for his ingratitude and disobedience; and,
perceiving that the iron candlestick had resisted the enchantment, or
rather the just punishment which those deserve who do not execute what
they promise, he said, prostrating himself, “What happened to me is just;
I have lost what I had no design to restore, and the candlestick which I
intended to deliver to the Dervise, remains with me: It is a proof that
it rightly belongs to him, and that the rest was unjustly acquired.” As
he finished these words, he placed the candlestick in the midst of their
little house.

When the night was come, without reflecting upon it, he placed the light
in the candlestick. Immediately they saw a Dervise appear, who turned
round for an hour, and disappeared, after having thrown them an asper.
The candlestick had twelve branches. Abdallah, who was meditating all
the day upon what he had seen the night before, was willing to know what
would happen the next night, if he put a light in each of them; he did
so, and twelve Dervises appeared that instant; they turned round also for
an hour, and each threw an asper as they disappeared. He repeated every
day the same ceremony, which had always the same success; but he could
never make it succeed more than once in twenty-four hours. This trifling
sum was enough to make his mother and himself subsist tolerably: there
was a time when they would have desired no more to be happy; but it was
not considerable enough to change their fortune: it is always dangerous
for the imagination to be fixed upon the idea of riches. The sight of
what he believed he should possess; the projects he had formed for the
employment of it; all these things had left such profound traces in the
mind of Abdallah, that nothing could efface them. Therefore, seeing the
small advantage he drew from the candlestick, he resolved to carry it
back to the Dervise, in hopes that he might obtain of him the treasure
he had seen, or at least find again the riches which had vanished from
their sight, by restoring to him a thing for which he testified so
earnest a desire. He was so fortunate as to remember his name, and that
of the city where he inhabited. He departed, therefore, immediately for
Magrebi, carrying with him his candlestick, which he lighted every night,
and by that means furnished himself with what was necessary on the road,
without being obliged to implore the assistance and compassion of the
faithful. When he arrived at Magrebi, his first care was to enquire in
what house, or in what convent, Abounadar lodged; he was so well known
that every body told him his habitation. He repaired thither directly,
and found fifty porters who kept the gate of his house, having each a
staff with a head of gold in their hands: the court of this palace was
filled with slaves and domestics; in fine, the residence of a prince
could not expose to view greater magnificence. Abdallah, struck with
astonishment and admiration, feared to proceed. Certainly, thought he,
I either explained myself wrong, or those to whom I addressed myself
designed to make a jest of me, because I was a stranger: this is not
the habitation of a Dervise, it is that of a king. He was in this
embarrassment when a man approached him, and said to him, “Abdallah,
thou art welcome; my master, Abounadar, has long expected thee.” He
then conducted him to an agreeable and magnificent pavilion, where the
Dervise was seated. Abdallah, struck with the riches which he beheld
on all sides, would have prostrated himself at his feet, but Abounadar
prevented him, and interrupted him when he would have made a merit of
the candlestick, which he presented to him. “Thou art but an ungrateful
wretch,” said he to him: “Dost thou imagine that thou canst impose upon
me? I am not ignorant of any one of thy thoughts; and if thou hadst known
the value of this candlestick, thou would never have brought it to me: I
will make thee sensible of its true use.” Immediately he placed a light
in each of its branches; and when the twelve Dervises had turned round
for some time, Abounadar gave each of them a blow with a cane, and in
a moment they were converted into twelve sequins, diamonds, and other
precious stones. “This,” said he, “is the proper use to be made of this
marvellous candlestick. As to me, I never desired it, but to place it
in my cabinet, as a talisman composed by a sage whom I revere, and am
pleased to expose sometimes to those who come to visit me: and to prove
to thee,” added he, “that curiosity was the only occasion of my search
for it; here are keys of my magazines, open them, and thou shalt judge
of my riches: thou shalt tell me whether the most insatiable miser would
not be satisfied with them.” Abdallah obeyed him, and examined twelve
magazines of great extent, so full of all manner of riches, that he could
not distinguish what merited his admiration most; they all deserved it,
and produced new desires. The regret of having restored the candlestick,
and that of not having found out the use of it, pierced the heart of
Abdallah. Abounadar seemed not to perceive it; on the contrary, he loaded
him with caresses, kept him some days in the house, and commanded him to
be treated as himself. When he was at the eve of the day which he had
fixed for his departure, he said to him, “Abdallah, my son, I believe
by what has happened to thee, thou art corrected of the frightful vice
of ingratitude; however, I owe thee a mark of my affection, for having
undertaken so long a journey, with a view of bringing me the thing I had
desired: thou may’st depart, I shall detain thee no longer. Thou shalt
find to-morrow, at the gate of my palace, one of my horses to carry thee;
I make thee a present of it, as well as of a slave, who shall conduct
thee to thy house; and two camels loaded with gold and jewels, which thou
shalt choose thyself out of my treasures.” Abdallah said to him all that
a heart sensible to avarice could express when its passion was satisfied,
and went to lie down till the morning arrived, which was fixed for his
departure.

During the night he was still agitated, without being able to think of
any thing but the candlestick and what it produced. “I had it,” said he,
“so long in my power; Abounadar, without me, had never been the possessor
of it: what risks did I not run in the subterraneous vault? Why does he
now possess this treasure of treasures? Because I had the probity, or
rather the folly, to bring it back to him; he profits by my labour, and
the danger I have incurred in so long a journey. And what does he give
me in return? Two camels loaded with gold and jewels; in one moment the
candlestick will furnish him with ten times as much. It is Abounadar who
is ungrateful: what wrong shall I do him in taking this candlestick?
None, certainly, for he is rich: and what do I possess?” These ideas
determined him, at length, to make all possible attempts to seize upon
the candlestick. The thing was not difficult, Abounadar having trusted
him with the keys of the magazines. He knew where the candlestick was
placed; he seized upon it, hid it in the bottom of one of the sacks,
which he filled with pieces of gold and other riches which he was allowed
to take, and loaded it, as well as the rest, upon his camels. He had no
other eagerness now than for his departure; and after having hastily bid
adieu to the generous Abounadar, he delivered him his keys, and departed
with his horse, and slave, and two camels.

When he was some days journey from Balsora, he sold his slave, resolving
not to have a witness of his former poverty, nor of the source of his
present riches. He bought another, and arrived without any obstacle at
his mother’s, whom he would scarcely look upon, so much was he taken up
with his treasure. His first care was to place the loads of his camels,
and the candlestick, in the most private part of the house; and, in his
impatience to feed his eyes, with his great opulence, he placed lights
immediately in the candlestick: the twelve Dervises appearing, he gave
each of them a blow with a cane with all his strength, lest he should
be failing in the laws of the talisman: but he had not remarked, that
Abounadar, when he struck them, had the cane in his left hand. Abdallah,
by a natural motion, made use of his right; and the Dervises, instead
of becoming heaps of riches, immediately drew from beneath their robes
each a formidable club, with which they struck him almost dead, and
disappeared, carrying with them all his treasures, the camels, the horse,
the slave, and the candlestick.

Thus was Abdallah punished by poverty, and almost by death, for his
unreasonable ambition, which perhaps might have been pardonable, if it
had not been accompanied by an ingratitude as wicked as it was audacious,
since he had not so much as the resource of being able to conceal his
perfidies from the too piercing eyes of his benefactor.

FINIS.

Harrild, Printer, Eastcheap.