One Thousand and One Nights

by Richard Burton

  “Consider,” said he, “that your Medjeddin has most probably found a night’s lodging, and slept better than you. Supposing him, therefore, to be at any probable distance, even if he had set out on his way at daybreak, he could hardly be here now: if you send these messengers after him, he may perhaps come home by a shorter path, while they will be searching for him in vain; wait at least till mid-day.”

  El Kattab yielded; he appointed the messengers to be ready at noon, and in the meanwhile walked through the gardens and in the country around the city, where they had been on the preceding day. His friend accompanied him, although he pointed out that Medjeddin might, in the interval, have reached home while they were walking, and that El Kattab was thus perhaps giving himself more trouble than was necessary.

  “I have yielded to you in the rest,” replied El Kattab; “let me at least in this instance have my own will, and walk here.”

  They went together to the fountain in the rock near the palms; they climbed the neighbouring heights; they called the name of the lost one in all directions; but no sound was heard in reply. At noon they went home, and asked all they met if they had seen a young man, whom they accurately described. Nobody could give them any information about him. El Kattab now sent out his messengers in all directions; promising a rich reward to the one who should lead his lost son back to his arms. The messengers returned on the tenth day, and reported that all their researches had been without success. At this the parent’s grief knew no bounds. His friend Salek remained almost constantly with him, comforting him; and all his friends held a consultation on the possible means of gaining tidings of Medjeddin. They agreed that he could not have been killed, for then his corpse would have been found: that he had no cause to conceal himself: that he could not have been attacked by enemies, as he had none: might he, they suggested, in the pursuit of the bird, have been led to the brink of the river, and have thrown himself in, and been carried away by the stream? scarcely had this idea presented itself, ere two messengers were despatched to each side of the river to search, from its junction with the Euphrates above Balsora to the spot where it flows into the Arabian Sea, and ascertain if the corpse of Medjeddin had been washed ashore. But these messengers also returned to the anxious parent, without having found what they sought. The parent and his friend now gave up Medjeddin for lost; El Kattab’s spirit was broken; grief for his lost son shortened his life; he soon became old: all joy fled from his mind; and his sorrow was only a little alleviated when his faithful friend Salek sat by him in the evening, talking with him of his son, relating the virtues by which he had been distinguished, and telling him how it had been his darling wish that this excellent young man should marry his daughter Maryam.

  A few days afterwards the caliph Haroun al Raschid went, as he was accustomed, in disguise, with his grand vizier Giafar, and Mesrur his chamberlain, through the streets of Bagdad, to see with his own eyes and to hear with his own ears how justice and order were maintained by his servants, and whether his people were happy and prosperous. He had, as usual, chosen the last hour of the evening for this walk, because he thought that at this time he could look deeper into the joys and pleasures of his subjects, as they had then ended their daily toils, and were seeking comfort and repose in the bosoms of their families. In the course of his progress he came to a street remarkable for its peculiar quiet. As he approached a house, before the door of which two men were standing whispering, Haroun al Raschid addressed them with these words: “Why do you whisper, as if you were concerting a crime? is not this street lonely enough, that you cannot hold your discourse aloud? Can you tell me why this street is so quiet, as though every inhabitant were dead?”

  “I can easily tell you, my lord,” answered one of the whisperers; “here, in the next house, lives the unfortunate El Kattab; and, as usual at this hour, his friend Salek is sitting with him to console him. Now all the inhabitants of this street respect this man, and wish not to remind him, by any outburst of joy, that happier men than himself live in his neighbourhood.”

  Before the caliph could answer him, the man turned away, and entered the house, and the other followed him.

  “Have you ever heard of this unfortunate El Kattab before?” asked Haroun al Raschid of his grand vizier; and as he answered in the negative, the caliph proceeded, “Let us make an inspection of the house where this El Kattab dwells; perhaps we may discover the cause of his sorrow.”

  They drew near, and saw the light from the inner court shining through a crevice. The caliph applied his eye to the aperture, and after he had watched for some time, beckoned his followers to him, and said, “Two grey-headed men are sitting in this court by the light of a lamp, and one seems to be comforting the other; but this latter continues to weep all the more bitterly, the more his companion endeavours to console him: both appear to be of the same rank. I am desirous of knowing what sorrow oppresses the unfortunate El Kattab: order him to appear at my palace early to-morrow morning; perhaps it may be in my power to lighten his calamity.”

  The next day the grand vizier executed his commission. El Kattab was alarmed when he heard that his presence was required at the palace. He was led into the great hall where the divan usually assembled; but there the attendants left him quite alone. He reviewed the whole of his past life, to see if he had sinned in any way, so as to bring on him the displeasure of the caliph; for he knew that Haroun al Raschid often, in a mysterious manner, discovered the faults of his subjects, and punished them accordingly. But he could not call to mind any deed of which he felt ashamed, nor any that deserved punishment. Whilst he was thus meditating, a curtain was drawn back, and the caliph entered, followed by his vizier and his chamberlain. El Kattab rose from the ground, and bowed his head down to the carpet on which the caliph stood.

  “El Kattab,” said the caliph, “a heavy weight of grief seems to oppress you; and by the anxiety which your neighbours manifest to show respect for your sorrow, I must consider you as a man of worth: I wish then to know the cause of your despondency; have you any objection to inform me of it before these two witnesses, or would you rather confide to me alone the reason of your tears?”

  “Ruler of the faithful,” answered El Kattab, “sorrow is great and deep in my soul; but still the cause of it is unworthy to distract for a moment the attention of the caliph from the cares of his kingdom.”

  The caliph replied, “That which fills the heart of the meanest of my subjects with such grief that it consumes his life, is not unworthy of my care. If I am careful for my whole kingdom, this care none the less extends to each individual; and, if I am careful for one, this one is a member of the whole, and thus my care is not lost. But speak, what is the cause of your affliction?”

  El Kattab then recounted the mysterious disappearance of his son; how he had sought for him every where, and how all his messengers had returned home without the least trace of him. “I must therefore weep for him as one that is dead,” — thus he ended his relation; “and in tears perhaps my sorrow might expend itself, if at the same time a spark of hope did not live in my heart, that possibly he is still alive: but ah! where? This spark of hope keeps the wound in the father’s heart always open.”

  “You have, indeed, real cause for grief,” answered the caliph, “and I comprehend that the uncertainty of your son’s fate must be as terrible to bear, as would be the mournful certainty of his death. You did wrong in not applying to me before; my power extends not only over believers, but also into foreign lands: other kings and rulers I have as my servants, whose eyes see for me, whose ears hear for me, and whose hands perform what is necessary in order to do my pleasure. That which was not possible to yourself, your friends, and your servants to accomplish, may perhaps prove easy for me. Now go home, and believe that you shall obtain news of your son, if he live on the earth, in any land where my power can reach.”

  With these words he dismissed him, after he had first inquired the marks by which his lost son might be recognised.

  W
hen El Kattab was sitting again with his friend Salek in the evening, he related to him the gracious and comforting words of the caliph. Salek perceived that hope was revived in his friend’s heart, and that he confidently trusted to find his son. He thought it his duty, therefore, to damp somewhat this hope, and said, “Beloved friend, I have once heard a speech, which sunk deeply in my memory: it is, ‘Trust not in princes; they are but men.’ In truth, the mightiest on earth are subject to destiny. If the caliph have influence in distant lands, it must still be within a comparatively confined and narrow limit; whilst what is in the farthest regions of the earth, as well as what is but a span distant, are all equally under the control of all-governing fate, even from the meanest slave to the ruler of the faithful.”

  Haroun al Raschid meanwhile resolved to do all he could to fulfil the hope he had raised in El Kattab’s heart. He gave a commission to all his servants in the kingdom, high and low, and to his ambassadors in the neighbouring kingdoms, and even sent into distant lands, with the princes of which he was on terms of friendship, at the same time despatching messengers with the charge to search for Medjeddin with all diligence, giving them a description by which they might recognise him if they found him. But week after week, and month after month passed away; even a whole year elapsed, without any intelligence being received either of the life or death of the lost one. So that all hope of finding him deserted the father for ever.

  Medjeddin, meantime, had not perished — none of the accidents suggested by his father’s advisers had befallen him; he still lived, but in such complete concealment that it was impossible for any one to discover him. He had followed the snow-white bird till evening, without clearly knowing why: he was induced to think he could catch the curious creature, particularly as it flew at such a moderate height from the ground, and at the same time so slowly. The tardiness of its flight made him conjecture that it must have hurt one of its wings; several times he succeeded in getting quite close to it, but just as he stretched out his hand to seize it, the bird again raised its wings, and flew a little in advance. Medjeddin now felt himself tired, and would have given up the pursuit, but the bird also seemed fatigued; he approached it, but again the bird flew a little farther off. In this chase he climbed a hill, and soon after found himself in a narrow meadow-valley, down which he ran; twilight came, but the snow-white colour of the bird still lighted him on. At last the pursued bird perched in a thicket; he hastened to it, but when he closed his hand to seize his prisoner, it flew away, leaving only one of its tail-feathers tightly grasped in his hand: still he saw it through the twilight flying before him, and still he hastened after it. The bird seemed now to quicken its pace; but as he had so nearly caught it once, he continued the pursuit with more eagerness; he ran through the high grass, with his strained sight fixed on this glimmering white object, he saw nothing else. Thus he came unexpectedly on a small but deep pool of water, which lay across his path; he jumped in, swam across, and tried to climb the other side, but it was so steep that he fell in with some of the crumbling earth: the water closed over his head, and he lost all consciousness. When he came to himself, he found himself lying on the turf, and a tall, grey-headed man of strange appearance by him, clothed in a long black robe reaching to his ancles, and fastened by a glittering girdle of a fiery colour. Instead of a turban, he wore a high pointed cap on his head, with a tassel of the same hue as the girdle.

  “Has your life returned to you?” he asked: “you deserved to be suffocated in the mud. Come, we must go farther before daylight quite leaves us.”

  With these words the stranger raised him from the ground, passed his left arm round his body, and flew with him through the air with the speed of an arrow. Medjeddin again soon lost recollection, and did not know how long he remained in this condition. He awoke at last as from a deep sleep; and looking around, the first thing he observed was a cage of gold wire, hanging from the ceiling by a long golden chain, and within was the snow-white bird he had so long followed. He found himself alone with this bird in a hall, the roof of which was supported on pillars of white marble, and the walls were built of smooth pale-green stones. The openings which served as windows were protected by lattices so skilfully contrived with winding tracery, that even the white bird could have found no space to pass through, even if it had escaped from the cage. Beside one wall stood a crystal urn; and from this fell a stream of clear water, which passing over the curved brim of the urn, was received in a white basin beneath, from which it disappeared unseen. Whilst he was observing this, and wondering what had happened to him, and how he came there, suddenly the old man in the black robe entered from behind a curtain. He carried a small golden box in his hand, and approached him with these words: “You have now caught the white bird, and have it safe in a cage; in this box is food for it, and there is water; take diligent care of it, and mind that it does not escape.”

  As he said this he disappeared. Medjeddin now arose and walked round the hall: he looked through the windows, and ascertained that he must be in a foreign land, as the forms of the mountains and trees were quite different from any he had before seen. The hall seemed to be high in the air, as if it were the upper story of a lofty tower. No other edifice was to be seen, and from the windows he could not distinguish what shrubs and plants bloomed beneath. He drew the curtain aside, and discovered a doorway; but there was a thick metal door which he could not open. He was now very much embarrassed, for he began to feel hungry, and could find nothing that would serve him for food. He examined the walls to see if he could discover any concealed outlet; he tried to open the lattices, that he might put his head out, and see if there were any body beneath, to whom he might cry out. There was no door; he could not open the lattices; and as far as he could strain his sight in every direction, he could see nobody: he threw himself in despair on the pillow, wrung his hands, and wept, and cried: “I am then imprisoned — imprisoned in a dungeon where splendour and riches are lavished around! Of what avail is it that these walls are built of precious stones? that this lattice is of fine gold, that this cage is of gold, and hangs on a golden chain? I am as much a prisoner behind golden lattices as I should be behind a grating of iron.” Then he rose and shouted through the lattices, in hopes that his voice might be heard, and aid brought; but nobody appeared, and no one answered him. When he again threw himself weeping on his couch, after these useless efforts, he observed that the white bird fluttered restlessly in its prison, and pecked at the golden dish for its food, without finding any.

  “Poor brother in misfortune,” said Medjeddin, “you shall not suffer want; I will take care of you; come, I will bring you what you want.”

  He took the pans from the cage, filling one with water from the urn, and the other with grain from the gold box which the old man had given him. Scarcely had he hung the last on the cage, when, on turning round, he saw a table behind him covered with costly viands. He was astonished, and could not understand how this had happened; still it was not long before he attacked the meats with the zest of a young man who had fasted nearly all day. Although these viands were altogether different from those he had been accustomed to taste in his father’s house, they all appeared excellent. He ate till he was fully satisfied, and then took from the table a golden cup, and quenched his thirst with pure water from the urn. After this he threw himself on a couch and fell asleep. When he awoke he felt strong and well. He arose and began to make another tour of the hall, and he then observed that the table with the meats had disappeared. This was a disappointment, as he had thought to make a good supper of the remainder. He did not allow this, however, to trouble him much, as he now felt pretty sure that he was not to die of hunger. He next proceeded to scrutinise his prison more closely: he examined all anew, pillars, walls, and floor; but could no where find a crevice or a fissure: all was fast and whole. His view from the windows did not allow him to make any further discovery; he only saw that he was very far above the earth, and in a spacious valley; mountains were to be seen in t
he distance, with curiously-pointed summits. As soon as he had completed this examination, and found there was nothing to occupy him, he turned his attention to the white bird in the cage. Here was still life; and if the cage was narrow, yet the prisoner could hop about on the different perches. Soon it remained still and gazed at him with its bright eyes, which seemed as if sense and speech lay in them, the interpretation only was wanting.

  Night put an end to these reflections. Next morning he observed that the bird again wanted food. He filled its seed-pan with grain from his golden box, and gave it fresh water from the urn. Scarcely had he done this, when the table covered with meats again stood in the same place as the day before. This day passed like the former, and the following in the same manner; Medjeddin wept and mourned, took care of the little bird, fed it, and was every time rewarded in the same manner with the table covered with dishes as soon as he had filled the bird’s seed-pan. He could not perceive who brought the table, nor how it disappeared. It always came whilst he stood beside the cage with his back turned, and without any noise. On the ninth day the old man suddenly appeared to him, and said, “To-day is a day of rest for you; you have performed your duty during the preceding days in giving the bird its food, you may now amuse yourself in the garden till evening.” He led him through a door into a narrow passage, at the end of which they descended twenty steps; he then opened a small metal trap-door, and then Medjeddin descended twenty steps more: they next came to a similar door, and descended twenty more steps to a third, and so on, till, after passing the ninth door, they found themselves in the open air.

  “Remain here till you are called,” said the old man, who went back into the building through the same doors, which he shut after him. Medjeddin was very curious to examine more closely the building in which he had been imprisoned: he therefore went round it, and narrowly observed it. It was a tower of nine stories, each about fifteen feet in height. The tower was nine-sided, with a window in the third side of each story, so arranged that no window was directly over another, and that consequently only three altogether appeared in each side of the tower from bottom to top. This distribution of regularity and order reigned throughout the whole building. The walls were made of large pieces of gold, quite as smooth as glass; and these were so skilfully put together that, even when closely looked at, the joints could not be discovered. The lattices of the windows were all of gold, like those in the upper hall, and the lower doors through which he had passed were of a yellow metal, inclining to green. All these considerations were not calculated to lessen his conviction that no man could possibly find him out in such a prison. Suddenly a new hope awoke in him: “I am no longer shut up in the tower,” said he to himself; “here I am in the open air, in a garden: I can clamber and jump like a monkey; I may possibly find some outlet from this garden, by which I can escape.” He immediately turned from the tower, and hastened through the gardens, seeking freedom; but he soon discovered that this hope was vain. He found the gardens surrounded on all sides by a lofty wall, constructed of the same materials, and quite as glassy, as the tower. After making the whole circuit of the garden, he at length found a gate, consisting of a grating of strong iron bars, polished to the highest degree of smoothness, and so close together, that he could scarcely pass his arm through. He tried to climb it by holding by the upper bars with his hands; but his feet slipped on the smooth iron, and he hurt his knee so much, that he lost his hold and fell backwards on the earth. He next examined the grating closely to see if there were no means of escape; but all was in vain: every where the bars were high, thick, and like polished glass. Sorrowfully he wandered round the garden; the sun’s rays darting down scorched up the grass, and he sought some shade where he might screen himself from their influence. He lay down on a mossy bank, and meditated anew on his fate. Besides his own grief at his imprisonment, the thought of his father’s sorrow at his loss pained him. The exhaustion consequent on tears and loud lamentations, joined with the noontide heat, at last caused him to fall into a deep sleep. When he awoke, the table covered with meats was again before him; he ate, and wandered again mournfully through the garden, meditating whether he could not make a ladder from the trees around him, to aid him in his escape over the grating. But there was something wanting for this work; he had not even a dagger or a knife. As he thus thought, the old man appeared, and said, “Evening is drawing on; follow me in.” He led him again to the upper room of the tower, and locked the metal door upon him.