Part 107

Then the magician related to the sultan of the Indies how she pretended to be sick, prince Ahmed compassionating her, had her carried into a subterraneous abode, and presented and recommended her himself to a fairy of incomparable beauty, desiring her by her care to restore her health. Then she told him with how much condescension the fairy presently ordered two fairies that attended her, to take care of her, and not to leave her till she was recovered; which great condescension, said she, could proceed from no other person but from a wife to a husband. Afterwards the old sorceress failed not to exaggerate on her surprise at the front of the palace, which she said had not its fellow in the world, while the two fairies held her by each arm, like a sick person, as she feigned to be, that could not walk or support herself. She gave a particular account of the care they took of her, after they had led her into another apartment; of the potion they made her drink, and of the quickness of her cure, which she pretended as well as her sickness, though she doubted not the virtue of the draught; the majesty of the fairy seated on a throne, brilliant with jewels, the value of which exceeded all the riches of the kingdom of the Indies, and all the other riches, beyond computation, contained in that vast palace.

Here the magician, finishing the relation of the success of her commission, and continuing her discourse, said, What does your majesty think of these unheard-of riches of the fairy? Perhaps you will say, you are struck with admiration, and rejoice at the good fortune of prince Ahmed your son, who enjoys them in common with the fairy. For my part, sir, I beg of your majesty to forgive me, if I take the liberty to remonstrate to you, that I think otherwise, and that I shudder when I consider the misfortunes which may happen to you from it. And this is the cause of the melancholy which I could not so well dissemble, but that you soon perceived it. I would believe that prince Ahmed, by his own good disposition, is incapable of undertaking any thing against your majesty; but who can answer that the fairy, by her attractions and caresses, and the influence she has already over him, may not inspire him with a dangerous design of dethroning your majesty, and seizing the crown of the Indies? This is what your majesty ought to consider as a serious affair of the utmost importance.

Though the sultan of the Indies was very well persuaded that prince Ahmed’s natural disposition was good, yet he could not help being moved at the discourse of the old sorceress, and said, I thank you for the pains you have taken, and your wholesome caution. I am so sensible of the great importance it is to me, that I shall take advice upon it.

He was consulting with his favourites, when he was told of the magician’s arrival. He ordered her to follow him to them. He acquainted them with what he had learnt, and communicated to them also the reason he had to fear the fairy’s influence over the prince, and asked them what measures they thought most proper to be taken to prevent so great a misfortune. One of the favourites, taking upon himself to speak for the rest, said, Your majesty knows who must be the author of this mischief. In order to prevent it, now he is in your court, and in your power, you ought not to hesitate to put him under arrest; I will not say, take away his life, for that would make too much noise; but make him a close prisoner while he lives. This advice all the other favourites unanimously applauded.

The magician, who thought it too violent, asked the sultan leave to speak, which being granted, she said, Sir, I am persuaded the zeal of your counsellors for your majesty’s interest makes them propose arresting prince Ahmed: but they will not take it amiss if I offer to your and their consideration, that if you arrest the prince you must also detain his retinue. But they are all genies. Do they think it will be so easy to surprise, seize, and secure their persons? Will they not disappear, by the property they possess of rendering themselves invisible, and transport themselves instantly to the fairy, and give her an account of the insult offered her husband? And can it be supposed she will let it go unrevenged? But would it not be better, if by any other means, which might not make so great a noise, the sultan could secure himself against any ill designs prince Ahmed may have against him, and not involve his majesty’s honour, or any body suspect him of any ill design? If his majesty has any confidence in my advice, as genies and fairies can do things impracticable to men, he will pique prince Ahmed’s honour, and engage him by means of the fairy to procure certain advantages, under pretence of deriving a great return, --for which he will be obliged to him. For example, every time your majesty takes the field, you are obliged to be at a great expense, not only in pavilions and tents for yourself and army, but likewise in mules and camels, and other beasts of burden, to carry their baggage. Might not you engage him to use his interest with the fairy, to procure you a tent which might be carried in a man’s hand, and which should be so large as to shelter your whole army.

I need say no more to your majesty. If the prince brings such a tent, you may make a great many other demands of the same nature, so that at last he may sink under the difficulties and the impossibility of executing them, however fertile in means and inventions the fairy, who has enticed him from you by her enchantments, may be; so that in time he will be ashamed to appear, and will be forced to pass the rest of his life with his fairy, excluded from any commerce with this world; and then your majesty will have nothing to fear from him, and cannot be reproached with so detestable an action as the shedding of a son’s blood, or confining him in a prison for life.

When the magician had finished her speech, the sultan asked his favourites if they had any thing better to propose; and finding them all silent, determined to follow the magician’s advice, as the most reasonable and most agreeable to his mild manner of government.

The next day, when the prince came into his father’s presence, who was talking with his favourites, and had sat down by him, after a conversation on different subjects, the sultan addressing himself to prince Ahmed, said, Son, when you came and dispelled those clouds of melancholy which your long absence had brought upon me, you made the place you had chosen for your retreat a mystery to me. I was satisfied with seeing you again, and knowing that you was content with your condition, and wished not to penetrate into your secret, which I found you did not care I should. I know not what reason you had thus to treat a father, who ever did and still continues to express what interest he takes in your happiness. I know your good fortune. I rejoice with you, and very much approve of your conduct in marrying a fairy so worthy of your love, and so rich and powerful, as I am informed. Powerful as I am, it was not possible for me to have procured so great a match for you. Now you are raised to so high a rank, as to be envied by every body, but a father like me, I not only desire you to preserve the good understanding we have lived in hitherto, but that you will use all your credit with your fairy to obtain for me her assistance, when I may want it. I therefore will make a trial of your interest this day.

You are not insensible at what a great expense, not to say trouble to my generals, officers, and myself, every time I take the field, they provide tents and pavilions, and mules and camels, and other beasts of burden, to carry them. If you consider the pleasure you would do me, I am persuaded you could easily procure from her a pavilion that might be carried in a man’s hand, and which would extend over my whole army; especially when you let her know it is for me. Though it may be a difficult thing, she will not refuse you. All the world, knows fairies are capable of doing most extraordinary things.

Prince Ahmed never expected that the sultan his father would have asked such a thing, which at first sight appeared to him so difficult, not to say impossible. Though he knew not absolutely how great the power of genies and fairies was, he doubted whether it extended so far as to furnish such a tent as his father desired. Moreover he had never asked any thing like it of the fairy Pari Banou, but was satisfied with the continual proofs she had given him of her passion, that he forgot nothing to persuade her that his heart perfectly corresponded without any views of interest, beyond maintaining himself in her good graces; therefore he was in the greatest embarrassment what answer to make. At last, he replied, If, sir, I have concealed from your majesty what happened to me, and what course I took after the finding my arrow, the reason was, that I thought it was of no great importance to you to be informed of them; and though I know not how this mystery has been revealed to you, I cannot deny but your information is very just. I have married the fairy you speak of. I love her, and am persuaded she loves me. But I can say nothing as to the influence your majesty believes I have over her. It is what I have not yet made an experiment of, nor thought of, and should be very glad you would dispense with my undertaking it, and let me enjoy the happiness of loving and being beloved, with all the disinterestedness I proposed to myself. But the demand of a father is a command upon every child, who, like me, thinks it his duty to obey him in every thing. And though it is with the greatest reluctance imaginable, I will not fail to ask my wife the favour your majesty desires, but will not promise you to obtain it; and if I should not have the honour to come again to pay you my respects, that shall be the sign that I have not had success: but beforehand, I desire you to forgive me, and consider that you yourself have reduced me to this extremity.

Son, replied the sultan of the Indies, I should be very sorry that what I ask of you should give you reason to cause me the grief of never seeing you more. I find you do not know the power a husband has over a wife; and yours would show that her love to you was very indifferent, if she, with the power she has as a fairy, should refuse you so trifling a request as this I desire you to ask of her for my sake. Lay aside your fears, which proceed from your believing yourself not to be loved so well as you love her. Go; only ask her. You will find the fairy loves you better than you imagine; and remember, that people, for want of asking, often lose great advantages. Think with yourself, that as you love her, you could refuse her nothing; therefore, if she loves you, she will not deny your requests.

All this discourse of the sultan of the Indies could not persuade prince Ahmed, who would rather he would have asked any thing else, than to expose him to the hazard of displeasing his dear Pari Banou; and so great was his vexation, that he left the court two days sooner than he used to do.

When he returned, the fairy, to whom he always before appeared with a gay countenance, asked him the cause of the alteration she perceived in his looks; and finding, that instead of answering her, he inquired after her health, to avoid satisfying her, she said to him, I will answer your question when you have answered mine. The prince declined it a long time, protesting that nothing was the matter with him; but the more he denied it, the more she pressed him, and said to him, I cannot bear to see you in this condition: tell me what makes you so uneasy, that I may remove the cause of it, whatever it may be; for it must be very extraordinary if it is out of my power, unless it be the death of the sultan your father; in that case, time, with all that I will contribute on my part, will comfort you.

Prince Ahmed could not long withstand the pressing instances of the fairy. Madam, said he, God prolong the sultan my father’s life, and bless him to the end of his days. I left him alive, and in perfect health; therefore that is not the cause of the melancholy you perceive in me. The sultan is the occasion of it, and I am the more concerned, because he has imposed upon me the disagreeable necessity of importuning you. First, you know the care I have taken, with your approbation, to conceal from him the happiness I have to see you, to love you, to deserve your favour and love, and to have received the pledge of your faith, after having pledged my faith with you. How he has been informed of it I cannot tell.

Here the fairy Pari Banou interrupted prince Ahmed, and said, But I know. Remember what I told you of the woman who made you believe she was sick, on whom you took so much compassion. It is she who has acquainted the sultan your father with what you have taken so much care to hide from him. I told you she was no more sick than you or I, and she has made it appear so; for, in short, after the two women, whom I charged to take care of her, had given her the water sovereign against all fevers, which, however, she had no occasion for, she pretended that water had cured her, and was brought to take her leave of me, that she might go the sooner to give an account of the success of her undertaking. She was in so much haste, that she would have gone away without seeing my palace, if I had not, by bidding my two women show it her, given her to understand that it was worth her seeing. But go on, and tell me what is the necessity your father has imposed on you to be so importunate, which I desire you will be persuaded you can be.

Madam, pursued prince Ahmed, you may have observed that hitherto I have been content with your love, and have never asked you any other favour: for what, after the possession of so amiable a wife, can I desire more? I know how great your power is, but I have taken care not to make trial of it. Consider then, I conjure you, that it is not me, but the sultan my father, who, indiscreetly, as I think, asks of you a pavilion large enough to shelter him, his court, and army, from the violence of the weather, when he takes the field, and which a man may carry in his hand. Once more, remember, it is not I, but the sultan my father, who asks this favour.

Prince, replied the fairy, smiling, I am sorry that so small a matter should disturb you, and make you so uneasy as you appeared to me. I see plainly two things have contributed towards it: one is, the law you have imposed upon yourself, to be content with loving me, and being beloved by me, and to deny yourself the liberty of asking me the least favour that might try my power. The other, I do not doubt, whatever you may say, was, you thought that what your father asked of me was out of my power. As to the first, I commend you for it, and shall love you the better, if possible, for it; and for the second, I must tell you, that what the sultan you father asks of me is a trifle; and upon occasions. I can do much more difficult things. Therefore be easy, and persuaded, that far from thinking myself importuned, I shall always take a great deal of pleasure in whatever you can desire me to do for your sake. Then the fairy sent for her treasurer, to whom, when she came, she said, Nourgihan, [108] (which was her name,) bring me the largest pavilion in my treasury. Nourgihan returned presently with a pavilion, which could not only be held, but concealed in the palm of the hand, when it was closed, and presented it to her mistress, who gave it prince Ahmed to look at.

When prince Ahmed saw the pavilion which the fairy called the largest in her treasury, he fancied she had a mind to banter him, and his surprise appeared presently in his countenance, which Pari Banou perceiving, burst out a laughing. What! prince, cried she, do you think I jest with you? You will see presently that I am in earnest. Nourgihan, said she to her treasurer, taking the tent out of prince Ahmed’s hand, go and set it up, that the prince may judge whether the sultan his father will think it large enough.

The treasurer went out immediately with it from the palace, and carried it to such a distance, that when she had set it up, one end reached to the palace. The prince, so far from thinking it small, found it large enough to shelter two armies as numerous as that of the sultan his father, and then said to Pari Banou, I ask my princess a thousand pardons for my incredulity: after what I have seen, I believe there is nothing impossible to you. You see, said the fairy, that the pavilion is larger than your father may have occasion for; but you are to observe, that it has one property, that it becomes larger or smaller, according to the army it is to cover, without applying any hands to it.

The treasurer took down the tent again, reduced it to its first size, and brought it and put it into the prince’s hands. He took it, and without staying any longer than till the next day, mounted his horse, and went with the usual attendants to the sultan his father.

The sultan, who was persuaded that such a tent as he asked for was beyond all possibility, was in great surprise at the prince’s diligence. He took the tent, and after he had admired its smallness, his amazement was so great that he could not recover himself when he had set it up in the great plain before mentioned, and found it large enough to shelter an army twice as large as he could bring into the field. Looking upon this circumstance to be a superfluity that might be troublesome in the use, prince Ahmed told him, that its size would always be in proportion to his army.

To outward appearance the sultan expressed great obligations to the prince his son for so noble a present, desiring him to return his thanks to the fairy Pari Banou; and to show what a value he set on it, he ordered it to be carefully laid up in his treasury. But within himself he conceived a greater jealousy than what his flatterers and the magician had suggested to him; considering that by the fairy’s assistance, the prince his son might perform things that were infinitely above his own power notwithstanding his greatness and riches, therefore, more intent upon his ruin, he went to consult the magician again, who advised him to engage the prince to bring some of the water of the fountain of lions.

In the evening, when the sultan was surrounded as usual by all the court, and the prince came to pay his respects among the rest, he addressed himself to him in these words: Son, said he, I have already expressed to you how much I am obliged to you for the present of the tent you have procured me, which I look upon as the most valuable thing in my treasury; but you must do one thing more for me, which will be no less agreeable to me. I am informed that the fairy your spouse makes use of a certain water, called the water of the fountain of lions, which cures all sorts of fevers, even the most dangerous; and as I am perfectly well persuaded my health is dear to you, I do not doubt but you will ask her for a bottle of that water for me, and bring it me, as a sovereign remedy which I may make use of when I have occasion. Do me this other important piece of service, and thereby complete the duty of a good son towards a tender father.

Prince Ahmed, who believed that the sultan his father would have been satisfied with so singular and useful a tent as that which he had brought, and that he would not have imposed any new task upon him which might hazard the fairy’s displeasure, was thunderstruck at this new request, notwithstanding the assurance she had given him of granting him whatever lay in her power. After a long silence, he said, I beg of your majesty to be assured, that there is nothing I would not undertake to procure you, which may contribute to the prolonging of your life, but I could wish it might not be by the means of my wife. For this reason I dare not promise to bring the water. All I can do is, to assure you I will ask it of her; but it will be with as great reluctance as when I asked for the tent.

The next morning prince Ahmed returned to the fairy Pan Banou, and related to her sincerely and faithfully all that had passed at the sultan his father’s court, from the giving of the tent, which he told her he received with the utmost gratitude for the favour she had done him, to the new request he had charged him to make for him. And when he had done, he added: But, my princess, I only tell you this is a plain account of what passed between me and my father. I leave you to your own pleasure, whether you will gratify or reject this his new desire. It shall be as you please.

No, no, replied the fairy Pari Banou, I am glad that the sultan of the Indies knows that you are not indifferent to me. I will satisfy him, and whatever advice the magician can give him, (for I see that he hearkens to her) he shall find no fault with you or me. There is a great deal of wickedness in this demand, as you will understand by what I am going to tell you. The fountain of lions is situated in the middle of a court of a great castle, the entrance into which is guarded by four fierce lions, two of which sleep alternately, while the other two are awake. But let not that frighten you. I will give you means to pass by them without any danger.

The fairy Pari Banou was at that time very hard at work with her needle; and as she had by her several clues of thread, she took up one, and presenting it to prince Ahmed, said, First take this clue of thread; I will tell you presently the use of it. In the second place, you must have two horses; one you must ride yourself, and the other you must lead, which must be loaded with a sheep cut into four quarters, that must be killed to-day. In the third place, you must be provided with a bottle, which I will give you, to bring the water in. Set out early to-morrow morning, and when you have passed the iron gate, throw before you the clue of thread, which will roll till it comes to the gates of the castle. Follow it, and when it stops, as the gates will be open, you will see the four lions. The two that are awake will, by their roaring, wake the other two. Be not frightened, but throw each of them a quarter of the sheep, and then clap spurs to your horse, and ride to the fountain. Fill your bottle without alighting, and then return with the same expedition. The lions will be so busy eating, they will let you pass by them.

Prince Ahmed set out the next morning at the time appointed him by the fairy, and followed her directions punctually. When he arrived at the gates of the castle, he distributed the quarters of the sheep among the four lions, and passing through the midst of them with intrepidity, got to the fountain, filled his bottle, and returned as safe and sound as he went. When he had got a little distance from the castle gates he turned about, and perceiving two of the lions coming after him, he drew his sabre, and prepared himself for defence. But as he went forwards, he saw one of them turned out of the road at some distance, and showed by his head and tail that he did not come to do him any harm, but only to go before him, and that the other stayed behind to follow. He therefore put his sword again into its scabbard. Guarded in this manner, he arrived at the capital of the Indies: but the lions never left him till they had conducted him to the gates of the sultan’s palace; after which they returned the same way they came, though not without frightening all that saw them, who fled or hid themselves to avoid them, though they walked gently, and showed no signs of fierceness.