Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers Part 6

But Haroun al Raschid answered, "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. When I am careful for my whole kingdom, this care extends to each individual; if, then, 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 sorrow and your tears?"

Then Naima recounted the mysterious disappearance of his son; how he had sought for him everywhere, and how all trouble had been useless, so that 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 tears, perhaps, might appease my sorrow, if at the same time a ray of hope did not dart through my heart that possibly he is still alive; but where does he live, if indeed he be still alive? This ray of hope keeps the wound in the father's heart always open."

"You have 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 in 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 for my pleasure. That which was not possible to yourself, your friends, and your servants to accomplish, might perhaps have been easy to me. Now go home, and believe that you shall obtain news of your son, if he lives 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 recognized.

When Naima again sat with his friend Saad in the evening, he related to him the gracious and comforting words of the Caliph. Saad perceived that hope was again revived in his friend's heart, and that he confidently trusted to find his son. He thought it therefore his duty to damp this hope, and said,

"Beloved friend, I have once heard a speech, which by its truth sank deeply in my memory: it is, 'Trust not in princes; they are but men.'

The moral of which is, that the mightiest on earth are subject to fate. If the Caliph have influence in distant lands, it must be in a confined and narrow limit. That which is but a span distant is under the control of all-governing fate, even from the meanest slave to the Ruler of the Faithful."

But if the power of Haroun al Raschid were bounded by the immensity of fate, yet he did all he could to fulfil the hope he had raised in Naima's heart. He gave a commission to all his servants in his kingdom, high and low, and to his amba.s.sadors in the neighbouring kingdoms, and even sent into distant lands, with the princes of which he was friendly, and on the same day dispatched messengers with the charge to search for Haschem with all diligence, and gave them a description how they might recognize him if they found him. But week after week pa.s.sed away, month after month, and even a whole year elapsed, without intelligence being received either of the life or death of the lost one. So all hope of finding him now deserted the father for ever.

CHAPTER III.

THE CAPTIVE.

Haschem was not dead; he still lived, but in such retirement that it was impossible to discover his abode. He 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 so slowly that he hoped quickly to reach it. The tardiness of its flight made him conjecture that it must have a defect in its wing: he often stretched out his hand to it, and drew near it, but the bird again raised its wings, and flew a little in advance. Haschem 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 reached a hill, which he climbed; he was now in a narrow meadow-valley, which he ran along; 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 take his prisoner, it flew away, leaving only one feather of its tail behind, which he had tightly grasped; still he saw it through the twilight flying before him, and he hastened after it. The bird seemed now to quicken its pace; and as he followed and had once nearly caught it, he continued the pursuit with more eagerness: he ran through the high gra.s.s, and with his strained sight fixed on this glimmering white object, he saw nothing else. Thus he came unexpectedly to a little dam which lay across his path; he jumped in and tried to climb the other side, but it was so steep that he fell in with some of the crumbling earth: while the water rushed over his head he lost all consciousness.

When he came to himself, he lay on the turf, and a tall, grey-headed man, of strange appearance, stood before him, clothed in a long black robe, which reached to his ankles, and was fastened by a glittering girdle of a fiery colour. Instead of a turban, he wore a high pointed cap on his head, at the end of which was a ta.s.sel 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 he raised him from the ground, pa.s.sed his left arm round his body, and flew with him through the air as quickly as an arrow. Haschem again momentarily lost recollection: it is not known how long he remained in this condition. He awoke at last as from a deep sleep; and as he looked around, the first thing he recognized was a cage of gold wire, which hung 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 to the windows were skilfully contrived with so many windings and narrow gratings, that even the white bird could have found no s.p.a.ce to pa.s.s 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, pa.s.sing over the curved brim of the urn, dripped into a white basin beneath, from which it disappeared unseen.

Whilst he observed this, and wondered what had happened to him, and how he came there, he suddenly heard the old man in the black robe enter 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; you now have it 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. Haschem 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 to any he had before seen. The hall seemed high, as if it were the upper storey of a lofty tower. No other edifice was to be seen, and from the windows he could not distinguish the trees and plants which bloomed beneath. He drew the curtain aside, and discovered an outlet; but there was a thick metal door which he could not open. He was now very much embarra.s.sed, 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 windows, that he might put his head out to see if there was anybody in the building beneath, to whom he might cry out.

There was no door: he could not open the windows; and as far as he could stretch his sight in every direction, he could see n.o.body. He threw himself in despair on the pillow on which he recovered his consciousness, and 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 iron."

As hunger pinched him still more, he cried out, "How much rather would I be in the vilest prison, with the coa.r.s.est food, than be confined in this splendid hall, where I must die of hunger!"

Then he again called out of the lattices, in hopes that his voice might be heard, and aid brought; but n.o.body appeared, and no one answered him. When he again threw himself, weeping, on his couch, after such useless attempts, he observed that the white bird fluttered restlessly in its prison, and pecked on the golden dish, where food was placed, without finding any.

"Poor brother in misfortune!" said Haschem, "you shall not suffer want; I will take care of you: come, I will bring you a.s.sistance."

He took the pans from the cage, and filled one with water from the urn, 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 all this had happened; but still it was not long before he attacked the meats with the zest of a young man who has fasted for several days. Although these viands were altogether different from those he had been accustomed to taste in his father's house, still they all appeared excellent. He ate till he was fully satisfied, and then took a golden cup from the table, with which he quenched his thirst with pure water from the urn. Afterwards he threw himself on a couch and fell asleep.

When he awoke, he felt strong and well. He arose and walked round the hall, and he then observed that the table with the meats had disappeared. This did not please him, as he had thought to make a good supper of the remainder. He did not allow this, however, to trouble him much, as he was now sure that he was not to die of hunger. He had now leisure enough to examine his prison more closely. He searched all anew pillars, walls, and floor; but he could nowhere find a crevice or a fissure: all was fast and whole. His view from the windows did not allow him to make any discovery: he only saw that he was very far from the earth, and in a s.p.a.cious valley. Mountains were to be seen in the distance, with curiously pointed summits: the nearest offered no change of prospect, and the farthest was too distant to raise his spirits by its contemplation: it was a high, wearisome abode. 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 looked at him with its bright eyes; and it seemed as if sense and speech lay in these eyes, only the interpretation was wanting. Night put an end to these reflections.

On the next morning he observed that the bird again wanted food. He filled its seed-box with grain from the 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 pa.s.sed like the former, and the following in the same manner. Haschem 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-box. He could not perceive who brought the table, nor how it disappeared. It always came when 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 repose for you: you have performed your duty during the preceding days in giving the bird its food; now you may amuse yourself in the garden till evening."

He led him through a door into a narrow pa.s.sage, at the end of which they descended twenty steps. Then he opened a small metal trap-door, and Haschem again descended twenty steps more. They came to a similar door; and after descending twenty more steps to another, and so on, till after pa.s.sing 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.

Haschem 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 storeys, each about fifteen feet in height. The tower had nine angles and nine flat walls; in each storey were three windows, so contrived that for every two walls without a window, the third had one. These windows were not directly over one another in the storeys, but alternate; so that only three appeared in each wall. This distribution of regularity and order reigned throughout the whole building. The walls were made of large pieces of gold, quite as smooth as gla.s.s, like large stones; 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 pa.s.sed 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. With a few steps he reached the end of the garden, and stood before a gate of lattice-work of strong smooth iron bars, so close together that he could scarcely pa.s.s 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, in consequence of not being able to bear the pain, he fell backwards on the earth. He now examined the lattice closely to see if there were no means of escape; but all was in vain--everywhere the bars were high, thick, and like polished gla.s.s. Mournfully he wandered round the garden: the sun's rays darting down scorched up the gra.s.s, and he sought some shade where he might screen himself from their influence.

He lay down on a neighbouring 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 his 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 anew 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 lattice. But there was something wanting for this work: he had not even a dagger or a pocket-knife. During these thoughts 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.

There was no change observable in his prison--only the bird seemed hara.s.sed and mournful: it sat quiet and still on the lowest perch; its plumage was rough, and its eyes dull.

"Poor creature," said Haschem, "what is the matter? Are you ill?"

It seemed as if the bird was affected by these sympathizing questions; but it soon sank again into its former dejection. He mused long upon this.

The next day and the following ones pa.s.sed like the former; but on the ninth the old man again appeared, led him into the garden, and at night conducted him back into the hall. He took care of the bird; and as soon as he had given it food and water, he always found the table covered with meats behind him. In the intervals he stood at the lattice of one of the three windows looking on the plain below, earnestly hoping to catch sight of some person to free him from his captivity.

In such monotonous employment many months pa.s.sed away. Every ninth day the old man appeared, and gave him leave to walk in the garden; but he did not derive much amus.e.m.e.nt from his strolls in this narrow enclosure. In the meantime he asked the old man many times the reason of his imprisonment, and how long it was to last. No answer was vouchsafed but these words: "Every man has his own fate. This is thine."

CHAPTER IV.

THE DELIVERANCE.

One day the old man appeared and led him into the garden; but he had not been there more than a quarter of an hour, when he returned, called him in, and then quickly retired with marks of disquietude.

Haschem also remarked that the white bird, which he loved more every day, sat at the bottom of its cage, more mournful than usual after his visit. He drew near, and observed a little door, which he had never before seen. He examined it closely, and found a fine bolt which pa.s.sed into a ring of gold wire. These were made so skilfully, like concealed ornaments, that n.o.body could have discovered them if his attention had not been drawn to them by accident. Haschem pushed back the bolt and opened the door; the bird moved as if some sudden joy had seized it, hopped out, and as soon as it touched the floor, it was transformed, and in its stead a young maiden stood before Haschem, clothed in a white silk robe; beautiful dark locks streamed over her neck and shoulders, and a thin fragrant veil fell over them, fastened to a forehead-band set with precious stones; her finely-formed countenance was as white as ivory, relieved by the softest shade of a rose.

Surprised and astonished, Haschem started back and said, "By the beard of the Prophet, I conjure you to tell me whether you are of human race, or whether you belong to the genii?"

"I am a weak maiden," said she, "and implore you to deliver me from the hands of this cruel magician. I will reward you handsomely for it.

Know, I am the only daughter of Kadga Singa, King of Selandia; and this wicked enchanter has cunningly carried me off from my father's palace, and shut me up in this cage. He has one son, as ugly as night, whom he wishes me to take for my husband. Every ninth day he comes, brings him with him, and praises his excellent qualities--presses me for my consent, and threatens me with cruel tortures if I give it not at the next new moon. On that day he will have kept me a year in imprisonment, and longer than a year he says he will not wait, and still give good words: then will the time of my punishment begin. I conjure you, therefore, to help me!"

At these words she burst into a flood of tears.

"n.o.ble royal maiden," answered Haschem, "how willingly would I help you! but, alas, I am only a weak man, and cannot free myself. But tell me--how is it possible? You say the enchanter brings his hateful son with him: why, then, have I never seen him?"

"He always sends you away when he comes," answered the Princess.