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manner. On this last occasion, the cruel ogre smeared the poor mother’s face with her child’s blood. She washed it off, but, in her hurry and anguish, missed a slight stain beneath her underlip. Her husband and her mother-in-law, already very suspicious, judged of course that she was a ghûleh and had devoured her offspring.

Zerendac told her story, but no one would believe it. Her husband, being loth to put her to death, ordered her to be imprisoned in a small underground chamber, and, at his mother’s suggestion, sought another bride. Hearing of the beauty of the daughter of a neighbouring sultan, he went to ask for her. But before setting out he sent for the mother of his lost children, and asked her what she would like him to bring her when he came back. She asked for a box of aloes,^[1] for a box of henna,^[2] and a dagger. Her request was granted, and when the prince returned from his betrothal to the sultan’s daughter, he brought with him these things for Zerendac. She opened the boxes, one by one, saying, “O box of sebr, you have not in you more patience than I have shown. O box of henna, you cannot be gentler than I have been,” and was just going to stab herself with the dagger, when the wall of her prison opened and Abu Freywar appeared, leading a handsome boy and two lovely girls. “Live!” he cried, “I have not killed your children. Here they are.” He then by his magic made a secret staircase connecting her dungeon with the