" Then he bared his left hand and his feet, and we
saw that the left hand was even as the right and that each of his
feet lacked the great toe. At this sight, our amazement increased
and we said to him, "We are impatient to know thy history and the
manner of the cutting off of thy thumbs and great toes and the
reason of thy washing thy hands a hundred and twenty times."
"Know then," answered he, "that my father was chief of the
merchants of Baghdad in the time of the Khalif Haroun er Reshid;
but he was given to drinking wine and listening to the lute and
other instruments, so that when he died, he left nothing. I
buried him and had recitations of the Koran made over him and
mourned for him days and nights. Then I opened his shop and found
he had left little but debts. However, I compounded with his
creditors for time to pay and betook myself to buying and
selling, paying them something week by week on account, till at
last I succeeded in clearing off the debts and began to add to my
capital. One day, as I sat in my shop, there came up to the
entrance of the bazaar a lady, than whom my eyes never saw a
fairer, richly clad and decked and riding on a mule, with one
slave walking before and another behind her. She halted the mule
at the entrance of the bazaar and entered, followed by an eunuch,
who said to her, 'O my lady, come out, without telling any one,
or thou wilt bring us into trouble.
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