to you; provide him a nurse,
and take as much care of him as if he were our own son; for, from
this moment, I acknowledge him as such." The intendant's wife
received the child with great joy, and took particular pleasure
in the care of him. The intendant himself would not inquire too
narrowly whence the child came. He saw plainly it came not far
off the queen's apartment; but it was not his business to examine
too closely into what had passed, nor to create disturbances in a
place where peace was so necessary.

The following year the queen consort was brought to bed of
another prince, on whom the unnatural sisters had no more
compassion than on his brother; but exposed him likewise in a
basket, and set him adrift in the canal, pretending this time
that the sultaness was delivered of a cat. It was happy also for
this child that the intendant of the gardens was walking by the
canal side, who had it carried to his wife, and charged her to
take as much care of it as of the former; which was as agreeable
to her inclination as it was to that of the intendant.

The emperor of Persia was more enraged this time against the
queen than before, and she had felt the effects of his anger if
the grand vizier's remonstrances had not prevailed.

The third time the queen lay in she was delivered of a princess,
which innocent babe underwent the same fate as the princes her
brothers; for the two sisters being determined not to desist from
their detestable schemes, till they had seen the queen their
younger sister at least cast off, turned out, and humbled,
exposed this infant also on the canal. But the princess, as well
as the two princes her brothers, was preserved from death by the
compassion and charity of the intendant of the gardens.

To this inhumanity the two sisters added a lie and deceit as
before. They produced a piece of wood, and affirmed it to be a
false birth of which the queen had been delivered.

Khoosroo Shaw could no longer contain himself, when he was
informed of the new extraordinary birth. "What!" said he; "this
woman, unworthy of my bed, will fill my palace with monsters, if
I let her live any longer! No, it shall not be; she is a monster
herself, and I must rid the world of her." He pronounced sentence
of death, and ordered the grand vizier to see it executed.

The grand vizier and the courtiers who were present cast
themselves at the emperor's feet, to beg of him to revoke the
sentence. "Your majesty, I ho