ultan Zebenezer stayed to see his daughter the Sultaness of India,
and Misnar the happiest and the most thankful of the children of
Allah.

"The children of Allah," said the sage Horam, "have indeed a freedom
of action; but that freedom is best exercised when it leads them to
trust and depend on the Lord of all things: not that He who seeth even
beyond the confines of light is pleased with idleness, or giveth
encouragement to the sons of sloth; the spirit which He has infused
into mankind He expects to find active and industrious; and, when
prudence is joined with religion, Allah either gives success to its
dictates, or, by counteracting its motions, draws forth the brighter
virtues of patience and resignation. Learn, therefore, ye pupils of
the race of immortals, not to forget your dependence on Allah while ye
follow the prudent maxims of wisdom and experience; for he only is
truly prudent who adds faith to his practice, and he truly religious
whose actions are the result of his faith."

[Illustration]

Sadik Beg.

Sadik Beg was of good family, handsome in person, and possessed of
both sense and courage; but he was poor, having no property but his
sword and his horse, with which he served as a gentleman retainer of a
Pasha. The latter, satisfied with the purity of Sadik's descent, and
entertaining a respect for his character, determined to make him the
husband of his daughter Hooseinee, who, though beautiful as her name
implied, was remarkable for her haughty manner and ungovernable
temper.

Giving a husband of the condition of Sadik Beg to a lady of
Hooseinee's rank was, according to usage in such unequal matches, like
giving her a slave; and as she heard a good report of his personal
qualities, she offered no objections to the marriage, which was
celebrated soon after it was proposed, and apartments were assigned to
the happy couple in the Pasha's palace.

Some of Sadik Beg's friends rejoiced in his good fortune, as they saw,
in the connection he had formed, a sure prospect of his advancement.
Others mourned the fate of so fine and promising a young man, now
condemned to bear through life all the humours of a proud and
capricious woman; but one of his friends, a little man called Merdek,
who was completely henpecked, was particularly rejoiced, and quite
chuckled at the thought of seeing another in the same condition with
himself.

About a month after the nuptials, Merdek met his friend, and, with
m