hich I have observed in your
dispositions seems to me to promise the most agreeable union. I
discern in him virtues which, now unfolding themselves, will soon
become the rivals of your own. You are born to govern kingdoms, and I
think he possesses virtues worthy of a throne. In giving him your
hand, and in allotting him my crown, I promote your happiness, his,
and that of my people."

The amiable Princess cast down her eyes, while she thanked her uncle
for his goodness. Selimansha immediately ordered the preparations
necessary for the celebration of the nuptials.

Public rejoicings followed it, and manifested the general
satisfaction. They lasted sixty days. At the end of this term
Selimansha, desirous of repose, abdicated the crown in favour of the
son to whose fortunes he had just united the lovely Chamsada.

Balavan, the eldest of Selimansha's sons, expected to ascend the
throne at the death of his father. Smitten with the charms of his
beautiful relation, he was reckoning upon offering her his hand, and
associating her with his fortune. Indignation and jealousy took
possession of his heart when he saw the rank and happiness to which he
thought himself called by the right of age pass into the hands of his
brother. Even if his merit had not been a reason for this preference,
he knew that the Sovereigns of this part of the East have the power of
choosing their successors in their family without regard to the
prerogatives of age. But the impetuous Balavan thought they should
have departed from this usage in his behalf, and followed that of
other nations.

The birth of a son to his brother increased his rage, and was another
obstacle to his pretensions. He found means to introduce himself
secretly into the apartment of the King his brother, and with a
furious hand plunged his poniard into his breast. He entered with the
same precautions and the same design into that where the infant was
asleep; but lifting the veil which concealed this young Prince, more
beautiful than the day, a supernatural feeling seemed to withhold his
hand.

"Thou shouldst have been my son," said he, "if injustice had not torn
from me the heart and the hand of Chamsada."

And recognizing at the same time in this innocent victim the features
of her whose charms he adored, an involuntary emotion made him strike
a feeble blow; the poniard wavered in his trembling hand, and the
wound of the stroke was not mortal.

Balavan was only induced to s