urning in the
streets, but about the fourth day after their transformation, as they
stood upon the Caliph's palace, they saw in the street a splendid
procession. Drums and fifes sounded; a man in a scarlet mantle,
embroidered with gold, rode a richly caparisoned steed, surrounded by
a brilliant train of attendants.

Half Bagdad leaped to meet him, and all cried: "Hail, Mirza, Lord of
Bagdad!" The two storks upon the roof of the palace looked at each
other, and the Caliph said: "Canst thou now divine, Grand Vizier, why
I am enchanted? This Mirza is the son of my deadly enemy, the mighty
magician Cachnur, who, in an evil hour, swore revenge upon me. But
still I will not give up hope. Come with me, thou true companion of my
misfortune! We will wander to the grave of the Prophet. Perhaps on
that holy spot this spell will vanish;" and they at once soared from
the roof of the palace and flew toward Mecca.

But flying was no easy matter to them, for the two storks had as yet
but little practice. "Oh, my lord," sighed the Grand Vizier, after a
few hours, "with your permission I must stop, for I can bear it no
longer; you fly altogether too fast. Besides it is now evening, and we
should do well to seek a shelter for the night." Chasid at once
yielded to the prayer of the Vizier, and, as they at this moment
perceived a ruin in the valley below, they flew thither. The place in
which they had taken refuge for the night seemed formerly to have been
a castle. Beautiful columns overtopped the ruins, and several
chambers, which were still in a fair state of preservation, gave
evidence of the former splendour of the building. Chasid and his
companion wandered through the passages to find a dry spot for
themselves. Suddenly the stork Manzor stopped. "My Lord and master,"
he whispered softly, "if it were not folly in a Grand Vizier, and
still more in a stork, to be afraid of spirits, I should feel much
alarmed, for something near by us sighed and groaned very plainly."

The Caliph also stood still, and heard very distinctly a low weeping
that seemed rather to come from a human being than from an animal.

Full of expectation, he was about to advance toward the place from
whence came the sounds of weeping and sighing, when the Vizier seized
him by the wing with his beak and begged him very earnestly not to
plunge into new and unknown dangers But in vain! The Caliph, who bore
a brave heart under his stork's wing, tore himself loose, with