Dschemila's mother came
out to look for her daughter.

'What have you done with her?' she asked anxiously.

'We had to leave her in the wood,' they replied, 'for she had picked up
an iron mortar, and could not manage to carry it.'

So the old woman set off at once for the forest, calling to her daughter
as she hurried along.

'Do go home,' cried the townspeople, as they heard her; 'we will go and
look for your daughter; you are only a woman, and it is a task that
needs strong men.'

But she answered, 'Yes, go; but I will go with you! Perhaps it will be
only her corpse that we shall find after all. She has most likely been
stung by asps, or eaten by wild beasts.'

The men, seeing her heart was bent on it, said no more, but told one of
the girls she must come with them, and show them the place where they
had left Dschemila. They found the bundle of wood lying where she had
dropped it, but the maiden was nowhere to be seen.

'Dschemila! Dschemila!' cried they; but nobody answered.

'If we make a fire, perhaps she will see it,' said one of the men. And
they lit a fire, and then went, one this way, and one that, through the
forest, to look for her, whispering to each other that if she had been
killed by a lion they would be sure to find some trace of it; or if she
had fallen asleep, the sound of their voices would wake her; or if a
snake had bitten her, they would at least come on her corpse.

All night they searched, and when morning broke and they knew no more
than before what had become of the maiden, they grew weary, and said to
the mother:

'It is no use. Let us go home, nothing has happened to your daughter,
except that she has run away with a man.'

'Yes, I will come,' answered she, 'but I must first look in the river.
Perhaps some one has thrown her in there.' But the maiden was not in the
river.

For four days the father and mother waited and watched for their child
to come back; then they gave up hope, and said to each other: 'What is
to be done? What are we to say to the man to whom Dschemila is
betrothed? Let us kill a goat, and bury its head in the grave, and when
the man returns we must tell him Dschemila is dead.'

Very soon the bridegroom came back, bringing with him carpets and soft
cushions for the house of his bride. And as he entered the town
Dschemila's father met him, saying, 'Greeting to you. She is dead.'

At these words the young man broke into loud cries, and it was some time
befor