rought his cousin home.

'Is that Dschemil?' asked the mother when he knocked softly.

'Yes, it is.'

'And have you found her?'

'Yes, and I have brought her to you.'

'Oh, where is she? let me see her!' cried the mother.

'Here, behind me,' answered Dschemil.

But when the poor woman caught sight of her daughter, she shrieked, and
exclaimed, 'Are you making fun of me? When did I ever give birth to an
ass?'

'Hush!' said Dschemil, 'it is not necessary to let the whole world know!
And if you look at her body, you will see two scars on it.'

'Mother,' sobbed Dschemila, 'do you really not know your own daughter?'

'Yes, of course I know her.'

'What are her two scars then?'

'On her thigh is a scar from the bite of a dog, and on her breast is the
mark of a burn, where she pulled a lamp over her when she was little.'

'Then look at me, and see if I am not your daughter,' said Dschemila,
throwing off her clothes and showing her two scars.

And at the sight her mother embraced her, weeping.

'Dear daughter,' she cried, 'what evil fate has befallen you?'

'It was the ogre who carried me off first, and then bewitched me,'
answered Dschemila.

'But what is to be done with you?' asked her mother.

'Hide me away, and tell no one anything about me. And you, dear cousin,
say nothing to the neighbours, and if they should put questions, you can
make answer that I have not yet been found.'

'So I will,' replied he.

Then he and her mother took her upstairs and hid her in a cupboard,
where she stayed for a whole month, only going out to walk when all the
world was asleep.

Meanwhile Dschemil had returned to his own home, where his father and
mother, his brothers and neighbours, greeted him joyfully.

'When did you come back?' said they, 'and have you found Dschemila?'

'No, I searched the whole world after her, and could hear nothing of
her.'

'Did you part company with the man who started with you?'

'Yes; after three days he got so weak and useless he could not go on. It
must be a month by now since he reached home again. I went on and
visited every castle, and looked in every house. But there were no signs
of her; and so I gave it up.'

And they answered him: 'We told you before that it was no good. An ogre
or an ogress must have snapped her up, and how can you expect to find
her?'

'I loved her too much to be still,' he said.

But his friends did not understand, and soon they spoke to him again
a