sum of one hundred thousand dinars. This note he delivered to Mesrur,
who saluted his master and immediately departed on his errand.

The Caliph and Giafer then seated themselves on the divan in the large
apartment into which they had been shown on first entering the house,
and, together with the slave merchants, passed the time in conversing
and discussing again the unique beauty of the two ladies whom the
Caliph was to purchase.

When Mesrur returned, bringing with him two slaves carrying the hundred
thousand dinars in fifty bags, there being two thousand dinars in a
bag, they were shown at once into the large room where the merchants
and the Caliph were sitting.

As the slaves deposited the bags on the floor the slave merchants, as
also the Caliph and Giafer, rose and stood by them, Asmut so placing
the lamp as that they could all see him count the money as they stood
together.

He proposed to count the money in one of the bags, and that he should
then proceed to weigh the other bags against that which had been
counted. While all were watching him as he poured out and counted the
money with much noise and many loud exclamations from both merchants as
to the lightness of some of the coins, neither the Caliph, Giafer,
Mesrur, nor either of the slaves, perceived that behind them, barefoot
and noiseless as camels, a number of huge and powerful black slaves had
entered the room.

Suddenly Asmut, seizing the empty bag and dashing it on the floor,
exclaimed, "I will count no more!"

This being the signal, no sooner had he uttered the words than the
slaves seized the Caliph and his companions, threw them down, and
before they could either struggle or cry out had securely bound and
gagged them.

"A good haul for one night's fishing," said Asmut, coolly; "a hundred
thousand dinars and five men, who will doubtless sell very well after
taking a voyage, that is not so bad."

Then ordering some of the slaves to be ready to take the prisoners down
to the river as soon as the dawn should appear, Asmut and his partner
personally superintended the removal from the room of the bags of gold.

Very early in the morning, as soon as it began to be light, a party of
the black slaves who had bound the Caliph and his followers came to
them, and unbinding their legs escorted them down to the river, where a
ship belonging to the slave merchants lay ready to receive them.

Their prospects of escape out of the clutches of the slave