at noon, we shall reach near
the summit of the mountain and the Well of Paravid, if my power last over
this Ass; and from that time thou wilt be on the high road to greatness,
so fail not to remember what I have done for thee, and be not guilty of
ingratitude when thy hand is the stronger.'

He promised her, and they lay and slept. When he awoke the sun was
half-risen, and he looked at Noorna bin Noorka in the silken bag, and she
was yet in the peacefulness of pleasant dreams; but for the Ass, surely
his eyes rolled, and his head and fore legs were endued with life, while
his latter half seemed of stone. And the youth called to Noorna bin
Noorka, and pointed to her the strangeness of the condition of the Ass.
As she cast eyes on him she cried out, and rushed to him, and took him by
the ears and blew up his nostrils, and the animal was quiet. Then she and
Shibli Bagarag mounted him again, and she said to him, 'It is well thou
wert more vigilant than I, and that the sun rose not on this Ass while I
slept, or my enchantment would have thawed on him, and he would have
'scaped us.'

She gave her heel to the Ass, and the Ass hung his tail in sullenness and
drooped his head; and she laughed, crying, 'Karaz, silly fellow! do thy
work willingly, and take wisely thine outwitting.'

She jeered him as they journeyed, and made the soul of Shibli Bagarag
merry, so that he jerked in his seat upon the Ass. Now, as they ascended
the mountain they came to the opening of a cavern, and Noorna bin Noorka
halted the Ass, and said to Shibli Bagarag, 'We part here, and I wait for
thee in this place. Take this phial, and fill it with the waters of the
well, after thy bath. The way is before thee--speed on it.'

He climbed the sides of the mountain, and was soon hidden in the clefts
and beyond the perches of the vulture. She kept her eyes on the rocky
point when he disappeared, awaiting his return; and the sun went over her
head and sank on the yon-side of the mountain, and it was by the beams of
the moon that she beheld Shibli Bagarag dropping from the crags and
ledges of rock, sliding and steadying himself downward till he reached
her with the phial in his hand, filled; and he was radiant, as it were
divine with freshness, so that Noorna, before she spoke welcome to him,
was lost in contemplating the warm shine of his visage, calling to mind
the poet's words:

The wealth of light in sun and moon,
All nature's wealth,
Hat