to his father and excitedly kissed his hand.
Then, turning to his mother, whose eyes were full of tears of vexation,
he put his hand under her chin, kissed her brow, and exclaimed with
triumphant satisfaction: "This is how we and the emperor do business!
When the father is the most liberal of men the son is apt to look small.
Meaning no harm, worthy merchant! As far as the hanging is concerned,
it may be more precious than all the treasures of Croesus; but you have
something yet to give us into the bargain before you load your camels
with our gold: Tell us what the whole work was like before it was
divided."

The Moslem, who had placed the precious tablet in his girdle, at once
obeyed this request.

"You know how enormous were its length and breadth," he began. "The hall
it decorated could hold several thousand guests, besides space for
a hundred body guards to stand on each side of the throne. As many
weavers, embroiderers and jewellers as there are days in the year
worked on it, they say, for the years of a man's life. The woven picture
represented paradise as the Persians imagine it--full of green trees,
flowers and fruits. Here you can still see a fragment of the sparkling
fountain which, when seen from a distance, with its sprinkling of
diamonds, sapphires and emeralds, looked like living water. Here the
pearls represent the foam on a wave. These leaves, cut across here,
belonged to a rose-bush which grew by the fountain of Eden before the
evil of the first rain fell on the world.

"Originally all roses were white, but as the limbs of the first woman
shone with more dazzling whiteness they blushed for shame, and since
then there are crimson as well as white roses. So the Persians say."

"And this--our piece?" asked Orion.

"This," replied the merchant, with a pleasant glance at the young man,
"was the very middle of the hanging. On the left you see the judgment
at the bridge of Chinvat. The damned were not represented, but only the
winged, Fravashi, Genii who, as the Persians believe, dwell one with
each mortal as his guardian angel through life, united to him but
separable. They were depicted in stormy pursuit of the damned--the
miscreant followers of Angramainjus, the evil Spirit, of whom you must
imagine a vast multitude fleeing before them. The souls in bliss, the
pure and faithful servants of the Persian divinity Auramazda, enter with
songs of triumph into the flower-decked pleasure-garden, while at their