aring this narrative, [342] I praised that man of honour,
and said, your kindness has been uninterrupted, and there has been
no limits to these fellows' shameless and villainous conduct; so
true is it, "That if you bury a dog's tail for twelve years, it
will still remain crooked as ever." [343] After this, I asked the
_khwaja_ the history of those twelve rubies which were in the dog's
collar? He replied, "May the age of your majesty be a hundred and
twenty years! After I had been three or four years governor of that
port, I was sitting one day on the top of my house, which was high,
for the purpose of viewing and enjoying the sea and plain beneath. I
was looking in all directions, when suddenly, I perceived two human
figures, who were coming along from one side of the wood, where there
was no high road. Having seized a telescope, I looked at them, and saw
they were of a strange appearance: I speedily sent some mace-bearers
to call them [to my presence.]

"When they came, I perceived they were a man and a woman. I sent the
woman into the seraglio to the princess, and called the man before
me; I saw he was a youth of twenty or twenty-two years of age, whose
beard and mustaches had commenced [growing;] but the colour of his
face had become black as that of the _tawa_. [344] The hair of his
head, and the nails of his fingers owing to the heat of the sun were
greatly grown, and he looked like a man of the woods. He held on his
shoulder a boy of about three or four years old, and two sleeves of a
garment, filled [with something], were suspended like a collar round
his neck; he cut a strange appearance, and was oddly dressed, I was
greatly surprised, and asked him, 'O, friend, who art thou, and of
what country art thou the inhabitant, and in what a strange condition
do I see thee?' The young man began to weep bitterly, and taking off
the two filled sleeves from around his neck, he laid them before me,
and cried out, 'Hunger, hunger! for God's sake give me something to
eat; I have subsisted for a long while on roots and herbs, and there
is not a particle of strength remaining in me.' I instantly ordered
him some bread, meat, and wine; he began to devour them.

"In the meantime, the eunuch brought from my haram several other bags
which he found on [the stranger's wife.] I ordered them all to be
opened, and saw that they contained precious jewels of every kind, each
of which was equal in value to the amount of the king's revenue