es and gives water to
the thirsty land and makes plain what is doing under cover of darkness;
it also sometimes kills, benumbs, or paralyzes. Thus the head of the
Gorgon Medusa turns into stone those who look upon it. Thus the ointment
of the dervise, in the tale of Baba Abdallah, not only reveals all the
treasures of the earth, but instantly thereafter blinds the unhappy man
who tests its powers. And thus the hand of glory, which bursts open bars
and bolts, benumbs also those who happen to be near it. Indeed, few of
the favoured mortals who were allowed to visit the caverns opened by
sesame or the luck-flower, escaped without disaster. The monkish tale of
"The Clerk and the Image," in which the primeval mythical features are
curiously distorted, well illustrates this point.

In the city of Rome there formerly stood an image with its right hand
extended and on its forefinger the words "strike here." Many wise men
puzzled in vain over the meaning of the inscription; but at last a
certain priest observed that whenever the sun shone on the figure, the
shadow of the finger was discernible on the ground at a little distance
from the statue. Having marked the spot, he waited until midnight, and
then began to dig. At last his spade struck upon something hard. It
was a trap-door, below which a flight of marble steps descended into a
spacious hall, where many men were sitting in solemn silence amid piles
of gold and diamonds and long rows of enamelled vases. Beyond this he
found another room, a gynaecium filled with beautiful women reclining
on richly embroidered sofas; yet here, too, all was profound silence.
A superb banqueting-hall next met his astonished gaze; then a silent
kitchen; then granaries loaded with forage; then a stable crowded
with motionless horses. The whole place was brilliantly lighted by a
carbuncle which was suspended in one corner of the reception-room; and
opposite stood an archer, with his bow and arrow raised, in the act of
taking aim at the jewel. As the priest passed back through this hall, he
saw a diamond-hilted knife lying on a marble table; and wishing to carry
away something wherewith to accredit his story, he reached out his
hand to take it; but no sooner had he touched it than all was dark. The
archer had shot with his arrow, the bright jewel was shivered into a
thousand pieces, the staircase had fled, and the priest found himself
buried alive. [49]

Usually, however, though the lightning is w