Chapter Sleek to Sleeper Awakened of S by Brewer's Readers Handbook

another sleeping draught being given him, he was carried back to his own house. When he woke, he could not decide if he had been in a dream or not, but his conduct was so strange that he was taken to a mad-house. He was confined for several days, and, being discharged, the caliph in disguise again visited him, and repeated the same game, so that next day he could not tell which had been the dream. (See Sly, p. 1019.) At length the mystery was cleared up, and he was given a post about the caliph’s person, and the sultana gave him a beautiful slave for his wife. Abou Hassan now played a trick on the caliph. He pretended to be dead, and sent his young wife to the sultana to announce the sad news. Zobeida, the sultana, was very much grieved, and gave her favourite a sum of money for the funeral expenses. On her return, she played the dead woman, and Abou Hassan went to the caliph to announce his loss. The caliph expressed his sympathy, and, having given him a sum of money for the funeral expenses, went to the sultana to speak of the sad news of the death of the young bride. “The bride?” cried Zobeida; “you mean the bridegroom, commander of the faithful.” “No, I mean the bride,” answered the caliph, “for Abou Hassan has but just left me.” “That cannot be, sire,” retorted Zobeida, “for it is not an hour ago that the bride was here, to announce his death.” To settle this moot point, the chief of the eunuchs was sent to see which of the two was dead; and Abou, who saw him coming, got the bride to pretend to be dead, and set himself at her head bewailing, so the man returned with the report that it was the bride who was dead, and not the bridegroom. The sultana would not believe him, and sent her aged nurse to ascertain the fact. As she approached, Abou Hassan pretended to be dead, and the bride to be the wailing widow; accordingly the nurse contradicted the report of the eunuch. The caliph and sultana, with the nurse and eunuch, then all went to see for themselves, and found both apparently dead. The caliph now said he would give 1000 pieces of gold to know which died first, when Abou Hassan cried, “Commander of the faithful, it was I who died first.” The trick was found out, the caliph nearly died with laughter, and the jest proved a little mine of wealth to the court favourite.—Arabian Nights.