Offensive Selections from

Christoph Martin Wieland’s

Dschinnistan
Translated by

Jonathan Tuttle
 Introduction
This work began with an interest in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The

Magic Flute, one of his most popular operas. Librettist Emmanuel

Schikaneder based the libretto on a short story titled “Lulu, or the Magic

Flute” by Jakob August Liebeskind, which appeared in a collection edited

by Christoph Martin Wieland titled Dschinnistan, oder auserlesene Feen-

und Geister-Mahrchen, published between 1786 and 1789. Curious about

the origins of the opera, I attempted to find a copy of the story in English.

Sadly, this did not appear to exist, and I had no understanding of German,

so all I could rely on was the occasional second-hand accounts of the story.

This state of affairs would have continued indefinitely except that

translation software advanced enough to halfway do the job. Laboriously I

began putting the story through the computer, supplemented with

dictionaries and grammar aids. The result halfway made sense, and I felt

very pleased with it. This may be the first translation of the story into

English ever published.

Buoyed, I decided to translate the rest of Dschinnistan in this

manner. This turned out to be a giant mistake. Two more stories and I lost

all taste for the project. As it turns out, Dschinnistan contains material that

is offensive by current standards: racist, sexist, and several -ists that

2
probably have yet to be named. Perhaps this shouldn’t be surprising given

when it was written, but the bigotry is excessive and more than just casual

thoughtlessness. I don’t know if anyone suggested it during his lifetime,

but Wieland should be ashamed of himself.

These stories are presented here solely for historical and literary

interest only, much as others have presented certain other documents. I do

not endorse or condone anything found in these stories. (If you did

condone the bigotry, I don’t think I’d care for you either.) Because of their

offensive content, I have no interest in gaining any profit from them. No

guarantee is made on the accuracy of these contents either. After all, I

needed a computer, dictionary, and grammar aids to translate these stories.

This document is free for all noncommercial uses. If you use this

document, please make a donation to an organization that works for the

equality of all people, or do something yourself to make this world a better,

fairer place. Wieland would probably be ticked off, and that’s the way it

should be.

—Jonathan Tuttle, 2011

jonathan.morris.tuttle@gmail.com

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 Contents
Adis and Dahy . . . . . . . . . 3

Aboflede . . . . . . . . . . 57

Lulu, or the Magic Flute . . . . . . . 83

4
 Adis and Dahy
In the district of Machilipatnam, in a town of the kingdom of

Golkonda, lived a good woman whom her late husband had left in limited

circumstances, supporting two very well behaved daughters. The older,

named Fatimah, was seventeen years old, and Khadijah, the younger,

barely twelve. They lived in a lonely, isolated hut and fed themselves only

by the work of their hands. A brook, which originated not far from their

hut, gave them water to wash the linen garments of some people in

Machilipatnam, whom she had known already for a long time. As soon as

the good peasant and her daughters had a piece of laundry rather nicely

washed and dried, they were in the habit of covering it with flowers so it

would be fragrant.

One day, as the mother, with the intention of picking flowers in the

meadow, by accident grabbed an adder, which lay hidden under a hyacinth.

The venomous worm took revenge right away and bit the poor woman so

violently on the finger that she had to squeal loudly. Her daughters came

running up, startled, and found her finger immensely swollen already. In

less than a quarter of an hour the poison had already penetrated into the

vital parts, and it worked so quickly that there was no recovery.

While the unfortunate woman felt so close to her end, she still wanted

5
to fulfill the last duty of a good mother and spoke to her daughters, “Dear

children, I am sorry that I must depart from you at a time when you still

need me, but my hour has come. I see the angel of death is approaching,

and we must separate. What comforts me is that I have no regrets over

your education, and that I have left you, thanks to the loving God, good-

natured, devout children. Always remain on the right path to which I have

led you, and have the commandments of our great prophets before your

eyes. He feeds you by your small labors, as we have done so far; the loving

God will not leave you. Especially, I recommend you, to live together in

peace and, where possible, never be separated, for your happiness is based

on your unity. You, dear Khadijah, are still a child. Obey your sister

Fatimah; she will never give you a bad advice.”

After this warning, the good woman felt her strength leave her; she

embraced her children for the last time and died in their arms. The pain,

which fell over the poor girls, was beyond all expression, for they saw their

mother lying without life before them. They burst into tears and filled the

whole district with their wailing.

Finally, as they had almost wept their eyes out, they sank into a kind

of numbness, from which they were woken by the need to do the last honor

to the corpse of their mother. They each took a graveyard spade, which

6
they otherwise used themselves to make a small kitchen garden by their

hut. They dug a grave about fifty steps away from it; with a lot of effort they

hauled the corpse in and covered it with earth and flowers. With that they

returned to their hut; there sleep, which the fatigue provided for them

through this sad work, lowered upon them some hours in a refreshing

forgetting of their grief.

On the following day Fatimah, being more sensible than her sister,

said that they must now get back to work, and told her to fill two baskets

with the laundry they had washed the day before her accident. Then they

set the baskets on their heads and took the road to Machilipatnam together.

They had hardly gone back a hundred steps when they were met by a small,

very ugly, bald-headed and humpbacked old man. However, he was

dressed quite richly, and looked at them with great interest. He seemed

close to a hundred years old and was supported by a staff, with the help of

which he nevertheless, for his great age, still plodded along stately enough.

The old man found both sisters to his taste. “Where to, you beautiful

children?” he said with a tone he sought to make as soft and sweet as

possible.

“We are going to Machilipatnam,” said the older girl.

“May I ask you, without all too much intrusiveness,” he shifted, “what

7
is your way of life and whether one could not possibly perform some

services for you?”

“Oh, good sir,” answered Fatimah, “we are only simple-minded

country girls and poor orphans. Only yesterday we lost our mother by the

unhappiest chance.” And with that she told him the story with all

circumstances, not without pouring many tears anew.

“Oh, what suffering does it to me”, said the old man, “that I had not

yet seen your mother before her death! I could have given her a secret

against all venomous wounds, which should have made her healthy again in

two days. My dear children,” he continued, “your sorrow goes to the heart,

and I offer myself to act in your father’s place for you. If you can put so

much trust in me, then leave the providing for your fate to my experience

and my good will. I confess you,” he added as he threw a look at young

Khadijah, “that I find a strong affection for this kind girl in myself. Her

first sight has excited feelings in me which I have never felt. If both of you

want to come with me, then I want to put you into a situation that is far

above your station. And you will find a reason to praise the day, eternally

happy, that you have met me.”

Here the little hunchbacked old man ended his speeches, waiting with

visible unrest for the response to him. He had, admittedly, all the reason to

8
be worried. His age and his body were not so provided that they could

make these young people want to listen to a proposal. Nevertheless, even

Fatimah already knew enough to realize that, in circumstances such as

theirs, this would not be the worst position.

The old man noticed her indecision with sadness. “My beautiful

child,” he said to her, “if you had seriously considered the danger to live

alone in such a remote area, you would not consider long to accept my

offer. Without any protection, as you are, do you believe yourselves able to

escape the traps which one will lay for your innocence? If you have enough

virtue to refuse your consent to depraved requests, then you will

nevertheless be missing the power to hold back attacks by force. With me

you have to fear no such thing. My age protects you from challenges to

myself, and my experience should guarantee you against those of other

people. Give up a tedious job that can barely provide the scantiest

maintenance for you. You should find everything with me that you could

require for the necessity and the convenience of life. And I want to say

things that will make you understand; the proposal that I make to you will

be fortunate for both you and me. Come, dear girls; you can do no better.

If your mother still lived, she would certainly give way to my reasons and

believe you safer under my protection than in the hut you inhabit.”

9
 In short, the small old man spoke so well that Fatimah started being

persuaded. “Good sir,” said she, “I believe I partially understand you and I

am inclined to make use of your goodness for me and my sister. But since

your request mostly concerns her, after the confession of your special

inclination, then I must nevertheless know her disposition beforehand,

before I can give you an exact answer. So speak, Khadijah: Do you feel

inclined to give this man’s request a hearing and to accept him for your

husband? For I consider him too honest, as he could want to deceive a few

innocent orphans to make them entrust their honor to him.”

“No, sister,“ answered Khadijah, blushing. “He is too old and too

ugly.”

The childish openness of this young girl placed Fatimah in some

embarrassment. “Dear sister,” said she, “one probably sees that you are

still at an age where one has little consideration, because you consider the

honor that this gentleman wants to show you is wrong. Instead of telling

him such impoliteness, you should consider it fortunate that you pleased

him.”

“Yes, really,” answered Khadijah weeping. “This is also something for

which one has to be glad a lot! I do not know if it is an honor for me, but I

know quite well that it is a poor delight to always have a man like this there

10
in sight.”

“You must not talk so,” said her sister.

“I cannot talk differently,” answered the younger. “If it is such a great

joy to like him, why does he not come along to you, because you are more

beautiful, nevertheless, and more sensible than me? I would probably like

to see, if he loved you, whether you would love him also.”

The little hunchbacked old man played no role during this pleasant

exchange of words. “How unlucky, nevertheless, my fate is,” he cried out in

suffering. “I have seen the most famous beauties of all the Orient and now

live to the age at which you see me, without ever letting my heart be

surprised. And now I must fall at this moment into the strongest passion

for a person who has an insurmountable dislike for me! I can see how I

prepared myself so much, and nevertheless my fate makes me follow an

inclination which pulls me away against my will.”

The eyes of the old man were full of tears as he said this, and he

seemed so moved that Fatimah, who was very tenderhearted by nature, had

to have pity on him. “Dear sir,” said she, “stop saddening yourself so! You

can’t be disturbed by the first speeches of a child who does not yet know

what feels good to it. Her mind will become riper with the years.

Admittedly you do not have the comfort of the young people any more, but

11
I take you for a valiant gentleman. Your love as your favors will still win her

indeed. In the meantime, we want to go with you, and I promise you that I

will do my best with her.”

“Fine, sister,” the little one interrupted her peevishly. “But if he

torments me and wants me to love him, then for you I will be good if I do

not run away instead.”

“No, beautiful Khadijah,” said the old man, “you should not be

tormented; I swear it by all that is holy in the world! I do not want to put

the slightest obligation on you. You should have unrestricted mastery over

everything I have. If you would like an expensive dress or any other finery,

then you will have it on the spot. Even more, if I notice that you are

annoying in my sight, then I want to spare you of it, as burdensome as I will

always find it.”

Fatimah took the floor again and said to the old man, “Then, as my

sister does not seem disinclined to go with you on the promised terms, only

let us carry this laundry first to the people it belongs to. We want to be with

you again soon.”

“Oh, I beg you please!” shouted the old man. “If you do not want to

take the life from me, do not take from me your lovely sister! It is now

caution or punishment enough; I fear to never see again you if you both

12
leave me, and that I would hurt myself to death. Will you come back again

soon? So leave her with me now, until you come back again! What do you

have to get? Could you have a suspicion…”

“No, no,” Khadijah cried in a hurry. “I go with my sister; I will not

stay alone with him.”

“And why not?” said Fatimah, who wanted to give a sample of their

promised good services to the old man. “Why don’t you want to stay with

him? I will be back here in a moment. I ask you, sister, remain and wait

here for me. You are the proof to the gentleman of your guilty confidence,

in order to comfort him over the unpleasant things that you have said to

him.”

Khadijah, as difficult as it was for her stay with him, nevertheless did

not dare oppose the will of her older sister, whom she regarded as a second

mother. Fatimah took both baskets and got herself on the path. Afterwards

she happily recommended he proceed carefully, due to the stubbornness of

the small person who she left behind with him.

Instead of coming back soon as she had promised, she did not come

again the whole day. Khadijah’s unrest had nothing to compare to, and as

she saw the night finally fall, she lost all patience and overwhelmed the

poor old man with accusations.

13
 “You alone bring us misfortune,” said she. “Without your annoying

acquaintance I would now be with my sister. Whatever accident might

happen to her, I would rather it keep me from her than to be here with

you.”

These words were painful to the old man. He did not know how he

should answer, he was so afraid of enraging the young person even more.

As he was well aware, she had only too much cause to have bad feelings

against him. Nevertheless, he did his best to calm her, but everything he

did only heightened her unrest and strengthened her dislike of him. She

told him he should be quiet, that she wanted to go to Machilipatnam in

spite of the darkness of the night and a great rain that had occurred in the

meantime. Ultimately it was even more not to have to spend the night with

the old man, rather than from desire to get news from her sister, however

much this might be.

However, he eventually dissuaded her from it by suggesting this to

her: Fatimah will probably come back, as she saw the thunderstorm

coming, stayed with one of her acquaintances, and tomorrow morning will

infallibly come back. In short, he was finally able to, despite her dislike and

stubbornness, so much over her, that she followed after him to her hut.

There, over a light meal of dry dates and well water, they could talk of

14
nothing but the unlucky events of the day. The young girl did nothing the

whole night but cry and cry; one can imagine how to her old lover felt

nearby.

As soon as the day began, they left the hut and went together to

Machilipatnam. They asked everywhere about Fatimah where Khadijah

knew that she had brought laundry, but nobody could tell her what had

become of her. They were not content with this. They searched for her

from lane to lane and asked in all houses for her, but their search was futile.

This darkness above Fatimah’s fate put them in extreme distress. They

could not doubt that the poor girl must have met something extraordinary.

Her younger sister remained completely inconsolable and said the hardest

things in the world to the old man, as much as he wanted to try to calm her.

They spent seven or eight days more going through the whole

neighboring area. There was no castle, no house, and no hut for four miles

around where they would not have looked, but always with equally bad

result. Finally, because they did not know how to help themselves

differently, they returned to the hut, completely in low spirits. As the little

old man saw now, Khadijah grieved without measure over the loss of her

sister. He swore to her with tearful eyes that she leave and to follow him

into the city where he usually stayed, from a place where everything fed

15
their pain and where he could not have protected her either.

He put forth all possible reasons to her, and since she gave him no answer,

he started again from scratch and did so long and so urgently with her until

she explained herself, more from despair than good will; he would like to

bring her forth, to where he is popular. They got on the road, but before

they went away, the old man wrote on the door with a coal where he lead

Khadijah, so Fatimah would have news of them if she possibly came back.

After that they locked the door and put the key in a neighboring hollow tree

as they always otherwise did with it before.

The town where the humpbacked old man thought to lead Khadijah

to was only a three-day journey from Machilipatnam, but a man of a

hundred years and a girl of twelve cannot make daylong journeys. They

spent seven days on it and both were completely exhausted by fatigue and

hunger when they arrived. The first thing that Dahy did (so the old man

was called) was send someone into the city in the greatest hurry to obtain

the best that one could find, to refresh his young friend and himself. After

their hunger was satisfied, he led her to a very fine room that he had

selected for her, and he himself went to rest in another room.

On the next day he went to the shops and bought an abundance of

beautiful trinkets with clothes for Khadijah, and to serve her an old slave,

16
one recommended to him as a great master in art of styling women’s hair.

Khadijah could not be surprised enough at the change of her circumstances.

Though she certainly noticed what attitudes of the old man had for her, she

did not understand how she had gotten such unlimited rule over him. Now

and again, if she thought that she nevertheless was guilty of all the

advantages she possessed, a flow of gratitude rose in her heart. Meanwhile,

she herself could nevertheless also say that concerning this, the fondness of

a decrepit lover towards her did not decrease disgust for his body. What

she meanwhile liked most of all about him was the large difference from

how he first met her, and that he, recalling his promise, she spared him

from being unpleasant before him as much as possible.

Several weeks had already passed before Khadijah only seemed to

collect herself again to some extent. The memory of her sister embittered

everything that could have made her present situation pleasant, and always

the last words of her dying mother occurred to her, who had so severely

instructed her to never separate from her sister. Nevertheless, the feeling

of her pain meanwhile became bit by bit a little duller, and probably

contributed to pleasant diversions which her Dahy sought to provide, no

less than did time and the vivacity of youth.

One day, as she had tired herself by going for a walk, she lay down

17
earlier than usual. She fell into a deep sleep, and towards the morning,

when the images that represent the soul are the purest and most vivid, she

had a dream that made a very strong impression upon her. In her dream,

there appeared to her a young man of extraordinary beauty, whose

expression and curly blond hair enchanted her. While she looked at him

with great attention, he spoke to her, “Where do you think are, Khadijah?

Could you forget your Fatimah so soon? Do you believe the beautiful

dresses that Dahy has for you to admire relieve you of the duty to find her?

No, certainly not, and I say to you, you cannot otherwise be happy unless

you come and seek her on the island of Sumatra. Look at me well, for you

see he who fate has intended for your husband.”

With these words the handsome young man disappeared, and

Khadijah awoke. She could hardly convince herself against the notion that

it has been real and no dream, so deeply the lovely picture had been

imprinted in her soul. She believed the handsome young man with his

curly-curled blond hair was still before her to see, and his voice still

sounded like music in her ears. She could not believe that there could be a

mortal of such beauty in the whole world. Regardless, her faith in her

dream was so strong that she immediately told old Dahy and even expected

him, on the very same day, to begin the journey to Sumatra.

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 He also had been made to be afraid, perhaps now from real conviction

or from obligation towards the little visionary. Her vision seemed

somewhat more than a mere game of fantasy, and he himself might have

some cause against the handsome competitor. Nevertheless, he explained

himself thus, that he had no other desire than to satisfy hers, and that he

was ready to go with her to the island of Sumatra.

Khadijah prepared for the departure with such impatience that she

hardly gave him time to make the necessary arrangements. Before they

went by ship, however, they wanted to make a journey back to the hut to see

whether they would find any trace that Fatimah had returned in the

meantime. But they found everything as they had left it, and they

confirmed this fact with the resolution to obey the instructions of the

dream. Thus they went back to Machilipatnam, where Dahy rented a small

cabin on a ship from Achem, which was contracted to go with a rich load

under sails. It provided all comforts that can lighten the hardship of a long

sea voyage.

Little Khadijah’s eyes opened wide, for she saw for the first time in

her life nothing but sky and water. But the longing for her sister bolstered

her courage. A certain feeling, made of curiosity and love for the handsome

young man that appeared to her in the dream, probably also contributed to

19
it. She herself did not want to confess that she brooded hopes in her little

heart, which she herself sometimes found absurd. But she was still curious,

how this all would end itself, and every moment she asked the old man how

long they still had until they arrived at Sumatra.

To distract her impatience as much as possible and to turn her

attention to other things, he looked out everywhere, such as his knowledge

gave him and the great journeys that he had made, he used for her

immediate amusement. And as her habit had made the nastiness of his

form and his great age somewhat bearable, so she listened to him gladly

and found even more pleasure at his association, the more she came to her

own understanding by herself and in that he became ever fairer. The new

commitment, in which she thus became guilty over him, increased with the

new virtues that she received with her own eyes. The attention and

admiration that instilled in her the virtues of his spirit increased even in

those circumstances with her ability to become more aware of it.

One also included now the trust as well, that he was always kind to

her and had inspired proper conduct towards her from the finest feelings,

and an assured friendliness that no one can break, to support each one who

is extraordinarily loved, however disinclined we may feel ourselves to

return their love.

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 So one will find it understandable, as this all unexpectedly became a

kind of friendship that sometimes expressed itself in such an affectionate

way. The good old man almost had to apologize if he himself sometimes

pretended with the excessive hope that he could arguably be loved in the

end—a hope that he in his special situation, despite all its unlikelihood,

could forgive himself over as it was the only one that made his existence

bearable for him.

In this sweet delusion he persuaded himself that it would now be the

time to leave her ignorant no longer of whom he might be, how a strange

fate had made him her lover and how much he earned her compassion.

“Would it be then the first time,” he said to himself, “that compassion had

been in the heart of a girl in love?” The good Dahy forgot how he looked at

this moment, his small hunchbacked body, his watery eyes, his bald head,

and his hundred years!

“Khadijah love,” he said to her one day on a beautiful, clear evening.

She was taking in with her eyes the descending sun, which made a

completely delightful pageant on the sea. With that they withdrew

themselves into their little room. “As decrepit and dilapidated I must seem

to you also in this form, you will be not a little surprised still if I tell you

that I am immortal.”

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 “Immortal?” said Khadijah as she looked at him very carefully, with a

tone and a look of such astonishment and disbelief blended together in very

equal parts. “If you were not him who said it to me…” she continued and

paused all at once.

“Nothing is more certain,” ventured Dahy and was silent again in

order to notice what happened in the soul of the young girl from such an

unexpected confession.

“As I deplore you from the heart,” she replied sadly, “it would be cruel

to wish you luck for an advantage in such circumstances, a property that

yourself may treat as impossible.”

“It would also be,” continued Dahy, “the most intolerable burden for

me, if I was actually what I seem. But you will be even more surprised,

beautiful Khadijah, if I tell you that you see me wearing a foreign form. My

own is, without glory to report, nicer, instilling your sex with love instead of

horror, and is all the more certain to always please as it has the advantage

of an eternal youth. Lilies and roses bloom on my cheeks, and, in a word,

everything that one calls handsome and charming is poured out over my

face and about my whole person.”

“Dear heaven,” cried the girl (in this instant the beautiful young man

from her dreams appeared again before her eyes), “how can you hesitate

22
even a moment to take such an favorable shape again?”

“Unfortunately, this is not in my power,” replied Dahy with a deep

sigh. “It is just my misfortune, but I've never felt so sad, dear Khadijah,

than since it has brought me before your eyes in such a repulsive disguise.”

“And it will never stop, this misfortune?” she said.

“That is only up to you,” he replied.

“To me?” ventured Khadijah with new astonishment. “How should I

understand this? What can I do to make such an incomprehensible miracle

happen?”

“Nothing, as dear it is to me,” answered Dahy as he looked at her with

an expression of tenderness, which in a face like his own became the

horrible grimace and so had just the reverse effect.

“If this is,” she said, “so I gain very much, you will remain as you are

forever. But, my good sir, how can you want me to put faith in such

incomprehensible things?”

“If you will only listen to me, my queen, you will doubt no longer the

truth of my statements.

“I have already told you enough to notice that I belong to the kind of

beings they call ‘genies.’ I have a brother who is as handsome by nature

and as mighty as I am. We are twins; his name is Adis, mine Dahy. Our

23
inborn level of ability let us control everything on this side of the moon, but

this would not prevent us from being subject to the whim of a certain

Brahmin of Visapur, who has acquired an unlimited rule over our kind

himself by his wisdom.

“To our misfortune, he showed a special affection for me and my

brother, and as evidence of his confidence, he appointed us to be guardians

of a wench, who he fiercely loved but whose loyalty to him seemed a little

unsure. Perhaps he would have better done to trust her without guards or

at least to admit none to her person. Meanwhile everything went well for a

very long while. We provided our service most punctually, the lady always

had one of us at her side, and we did not note the slightest thing, neither in

her inclinations nor in her manner, which could make us suspicious of her

loyalty to the Brahmin.

“But unexpectedly she fell into a kind of the melancholy which soon

changed into soft, sad languishing. She sighed in midst the festivities that

the Brahmin threw for her sake. Now and again she looked at us, at me and

my brother, as if she wanted to ask us for pity with a secret grief that

consumed her. We were both so far from thinking of illness as we asked

each other about the cause of this change, under which her beauty already

began to noticeably suffer. Despite all our genie understanding of almost

24
everything, we were under the delusion that we ourselves could be the

innocent cause of her concealed illness.

“And yet, it was not otherwise. The poor lady, who had us daily

before her eyes, maybe just from boredom, finally herself could not fight off

being attentive to our form, and this attention became her misfortune. She

herself might even talk about what she wanted. She herself knew how to do

(she confessed us later) her beautiful blond hair, which fell in large

naturally frizzy curls off her shoulders and flowed downwards. This did not

bring out our sensibility.”

Young Khadijah, who herself remembered her dream through this

train of thought, regarded the little old man with large eyes and felt that his

story started to interest her.

“In short,” continued the old man, “the lady fell in love with us

without us noticing any of it, and time, from which one always hopes the

best, did little to lessen her problem, which was much more worse every

day with her. It would be incomprehensible, as Kansu (as the Brahmin was

called), with all his great wisdom, did not see more clearly in the matters of

his mistress, if one did not know that even the greatest minds are people

who never see what lies before their feet.

“Finally the Brahmin noticed as little of it as we did and went on a

25
journey by himself past the borders of Greater Tartary, where he presided

over a meeting of wise masters, without showing the least concern for his

beloved Farsana. We decided, whatever it might cost, Adis and I, for us to

use his absence to find out her secret. The shortest way seemed to us to

make her unlock her heart to us independently. Therefore we talked about

it so. We pleaded with her to make her illness no longer a mystery to us.

And we offered, all in the strongest terms, what would always be in our

power, to restore her peace of mind.

“What Adis first said, when he started speaking in our two names,

seemed to make her greatly embarrassed. Alone, as she had a reason to

open herself to us, she received what she sought for a long time. Thus she

took hold of herself on the spot and decided to leave the great opportunity

we presented unused.

“ ‘You are too noble, kind Adis,’ she answered him, ‘for you to worry

about an unfortunate one who feels unworthy of this honor. Leave me, I

beg you, the poor comfort to weep in secret over an illness which cannot be

helped.’

“ ‘What are you saying, beautiful lady?’ I shouted, completely

surprised. ‘Your illness should not be helped? Thus I do not understand

really what illness can this be, for I know no incurable one.’

26
 “ ‘Mine,’ she answered, ‘is of such a special kind that if it could be

cured by something in the world, your compassion would be the only one

that I might hope could do this.’

“ ‘Oh, if it lies only in our compassion,’ I shouted a little too rashly,

‘you can count on it! But how could our very compassion help you? We will

not be very content until this deep melancholy, which wears you down bit

by bit, is helped. If any concealed physical illness is the cause, you know

that the secret healing powers of nature are available to us, or should the

manner of the Brahmin is not enough to deserve your value and your love

around him. Also it is not unknown to you how much we are capable of

over him. So speak, kind mistress. Put the condition on us, to prove our

busy eagerness to you and to us thereby together about the Brahmin, our

master, and deserving to be around a person who is so dear to him.’

“Farsana sighed out with these words. ‘My health is not affected,’ she

replied, ‘and Kansu has given me no reason me to complain about him.

Nevertheless I suffer in the cruelest way, and I do not know, my dear Dahy,

whether you, with all the eagerness that you assured me, would be so ready

to treat my suffering, if you knew it.’

“ ‘Ah, my mistress,’ shouted my brother, ‘you do us the greatest

injustice. If you put us to the test, then you will soon think more favorably

27
of us!’

“ ‘And if I told you know,’ she answered blushing, ‘that you both all

alone are the cause of the illness you want to heal…?’

“ ‘Who? Us?’ we both cried at the same time in total astonishment,

but still far from understanding due to the strangest blindness. ‘How can it

be possible,’ I added in, ‘that we could be sources of a cause which so totally

against our intention?’

“ ‘Such a question, after that, which I already told you, should

admittedly close my mouth forever,’ ventured the lady. ‘But I already let

myself out too far, in order not to complete my confession. Know then, it is

because you want to know, overly gracious brothers, that I was not strong

enough to stand against the effect of your irritation. I have exerted all my

powers in vain to put a halt to your daily growing symptoms, and this

resistance finally brought me here, to where you see me.’

“She accompanied these words with a stream of tears which seemed

to fan the fire of her eyes only stronger. Our dismay with such an

unexpected confession is indescribable, but we recovered soon enough to

convince her that she dared not hope she could tempt us to join in her

misdeed against the Brahmin, our master. We ourselves were insistent in

the gamble to make her consider how she should really feel about her

28
injustices against Kansu, and the terrible consequences that her passion for

her and us would have. But it had come already too far with her. She heard

us with serenity, as the confession, so she seemed to us, had relieved her

heart from an oppressive burden, but our ideas did not make the slightest

impression on her mind. She flattered herself for a while with the hope to

receive by her persistence and by constant repetitive attacks the victory

over us finally; but as she saw herself cheated in her expectation from one

day to the next, so she went to ruin again in her previous state.

“Unfortunately, the explicit order of the Brahmin obliged us not to let

her out of our sight. So her longings always received new food, and every

day and every hour we found her complaints and criticisms set out for us.

The strangest of all was that her passion was not just for one of us, but was

directed with the same ferocity towards both. Also about this, as shocking

it always was to us, it did not help her perception. She cast the blame on

her disaster and on the impossibility of preferring one of us to the other.

She could and would never be calm, she said, unless we both divided her

boundless love between us.

“With the intimate friendship that made us almost like one person, no

jealousy could take place between us. In short, no resistance would help

here. If we could be cruel enough to let her languish even longer without

29
helping, no other comfort would remain to her but that we would see soon

enough at the end of her wretched life.

“It was not a light thing, dear Khadijah, to be against the combined

effect of the irritations of the beautiful Farsana. The sight of her suffering

inspired compassion in us, and we endured the unending storms that she

had against our constancy. Nevertheless I always remained firm, though I

deplored the blindness and the stubbornness of the poor unfortunate one

wholeheartedly. But who could dare that he, in such a situation, under

such temptations, always would remain master over his senses?

“One evening, as I was alone with her and saw her in low spirits even

more than usual, I asked what new cause she could probably have to grieve

so.

“ ‘Cruel Dahy,’ she answered me, ‘how can you ask me such a

question? Do I need another reason to be all on edge when this unrelenting

strength is used against me?’

“ ‘Unlike my brother?’ I asked, surprised. ‘How should I understand

this?’

“ ‘He has done everything for me that I expected from him,’ she

ventured in a languishing voice.

“I believed I heard wrongly. ‘How?’ I cried. ‘My brother Adis? He

30
would satisfy your desires?’

“ ‘Yes,’ she ventured quite coldly. ‘And what is it about that fact that

puts you in such astonishment? Do you think everyone should be so

hardhearted as you? He could be softened by my tears, he has opened his

heart to love, and he is happy and now only regrets that he lost so much

time where it could have been him.’

“ ‘And you are not contented yet?’ I shouted with fierceness. ‘Do you

not have enough of a victim of battle and hope you would also seduce me

too, just as you seduced the all-too-yielding Adis?’

“ ‘Yes, my dear Dahy,’ she answered as she shot a look at me where

every arrow of the most fiery passion was pushed together. ‘Yes, I still lack

only your heart to be happy. Woe is me! Has all the suffering I have

endured for you for so long finally not able to earn a little pity from you?’

“ ‘O Farsana,’ I answered, ‘what you tell me persuades me that you do

not love my brother. Impossible, for if you loved him, could you still also

sigh for another?’

“ ‘I adore him,’ she ventured. ‘A hundred times I wanted to devote my

life to prove my love to him. But even this boundless love that I feel for him

has again kindled the strength of that which I carry for you. How often I

have already told you it: I cannot love one of you less than the other.

31
Everything that Adis feels for me is so dear to my heart cannot make me

happy if I am not able to inspire you with the received sensations. With a

word, dear worthy Dahy: I die if you yourself do not let me ask. Can you be

more unfeeling than your brother or are you ashamed to follow his

example? Oh, listen again to stop me if you do want me to stab myself now

with a dagger before your eyes!’

“With these words she collapsed in a stream of tears at my feet and

showered me with such vivid displays of the hottest passion that I had to

fear she would make good on her threat if I opposed her wishes any longer.

I confess it, I was overpowered; I lost the strength to resist any longer. In

short, I became as weak as my brother, whose seduction to her the cunning

Farsana (as he confessed to me afterwards) had served the trick on both of

us. A natural consequence of the victory she gained over us was that her

health restored itself in a short time. She got her whole liveliness back,

became more beautiful than ever and would give us a wealth of love, that

was large enough for both of us, maybe made both of us happy, if she could

have brought the accusations, with which our hearts punished our

disloyalty to the Brahmin, to silence. With all this, for a few days we had a

pleasant life, when our carelessness plunged us at once into disaster, the

consequences of which I must bear up to this hour.

32
 “Among the servants of the Brahmin was a very ugly black slave called

Torgut, whose usual task was to groom a Tartar mare which Farsana was in

the habit to ride if she wanted to travel by herself outside. This ugly

monster arrived boldly, raised his eyes up to his mistress and made a

declaration of love to her. So badly built was he in his body, as nature had

given him instead a very amusing spirit. If he walked along thus beside his

mistress sitting on horseback, he was in habit to care for her with the all

kinds of droll little stories in which Farsana found great pleasure.

“One day it occurred to him to gossip with her about several maidens

which he pretended to have enjoyed pleasures. ‘How, Torgut,’ said the lady

with laughter, ‘can someone with a body like yours boast about his luck

with the ladies?’

“ ‘Why not?’ answered the black person. ‘Am I possibly not as good as

another? Oh, truly, if that were, as I miscalculated, for I got it into my

head, beautiful lady, to increase the list of my conquests also with your

name.’

“With these words of the black person, Farsana broke out in a still

greater laughter, as she did not think any differently, as if he said it only to

give her pleasure. ‘You have intentions on me?’ she said. ‘It is good for me

to know that. I come before such a dangerous man as you are, I take care to

33
know.’

“Torgut answered in the taken tone, and so it came to nothing but

jokes. The crude fellow made seriousness from joke and acted such that

Farsana saw herself forced. He was not only very serious and with the

contempt that he was entitled to refuse, but, as he was impudent enough,

he took her indignation still for joke, even should she threaten to complain

about his gall to the Brahmin.

“The black person became vicious over an encounter that his

supposed merits so poorly matched. The good opinion he had of himself

did not let him understand that Farsana could have resisted him if her

heart had not been already captured by another favored lover. He planned

to watch her thoroughly, and he succeeded so well that soon our secret

understanding with her was no more a secret for him.

“From envy and thirst for revenge he revealed it to the Brahmin. The

thing seemed so unbelievable that he only wanted to believe the testimony

of his own eyes. In order to make sure about us, he pretended again to take

a journey, but he came back untimely enough for us, to surprise me and my

brother Adis with Farsana in the bath. The precautions we had made so no

one could discover us were of no help against the wisdom of the Brahmin.

All doors opened to him, the magic fog that surrounded us melted away,

34
and all at once Kansu stood there as the most dreadful judge before us.

“ ‘Unworthy,’ he spoke as he threw at look at me and my brother. He

was already at the beginning of his revenge. ‘The cruelest torments would

be too light a punishment for your crime. But I want you to fall down into

such a miserable condition as you are not able to die, that privilege of the

nature of your kind, when you should mourn for the extreme misfortune!’

“And immediately, without wanting to listen to a word of our apology,

he began his incantations. In an instant, the chamber where we were filled

with the thickest darkness. We heard the thunder rolling with awful noise

overhead, the earth trembled under our feet, and dreadful, roaring

whirlwinds seemed to announce the downfall of nature. We remained of

two whole hours in this gruesome darkness and in shaking expectation of

the punishment that would be prepared for us. Finally it became as

cheerful as before. But how great was our astonishment when we both, I

and my brother, instead of in a magnificent palace and the exquisite bath,

found ourselves in the middle of a dry heath, both covered in rags and in

the form of two small misshapen old men, such as I, beautiful Khadijah,

appear before you in this instant.

“ ‘Thankless,’ said Kansu. ‘From this moment you are robbed of all

privileges of your nature and are lowered to the state of usual people, as you

35
seem to be. You will not know any more, not be capable of any more than

they, and death alone excluded, you will be subjected to all chances and all

hardship of the mortals.’

After the Brahmin had pronounced this judgment over us, he now

demanded to know from us the circumstances we committed treason

towards him. We told him everything from the outset with the greatest

sincerity: into what confusion Farsana’s explanation set us, what trouble he

brought ourselves to bring her into other thoughts, how long and seriously

we resisted against her and our own inclination, what the lady uses for a

trick to seduce us, and as painful the thought is to us, to have so badly

betrayed his trust.

“This account and the sincerity of our regret changed the Brahmin to

milder attitudes towards us. He seemed to blame himself that he had

exposed our loyalty to such a dangerous test. And as we had been always

very dear to him, he could hardly restrain himself from looking at us with

compassion.

“ ‘My children,’ he spoke, ‘it is no longer in my power to return to you

your previous figure unconditionally, but I want you to so much that I can

try to make the harshness of your destiny bearable. You will regain your

natural body with all its abilities as soon as each of you has found a girl less

36
than twenty years who loves him.’

“Discouraged, we turned our eyes down low at these words, for he

needed only one view of us under such a condition to banish all hope for us

forever. Kansu guessed our thoughts.

“ ‘As unlikely it may also always be,’ he said, ‘that you could inspire

love in this form, nevertheless, it is not impossible. Live with this hope and

be assured that in no other way can you return to your previous conditions!

Now go, children, and fulfill your destiny! You must separate, so that

everyone can search on his side that he necessarily has.’

“Here he assigned a certain place to each of us for the usual residence,

about sixty miles from each other, allowed us to keep respectable clothes

and each the value of fifty thousand sequins he gave in gold and jewels from

his treasure, so that we could live out our banishment in leisure. Here he

embraced us and wished us a quick end of our unhappy state.

“But against the poor Farsana he remained relentless. He

transformed her into a frog and exiled her to a marsh. After he had

discovered by his art that this had happened out of bare thirst for revenge

by the traitor towards his mistress, he gave her the slave Torgut for her

misfortune companion. In such a way the accuser and the accused were

both condemned and transformed into frogs, to spend her remaining life in

37
the solitary marsh where the hope of tormenting each other was, at most,

the only wretched consolation which was left to them.

“Without stopping you, dearest Khadijah, by describing the sad

parting, where we brothers had with so little hope of seeing each other

again in the next millennium, we left independently. I want to begin the

continuation of my story right from the city, where Kansu had directed me

to the main residence. My first concern was fifty thousand sequins (as the

capital on which I might live longer than I wished) to support the task.

Then it succeeded there so well for me that I was able in less than three or

four years, without disadvantage of my main funds, to make a completely

good profit.

“If the prophecy of the Brahmin should come true, I had to find a

young person who would have such odd taste to have an affectionate

inclination for me. Fortunately the beautiful sex was not as locked up in

our city as in most Eastern countries, but lived in a decent freedom. Every

day I had opportunities to see ladies. I made nice little gifts to them,

delivered them honors in small portions and with every public

entertainment. In short, I did my best, under the influence of the unlucky

star that pursued me, to distinguish myself. In this way I quickly made

myself popular with everyone.

38
 “ ‘The good honest skin!’ one said. ‘He is made of nothing but

cheerfulness and good mood. What he must have only been in his youth, as

he, with a foot in the grave, is still such a great lover of pleasure!’

“The women raised me sky-high, above all, and presented me to their

men as an example. The grumblers among the men were the only ones who

scoffed at my conduct.

“ ‘But what a fool the man must be,’ they said, ‘who still chases after

pleasure he can no longer enjoy at his age!’

“I, who best knew my place, how and why, let the people say what

they wanted, and went on my way. Meanwhile, though I also did such and

though I gave myself much trouble, I did not want to be at all with the love-

afflicted. I did not limit myself to the city where I lived, although it there

was no lack of young ladies. I made journeys of more than fifty miles

around.

“But all that I gained there was the belief I could not like, an idea that

made me almost senseless without nevertheless overwhelming my patience.

More than two hundred years have already passed in this vain search. One

did not finally know anymore what one should think of me. I have already

seen the world young again and bury four times all those who have seen me

in her childhood just so old and died as her great-grandchildren. Everyone

39
said in each other’s ears, ‘What kind of person is this? One sees no change

in him.’ The oldest men pointed me out to their grandchildren with their

finger. ‘See there the good old Dahy,’ they said. ‘Don’t you pretend any

that I have ever known him young. I think he was always as old and frail as

you see him now, and in my youth I heard my grandfather say he had never

seen him different.’

“You can easily imagine, my love, that I took little pleasure in being

such a miracle in the eyes of the people. The hope, which Kansu had left

me, meanwhile continued to strengthen, for it already had deceived me ever

longer. I always made new, similar, likely always futile journeys, and so it

finally happened, as I was at the point even of turning from Machilipatnam

again towards home that I came to you and your sister on the path. What I

said to you at the time, lovely Khadijah, showed you clearly enough how

much your sight enchanted me. But unfortunately, I saw at the same time

only too well how unpleasant mine was to you!”

The voice of the good old man broke with this idea. The talking left,

and Khadijah, who was very stirred by his misfortune, would have gladly

told him such comfortingly, and told him really everything, what her pitiful

and perceptive heart could know of him, not only the only one on which his

luck depended. And nevertheless, this alone was what he longed to hear.

40
They sometimes had small arguments about it, in which both their patience

threatened to break more than once. Dahy lamented himself over her

severity and Khadijah over his unfairness, and their fight always ended

itself with the fact that both were annoyed at themselves: he, that he

wanted the impossible from her, she, that it was impossible for her to love a

man she had gladly helped and yet might see.

Incidentally, if the lovely girl sighed (which happened often enough),

it did not always happen out of compassion with poor Dahy. Her small

heart had its very own anxieties. It was impossible for her to get the

handsome young man with the tightly curled blond hair out of her mind;

his image stole some hours from her sleep. His similarity with the

description that the old Dahy had made of what he was before his

transformation, and the words “Treat me well, for you see him, the fate

your husband intended for you” aroused her thoughts, from which she did

not know how to help herself. “Could it really be,” she sometimes thought,

“that Dahy is even the husband who is fated for me?” How friendly she

found him in the form that he had appeared to her in the dream!

But then she needed only one single look at the Dahy who actually

stood before her to feel that it would always be impossible for her to fulfill

the condition under which she could return his original figure and

41
everlasting youth to him. And nevertheless a youth with this form was

fated to be her husband! And Kansu had made hope for the unfortunate

brothers, that they would finally find the girls who would put an end to

their enchantment!

Meanwhile the ship they were on had put back in fourteen days more

than five hundred nautical miles, and, according to Dahy’s calculation, they

could not be very far from the coast where their course was directed. Then

the wind shifted itself suddenly and a violent storm drove her with such

force into the wide sea that it was impossible for her to hold a certain

course any longer. She was driven far back and forth for several days and

finally thrown to an island that was known to neither the ship’s captain nor

one of his people.

They saw a big town that rose in the form of half a moon about the

shore and formed a spacious and comfortable harbor. They had hardly

arrived at the same when they saw themselves surrounded from all sides by

a multitude of small boats, from which an infinite multitude of manlike

things swarmed forth which scrambled upon their ships with unbelievable

agility.

Our travelers had not seen such strange creatures in their lives. They

were all small, ugly, and badly built and were ridiculously distorted in the

42
facial formation, such a grotesque liveliness in their movements and

gestures. In a word, they were somewhat part-ape in their whole nature, so

if they had not spoken a language that was known our travelers, one would

have considered them a kind of forest demon instead of people. Their

clothes were as strange as their bodies and their manners. They had tall

three-cornered hats of multicolored cardboard on their heads and carried

long skirts of cotton stuff that were painted over and over with yellow, blue,

and green blobs and grotesque figures and increased the outrageous

appearance of these odd islanders not a little.

In few moments the whole ship was so filled with them that the

people in the ships could hardly move and, as opposition here would not

have helped, they all had to start being allowed what they liked. It soon

appeared that they, by virtue of the laws of their island, treated everything

that was on the ship as their earned property. Accordingly, what they did

first was put all members of the crew in a long row to look at one after the

other one from the front and in the back. They very attentively examined

the hair and teeth and especially the wrinkles if they found them on a face,

which they counted with great accuracy. The people would have died

laughing over the grimaces they made as well, if the astonishment and the

uncertainty of what would become of them in the hands of such monsters

43
had not been made earnestly against their will.

They soon started selecting some old sailors, and seemed to pick them

out with special esteem when they saw Dahy, Khadijah, and the old slave

appear, who had still been hidden up to now in the cabin and had not

arrived in the rows. At this sight the commander came, one who held a

substantial position at the court of the queen of this island, over the delight

of all but himself. Particularly his eyes stayed on the old slave, who he

found so kind at first sight, that he decided on the spot to send him to the

forefront of his harem. He threw himself at their feet, explained to them his

passion in the fieriest expressions, and urged them to receive the offerings

of his heart favorably. Since it would have been in vain here to want to

create ill will, the old slave surrendered with good style and made himself

thereby, so it seemed, the happiest of all men. He immediately handed over

to them the closest among his servants, told him that he would stand

among them, and suggested to him over all to be careful that nobody should

take the slightest freedom with him.

The wise Dahy did not know how he himself could explain such a

perverted taste. “Women must be very rare on this island,” he said to

himself, “for even an old piece of furniture is more capable than this slave

of making such a strong impression.”

44
 This thought, because of Khadijah, put him in great discomfort, the

irritations of which would have inevitably disastrous consequences for him.

But it soon appeared that he himself had worried in vain. His young lover

did not have anything that gave her value in the eyes of the islanders, and if

she ran some risk with them, then it was not the least like that which he

feared. The commander had hardly allowed the old slave to be led away to

his harem when by chance he let fall a look at the young person. Surprised

to see her so richly dressed, he said in a rough tone to her, “For such an ugly

little animal you are dressed well enough, small girl!” And immediately he

ordered to one of his servants to lead away the nasty thing to his servants’

quarters and to consign her to the lowest service.

Such an unworthy treatment was more than the good girl, who had

always been used to the most affectionate encounters, could endure. She

broke out in a stream of tears and asked her old, destitute protector with

lifted hands to take care of her. The motion that he made at this moment

towards her, and his nervous shouting, as he saw them dragging away by

force, all at once attracted the attention of the islanders to him. His small,

totally crooked body, his short outward-bent legs, his wrinkles and watery

eyes, his green-yellow, shriveled skin, the hairy warts which covered his

face—in short, everything that was revolting to Khadijah and disgusting

45
about his person—became the object of the admiration of these absurd

people.

For a moment the commander forgot the affluence of his dignity and

let himself be carried away by the general enthusiasm. But he immediately

took control of himself again, threw himself to the feet of the admired old

man’s feet, tossed his pointed hat of cardboard against the ground, and

asked him in the most respectful terms for forgiveness that he had not yet

shown him the honor he was due.

“I, in my place, admit,” he continued, “that, more than your

attendants, I was too strongly dazzled by the brilliance of the beautiful lady

who is now in my harem, too powerful for myself to remain. But however

much I’m used to it, I must confess that all your beauty surpasses what this

island has ever seen. Allow one to lead you into the palace of our queen

Shahrbanu. I am certain that this great princess will be charmed by the

sight of you and will show you every compliment to which you are entitled.”

The commander wanted to continue, to tout to him the good fortune

that he expected, when Dahy, losing his patience, cried out to him and said,

“Instead of chatting before me such vulgar things, give me the young person

again, who you’ve taken away from me!”

“Who?” replied the commander. “The little changeling? Ah, nice old

46
man, you believe that yours are worthier. You now think only about it as

you want to please our great queen, before whom we are in the process of

leading you to.”

With these words he and his lieutenant grabbed the good old man

under the arms, and led him, however much he himself also resisted,

towards the palace of the queen.

Dahy regarded the force that one needed against him as a thoughtless

mockery of his body and his age laid on through painful observations.

“What an unfortunate fate!” he said to himself as one dragged him away.

“Who would think that a genie of this weakness and imperfection could be

so humiliated? It is indeed not the most bearable outcome of my

misfortune that must leave me fallen, to serve the children of Adam as a

musical instrument.”

So natural this thought of his was, though up until now it had been

missing, that it had been appreciated by the islanders as their right. For in

fact what they said to him was, for them, always completely serious. The

queen herself, as soon as she saw him, could not contain herself, to admire

him and to reveal to him in the most flattering expressions the passion that

she began to feel for him. She happily praised the day on which her

empire’s salvation would happen, to have a visit from such a wonderful

47
person. And if she forced herself not to immediately show him the whole

range of tenderness that he inspired in her, then she said just enough

around the courtiers of what came from her heart not to leave them in

uncertainty. And these understood their trade too well, for they would

approve of the first sign of the attitudes of the queen.

The old Dahy was overwhelmed after this by the most excessive

marks of respect that were showered and, finally the great ones of the

empire paid homage to him, with bent knees and caps taken off, on the

instruction of the queen, tremendously, as one towards the highest official

of an administrative district. She accompanied him to the dwelling she had

instructed, into a magnificent furnished chamber with multicolored straw

mats that she chose completely by herself for him.

Once the courtiers had again departed, the good queen could not wait

any longer to give her charming guest a secret visit and for him, by virtue of

her royal privilege, to do a dear request. The old man, as weak as the

supposed mockery also was, with all reverence he replied at first that a lady

of her rank was guilty of a mild joke. As he saw from her answers that it

was really serious and her majesty became even more fiery and urgent, the

more he withdrew himself. So the bile overflowed on him finally; with

disregard of all respect, he could no longer keep himself from saying things

48
to her that no queen yet would be told and no queen, as much she also

might be possessed by the speaker, could listen to with composure.

Nevertheless, she held back her displeasure and made various attempts to

bring him gently to better ideas. But as nothing at all would catch and

Dahy became ever more insulting in his expressions, so she left to call the

captain of her guard.

“Take for me,” she said to him, “this old man into the black tower,

where he may provide companionship for the other, who has defamed the

tenderness of my sister Mulkara. She will find opportunity there to let him

regret that they wanted to play cruelly with us.” With these words her

majesty with proper pride went away, and her order was carried out

immediately.

Dahy let himself be lead away completely willingly towards the black

tower; he imagined it no small consolation for his misfortunes that he

would have another equally unhappy old person there for his companion.

But how great was his astonishment as he recognized his brother Adis with

the first sight in his misery! They went with open arms and held each other

with tearful eyes for a long time embraced, without being able to bring a

word out.

Meanwhile they found their speech again at last, and one can easily

49
imagine oneself how much two brothers who so tenderly loved each other,

for more than two-hundred years had not seen each other, and now were

again united by the old regularity of their fate to all the same suffering,

saying they must have each other. Their present state and the absurd taste

of the inhabitants of this island naturally betrayed their present condition,

the first material of their talks.

“What do you understand of it?” said Dahy to his brother. “There is,

admittedly, a stupid riff-raff character about these people. I arguably know

people with a flat nose, piggy eyes, a pointed head, and a paunch who are

considered beauties. But how one can find delight in bodies like ours, I

have no idea.”

“I will resolve the mystery with two words,” returned Adis. “These

islanders have a big ugly monkey for their god, and this god has priests. If

you do not understand the thing now, I cannot help you. Where a monkey

is the archetype of perfection and has temples and priests, then it happens

quite naturally if its followers gradually become monkeys. Each people

takes shape implicitly after its god.”

Dahy had nothing to argue against this conclusion, as their fate had

not improved by it. They started here asking each other what had

happened to everybody in the long time of their separation. Dahy did not

50
neglect to tell his brother the whole story of his acquaintance with Khadijah

and everything that had happened to him since the same without leaving

out the slightest fact.

As soon as he was finished with it, Adis said, “What you have told me

here leaves me no doubt that our misfortune will soon come to an end. Yes,

my dear brother, we are near the moment that will return to us our own

form and with them the rights of our kind that we have already been robbed

so long. You will doubt this just as little as I do if you have heard what I

want to tell you.

“I myself had lived in the country which the Brahmin Kansu had

instructed me already for more than two-hundred years in vain, done

everything in the world to find a young beauty who could fall in love with

my hideous body. Then one time there appeared to me in a dream a young

peasant woman of seventeen to eighteen years who said to me, ‘You hope in

vain to come to the end of your exile in this town. If you want to experience

this miracle, then set sail towards the island of Sumatra. Look at me well,

for you see in me what destiny has chosen for your spouse.’ The maiden

was exceptionally beautiful. I felt my heart break out in love from her sight;

I wanted to say it to her, but she disappeared, and I awoke.

“This dream seemed to me to be more than a usual dream. I looked at

51
it as a secret hint, set sail for Sumatra, and became, like you, by a storm

that I do not consider natural, thrown upon this island. Here I met with the

princess Mulkara, who ruled at that time in absence of her sister,

everything that you have encountered is with the queen Shahrbanu. She

explained her love to me. I believed she had her joke with me; she

persuaded me of the opposite and received the answer that you can

imagine. She became urgent, I became impatient. Finally we both got hot,

and the end of it was that I was thrown in this tower for so long until I find

myself bowing at the feet of my princess to make up for the insults added to

the irritations.

“In this condition I could have languished forever in this tower. But

the fact that we meet so unexpectedly here and the means that brought us

together, and the miraculous resemblance of my dream with the dream of

your lovers and the resemblance of the young peasant woman whose image

since then has not come from my soul, with her sister Fatimah, all that

persuades me that a concealed hand is at work, and that we…”

Before Adis could complete his speech, the door of their dungeon

opened, and the captain of the bodyguard came in. He bumped again

against the floor with his pointed cap and addressed the two brothers

thusly: “Most glorious among all old men, I come in the name of our

52
illustrious and gentle-hearted princess by marriage, to announce to you

that they have sunk everything that could have been disparaging to them in

you manner into the abyss of the oblivion. As evidence of this and from

conviction, that such a superhuman beauty as yours can only be from the

portion of the family of the great apes, she has decided with the approval of

the venerable priesthood that its temple shall be your apartment from now

on and that all honor shall happen to you there, including the same her

close relatives are entitled to.”

Both brothers were very concerned about this new outbreak of the

strange folly of these adventurous people, and had bad feelings about being

the central figures of the new mockery that they wanted to play with them.

Meanwhile, dungeon against dungeon, a temple was nevertheless better

compared with the black tower and they were resolved to give in to their

destiny in all things. They followed the captain willingly towards the

pagoda, where they were received by the hierophant and the remaining

servants of the temple in the gate with great solemnity.

The queen, her sister, the court, and the whole city were already

present. They began singing hymns in honor of both cousins of the great

apes, and after one of them, after many comical ceremonies and

genuflections, sang well and had burned incense, let one of them climb on a

53
large, seven-foot-high scaffolding, where two splendid thrones were

prepared from colored straw mats for them. Both brothers patiently took

their seats. While the priests made preparations for the sacrifice that would

be offered on the altar behind which the scaffolding was erected, a choir of

singing young maidens danced around the altar. The eyes of all present

were directed in enthusiastic joy towards the new gods in the robes of

multicolored straw which one had draped them, a very comical appearance

it made. Thus they looked as if they found no particular pleasure in all this

nonsense.

But suddenly song and dance and victims were interrupted by an

event that suddenly put an awful end to the joy and devotion of the persons

present. Adis and Dahy lost the forms of decrepit old men and shone again

in their own. On the foreheads and cheeks bloomed again the flower of

some youth, thick blond hair flowed in big locks around their milk-white

necks; in short, they suddenly became again what they were when Farsana,

to their misfortune, cast too tender an eye at them.

What a terrible transformation in the eyes of the islanders! A general

monstrous cry announced the general dismay. The priests, who held such

an unnatural transformation for a miracle of bad omen, ran in the greatest

confusion from it. The maidens who danced around the altar turned in full

54
horror and fled. The queen and the princess, her sister, whose affection

was at once turned into disgust, rushed back to their palace. In a moment

the whole pagoda was empty, and only both genies remained and marveled

at each other. However, as they had also recovered their remaining powers

with their bodies, they immediately recognized that their enchantment had

been dissolved by two young people who had fallen in love during the

ceremonies with their old men’s forms, and had run away at their current

ones with the others in disgust.

They still testified their joy at this happy surprise to each other when

they saw the Brahmin Kansu with Fatimah in hand step into the pagoda. At

first sight Adis recognized the lovely peasant maiden of his dream.

“Ah!” he shouted with delight. “This is she, the lovely maiden whose

picture sits so firmly in my heart!”

“Yes, Adis, there she is,” said the Brahmin. “To make your fortune

complete, I have brought her. Since she was separated from her sister, she

has been under my protection. Finally, my children,” he continued, “I take

the pleasure to have pulled you again from the sad state in which I put you

through quick anger. It was painful to me to see you so long in it, but it was

impossible to do earlier what I have done for you. For I am the one, Dahy,

who allowed you to find both sisters, who are intended to compensate you

55
for all your sufferings by their love. I am the originator of the dreams that

woke the thought of travel to Sumatra in you, and I have thrown you by

storms excited by me to this island, for I knew what would happen here.

Yes, I do not deny that I, to advance my plan, the usual folly of these apelike

islanders has been helped a little by my art. Now we lack only a person.

Dahy, go, get Khadijah, and give her the pleasure of seeing her sister again

and the handsome youth of her dream.”

Dahy flew like a flash into the kitchen of the captain of the bodyguard

and brought Khadijah into the pagoda. The embraces of both sisters, the

delight of both brothers, and the joy of the old Brahmin at the fortune of

this double pair, which was his work, made for a scene that goes beyond all

description. To make their fortune complete, Kansu also returned their

freedom to both genies and allowed to them to live with her lovers wherever

they liked. He vanished from their eyes, and the two brothers flew with the

beautiful sisters to an island of Jinnistan, which they lived on and

populated, being an image of the earthly paradise.

56
 Alboflede
More than a hundred years before the invasion of the Franks in Gaul,

on a lonely little island, made by the Seine one mile above the town of

Troyes, lived an extraordinary woman named Alboflede. What was most

noticeable at first sight was her age and ugliness. Both exceeded anything

one could imagine. The ice-gray Fates were young and the ugliness of

Gorgons seemed just irritating next to her, which may be enough of it,

because I do not like to paint what one might see.

People told wonderful things of her power and the extent of her secret

sciences. The people considered her a great witch; if she had been as

beautiful as she was disgusting, they would have considered her a fairy.

Nevertheless she stood through the whole country in good reputation. The

common people feared her. However, the nobles sought her favor in hope

of foreseeing the future, making good use of her magic and her gift on

occasion.

She lived on the bank of the river in a small palace, which rose up on

a gallery of marble columns rather far over water, and the associated

gardens took up the rest of the small island. They were filled with the rarest

herbs and vegetation over the whole ground, and were always kept in the

most beautiful condition; nevertheless, no one saw any hands that waited

57
on her. Those who wanted to visit Alboflede found a gilded gondola on the

farther shore that went by itself, and those whose visit would be pleasant to

her were taken over in a few moments; it would have been impossible for

anyone else to return it to its place. Those who received the admission were

taken very well; one could not be more wonderfully entertained, albeit

neither male nor female servants appeared in the whole house.

It happened one day that the gondola brought over a pair of young

lovers who were troubled by a fierce desire to learn the fate of their mutual

passion. Alboflede received them kindly, and after some preliminary

refreshments for them (because they seemed to be exhausted from the

discomfort of a long trip), she inquired the reason that motivated their visit.

“We came,” answered the young man, “for you, for whom no future

thing is hidden, in order to ask the fortune of our love. I love the beautiful

Selma, as I know her, and that she let herself ask me to accompany me

here. She has already revealed enough of the secret of our hearts to make a

formal confession. But powerful obstacles oppose our fortune. We are

afraid of being separated forever through the hard-heartedness of our

people. Advise us, wise woman, what are we to do!”

“Go home again and calmly await what fate and love have decided for

you,” answered Alboflede.

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 The maiden sighed. “That is impossible,” cried the young man.

“Have pity on us, kind fairy! Strike open the page in the book of destiny on

which ours is written! Reveal to us whether we can escape the misery to be

condemned to hopeless loving, if we can overcome the obstacles that

threaten us with eternal separation!”

“Then suggest something better yourself,” said Alboflede, “and

suppress your meddling, the satisfaction of which does not change your

fate, but could probably make things worse. A charitable hand wove the

thick curtain that hides the future from the eyes of mortals, but inevitably it

punishes those who remove it and dare to intrude into the forbidden with

immodest glances. My children, without my being guilty, I am an

unfortunate example of this truth. And so that strange experience saves

you the agonies of someone who repented too late, I want to tell you my

story, if you desire to hear it.”

The young people thanked her for her kindness, as they wanted to

show her respect in this way. They followed her into the garden and went

through an arrangement of beds full of flowers; all at once the most

beautiful bouquet planted itself before the bosom of the young Selma,

without anyone seeing how it happened. Alboflede smiled over the pleasant

frightening of the maiden, but acted as if she had not noticed it. Soon

59
thereafter she brought her two guests to curl up below a high place full of

blooming rose bushes and her narration began as follows:

“My father was a druid of this land in whose old age I was born. He

was so devoted to astrology that he was accustomed to contemplating the

sky and the stars without comment; he looked at all of India with contempt,

unworthy of his attention. He troubled himself little with my education;

but then he cast my horoscope for the instant of my birth, and found that I

would exceed all the women of my time in beauty and ability. So over the

connection of two such dangerous characteristics, thoughts rose into his

head that worried him from time to time, becoming worse as I grew up.

“Unbelievable as it is to you, my children, it can happen in a moment.

The first part of my horoscope had happened just as predicted, so my father

doubted even less, more than was dear to him, he would see the other part

realized as well. To my misfortune, he had taken the ability of the body,

giving me the ability to divine from the stars for the ability of my mind.

And this idea set itself down so firmly in his head that, from my early youth

on, he looked at me as a girl who ran the largest risk of becoming a stain on

his name and her sex.

“Meanwhile, my beauty seemed to receive new increases with each

day. Those who saw me were infatuated with my body, but nobody was

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more so than I myself. My father regarded this as the first sign of my

unfortunate tendency towards immodesty that he had discovered in the

stars. And with the good intention to take from my weakness some means

for preserving my honor, at once he took me aside, and with great

seriousness he uncovered for me what would be an important secret of the

fortune of my life: the sufferings, to which I attached such great

importance, depended only on my stubbornness, and the first victory one

man had over me would make me the ugliest person in the whole world.

“ ‘I don’t approve of you, my daughter,’ he added, ‘but it does not

stand in my power to erase what is written in the stars for you. Everything I

can do is done, so I can inform you of your fates and advise you, if you are

otherwise ready for it, that to remain as you are, to stay away from men. To

let them come so close that they could speak to you, or to stop and listen to

them, already would be dangerous. The safest thing is to run away before it

comes so far. A maiden with the imprudence to listen to the voice of these

lures is always in danger of getting stuck on bars of glue, and I have told

you what would be the consequence for you.’

“My good father could have saved half of his warnings if he had had a

notion of the degree that I was in love in myself, or what happened to me

back then was much the same; I had fallen in love with my body. However,

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I never doubted the truth of his words, and I took everything in the literal

sense. Nevertheless, all that indifference, as I always looked at my present

lovers, could not save me from the terrible danger my father had threatened

me, which he did from time to time in great fear.

“Naturally, it had to happen. My poor adorers, their number

increased with every day, and this all the more, because nobody among

them could boast about the smallest advantage with me. In vain they bore

their concern before me in only language they were permitted, in looks and

sighs. In vain they tired the poor echo with repetition of my name, day and

night. Pointlessly they scratched it in all the area’s trees. The mere thought

of these beautiful eyes, whose murderous shine men cursed in a thousand

odes and elegies, would please them enough to go out to see; I acted as if I

instead might have fossilized them all with a look. Bit by bit, this manner

removed all reverent lovers from me.

“But every now and then were also found daring ones who did not

want to let themselves stop, and who gave me so many opportunities to

show my swiftness that I could have quickly gotten into this playacting with

all Atalantas and Camillas of the writers. Finally, these opportunities came

too often. I became weary of it, always running without having any desire

for it, and letting the odious rivals disturb me from sweet preoccupation

62
with my own beauty, enjoying myself in any crystal brook with my viewing.

I withdrew myself to a wilderness to enjoy this pure pleasure all the more

quietly. But it was in this wilderness that the angry love god found the

means to exercise a cruel revenge on his thoughtless despiser.

“Of all the irritations that nature had so lavishly presented me for my

misfortune, my hair was maybe the least. It had the most beautiful color in

the world, and was so long and thick that I only needed to let it down to be

covered up by it to my feet. One day, I was by the edge of a river that I had

bathed in to comb out my hair, believing myself completely alone. A snow-

white deer appeared suddenly, persecuted by hunters that burst out

afterwards. It plunged into the water, swam to the shore on this side over

here and lay down, extremely jaded and with a look to my feet that seemed

to ask for my protection; its pursuers on the opposite shore looked for a

place in noisy confusion where they could land without danger across the

river. In my life I had never felt so much kindness for any creature than for

this nice animal, which knew how to excite my compassion in such a

moving way. I laid my hand on its back and started stroking it softly and

caressing. I hardly had touched it when it changed into a wonderful young

man who held himself entitled to answer this caress, and to start his

declaration of love with what one is in the habit to normally end them with.

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 “I confess that my fright about such an unsuspected miracle at first

sight, as I do not know which feeling (being mixed) had been more pleasant

than aversive. But my inclination towards the other was mostly disgust;

what a man sees immediately once again got the upper hand. Besides, the

wonderful stranger had surprised me in a state that was little different from

my usual neglect of kindness.

“I hurried along on my feet, and as the shame of my natural ability

spurned a new degree of speed, I seemed to fly more than to run. But my

new lover who shamed me, made all the bolder, seemed have kept not only

his previous deer nature, but also had gotten many wings of love on his

heels. A lead of five or six paces was all I could get against him by the

highest exertion of my efforts. During the race, the wind blew my long,

thick hair that would have otherwise given me an adequate covering, came

apart. It became a traitor to me, and gave an advantage over me to my

pursuers, against which my speed was not enough. This fact left my reason

in such a mess that I buckled thoughtlessly into the first good bushes, then

just sped away from the accident I wanted to escape from. To make it

short, children: I got caught in a bush by my long hair, the nice stranger

caught up with me, and at the same time I sacrificed some of my odious

locks to break loose from him, yet it was impossible for me to escape my

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fate.

“I confess that the wantonness with which the stranger took

advantage of me was not able to totally extinguish the likable feeling I had

at the first sight of him. My misfortune would have seemed to me less

intolerable than it actually was, if the thought that it cost me my whole

beauty had not made it the cruelest one which could meet me. The escape

from my lover might have released my horrific screams and fear of being

detected, and this seemed to me the first confirmation that the predictions

of my father about me had been fulfilled.

“My pain, my desperation was inexpressible. I did not have the heart

to have a look. The daylight became odious to me. I fled to the most

desolate wilderness, became hidden in the darkest gaps in rocks and did

not stop mourning about a misfortune that existed only in my imagination

anyhow. One single look in one of the brooks or springs, in which I tended

to be reflected with such intimate pleasure, would have deprived me of my

fatal mistake. But now a mirror was the most awful of all awful things in

my imagination, and the fear of my own sight meant that I avoided the

brook in thousand steps.

“Finally, to my misfortune, the fairies also interfered in my matters,

either from malice or compassion. At an unblessed hour, because my

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desperation had just risen so much, one of them came to me on the path

with the good idea to comfort me, and promised to grant to me every gift

for which I would ask them.

“ ‘Oh,’ I shouted without reflecting a moment, ‘if you want this,

compassionate fairy, then transform my body into the opposite of what it is

now. Make me as unlike myself as possible. This is the greatest kindness

that you can show to me.’

“The fairy looked at me some moments with astonishment, but she

had already given her word, and a fairy word is, as you know, irrevocable.

My request was granted to me. What before had been only a fancy, a well-

intentioned lie of my father that he had put in my head, now became real.

From the most beautiful maiden in the world, I was transformed right away

into such a hideous creature that the fairy herself could not stand my sight

and made off hurriedly.

“Alone, in joy at the supposed restoration of my beauty, I did not

notice the expression of loathing in her face, and imagined that she had

only vanished back to fairy kind again in order to save me from thanking

her for the incalculable gift, that I believed I had received.

“Soon afterwards another fairy met me as I just was about to look for

a brook in which I could view myself. Also she offered a gift to me, and I

66
reflected even less than the first time.

“ ‘Give me,’ I shouted in the joy of my heart, ‘give me the gift, with all

the sufferings which I have now, to live as many years as I have hairs on my

head!’

“The small fairy looked at me with the astonishment in with which

one hears a person, whom one held for clever, speaking madness. She

twitched her shoulders and seemed undecided a moment whether she

should grant me such an incomprehensible wish. Only, because she had

given her word, was she herself able to do so, just as little as the first, for

she could not break from it. The fairy disappeared, and I unfortunately

believed myself suddenly in the possession of a beauty I considered

enormous; I thought it would last as long as the abundance of my hair was

great. So after such a long separation from myself, I went to a spring

nearby, to refresh my appearance to the fullest once more.

“But that puts the whole inability to express my horror before you,

since I am nothing but the ideal of ugliness, a caricature of everything old

and disgustingly shapeless and gruesome, in short, just the body I saw

therein, what you see before you! I could not possibly believe that I was

this monster. I looked around everywhere for the subject of that hated

picture that I cover myself with. But as I saw all the movements that I

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made myself, I found myself finally forced to admit the horrible truth, and

now recognized too late, how much I had been a plaything of envious stars,

and a victim of my father’s pious fraud and my own gullibility, self-love,

and hastiness.

“It would be cruelty, my children, if I wanted to torment you with a

description of the way this discovery fell on me. A thousand times the

desperation made me want to put an end to my life, but always an invisible

arm with stronger power held back me. Finally, time, whose blunting effect

on our senses makes us experience the most pleasant as boring and the

aversive as tolerable, finally did so much that I submitted to my destiny

with some calmness. But what contributed the most to it was the certainty

that my misery would last no longer than three years, which was just as

many years as the hairs the fairies left me on my bald head.

“Now my most pleasant employment was the hours and moments to

think over, which gave me an understanding of the final purpose of my

wishes. And while my odious existence wore on in this way, in the darkest

woods and the most lonesome wilderness, I had reached the twelfth month

of my last year when I arrived at a gloomy night in which I had wandered

for a long time between rocks and abysses on this very island where I have

since then pitched my dwelling.

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 “I believed there, by the bushes which covered its shores, I saw a fire

which spread such a big clarity over everything around, as if it was a bright

day. Regardless, for me, after my own body, nothing was more hated than

the light. But I had a new longing I could not resist in that moment, and I

was seized nevertheless.

“I waded through a shallow part of the river, which I noticed shined in

this light. I was very surprised when I found in the bushes, where I thought

the pretty fire was burning, I found a small black person sleeping. I

discovered that a necklace of carbuncles, which he had around his black

neck, was the only cause of the bright and almost brilliant shine that

illuminated a part of the island so delightfully. I did not have the heart to

approach him for a good while, as he seemed to be even more nasty and

hideous than myself. But suddenly such a violent desire made me want to

be the owner of this wonderful jewelry that I felt strong enough to tear the

throat from the three-headed Cerberus itself. This desire was all the more

senseless as I had only a few days to live and the necklace, as priceless it

might also be in itself, could do nothing to help me but put my ugliness in a

more striking light. But it was stronger than my reason and my own love

taken together, and so I came, with fearful steps, to the small monster,

before whose sight I might have become helpless in an instant. Finally, I

69
was near enough to note that the necklace was held together by only a weak

silk thread. I seized the same without trouble, and was about to make off

with my precious booty when the black person awoke and held me fast by a

corner of my skirt.

“ ‘Where are you going in such a hurry, beautiful Alboflede?’ he called

to me as he blew out his snout; before this sight I might have sunk. To want

to escape from him was not an option, for I had also lost the speed that

could save me with my body. My embarrassment and confusion seemed to

put the monster in a good mood. ‘If you only knew the value of the jewel

you wanted to steal from me,’ he spoke, laughing and unconcerned, such

that his laughter made him ten times uglier, as if he was angry. ‘But be of

good courage, beautiful Alboflede! I am not mad at you, and if you can

agree to only a little kindness from yourself, then the necklace should not

matter to me. Besides, for me is it only used for nothing but the lights at

night.’

“ ‘And what would that small favor be?’ I asked him with a turned-

away face, while I withdrew a few steps to not be reached by his breath.

“ ‘Almost nothing,’ he answered with a hideously friendly snarl. ‘To

love me and to become mine.’

“All bones on my whole body clattered together at this proposal and

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at the vision which my imagination connected with it, while it reminded me

to the contrary of the will of the snow-white deer. ‘Not for the whole world,

even if it was made of nothing but carbuncles,’ I shouted as I threw his

necklace with loathing at his feet.

“ ‘Let justice happen to me,’ returned the grinning changeling as he

lifted the necklace with great calmness from the earth. ‘I am not,

admittedly, the most kind, and I cannot blame a young lady of such

extraordinary beauty, as you are, to not be sad, if she winces a little at a

proposal like mine.’

“ ‘This inhuman mockery,’ I shouted out of my rage, ‘proves to me

that your soul is even more hideous than your outside.’

“ ‘It proves nothing, beautiful Alboflede,’ said the black person, while

he, despite my resisting, hung the sparkling jewelry over my scrawny black-

yellow throat. ‘I say nothing when this mirror would also say that to you!’

“With these words he held to me a big mirror before the face,

and—how should I express to you my astonishment, my confusion and my

delight?—I briefly saw myself again in my former body, in the full shine of

beauty and youth, so completely everything that I had been, that my eyes

dared me to believe neither the mirror nor myself.

“ ‘Is it possible?’ I shouted in stammering drunken delight, while I,

71
from fear that the mirror could be enchanted, like a fool bumped it into the

middle of the river, reflected around me in its unsuspicious flow. The black

person, who might imagine that I wanted to be away from him, ran after me

so quickly that he caught me in mid-leap. But as he bent me down over so

quietly over a dark spot of the waters towards my own image, I saw it

became a lingering ghost. He was content to remove the necklace from me

again, all gentle from behind, and in this way made an end of my whole

delight all at once.

“For at the moment, as the necklace was again in his hands, I stood

there again as old and nasty as you see me, and looked with my totally

wrinkled and obliterated little piggy eyes in vain where my so intimately

beloved self would have been brought forward all at once. One would have

to be in such a situation oneself to get a real understanding of it. The

cursed black person went back again with his necklace in the claws quite

calmly, and I, as if I wanted to snatch away my robbed beauty from him

again, ran after him. I would have run after him as long as he had it in his

hands, in spite of my loathing of his revolting black person’s face, until the

end of the world had passed. He seemed to have compassion with my

oppressive situation, and his tone became more and more polite and

affectionate; because of this, I found his body more tolerable.

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 “He led me into his small palace and showed me all his treasures and

rarities; he disclosed to me in confidence that he is the son of a fairy, and,

by means of knowledge his mother was gifted with, he was able to do

extraordinary things. But with all he has, it is not in his power to return to

me the necklace except in the way he announced.

“ ‘So you should want to really love me as I am,’ he put forward, ‘I

meant, perhaps, to ask a little of the impossible from you. But I am not so

unfair to want you to be happy through acting as if you love me, only to find

you also worked against me as soon as you received your beauty again from

me with the necklace. And so that your favor costs to you less, then know

that this is the only way to see again the snow-white deer, which might not

be unimportant to you.’

“I would have turned red if such parchmentlike skin as mine could

have blushed. It was incomprehensible to me how the little black person

could know so much about my history, and my embarrassment increased

with the desire for the necklace in plain sight. What should I tell you?

Basically there was no price for the goods that was, in my opinion, too large.

At least at that time I thought that way, and also maybe anyone else would

have thought so in my place. In short, I received the necklace with all my

beauty again as soon as I started to prove my gratitude to him, and to my

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great astonishment, the hideous little black person changed into the

wonderful youth who had won my heart in the form of a snow-white deer

and whose naughtiness had been the start of all my adventures.

“I learned from him then that a conflict with another fairy, as

powerful as she was jealous, was the cause of his transformation. He could

recover his own form under no other condition except by making the most

beautiful person in the world his own while in his ugly black person’s mask.

And who could he ever hope to get, other than someone who he gave the

advantage of knowing whether she would be the most beautiful or the

ugliest of her sex depended on it?

“Alquif (so my new husband was called) was a great magician, but the

necklace, which counts as a masterpiece of the magical arts, nevertheless

was able to totally destroy the work of the fairies. The strength of this

mighty talisman applied only to the hours of the night; as soon as the day

began, my beauty disappeared along with the wonderful shine of the

neckband, and I received once again all that ugliness that the first fairy had

given me. As soon as he saw me again in this condition, Alquif had no

priority except the only gray hair that I still had on my head, to make it so

firm and permanent by the strongest magical cures, that it could bear the

whole number of years which the extraordinary fullness of my hair in my

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state of my beauty had guaranteed. And as the day was the time when my

company could not be the most pleasant to a young man who loved

pleasure, he applied himself in the first weeks to draw me into the

mysteries of the art in which he was one of the greatest masters. But he

hardly saw me, for I made such rapid progress that I was able to do without

his assistance, so he surrendered to his natural instability and removed

himself from this island, and we have not seen each other ever since.

“I have told you this stories, my children,” continued Alboflede, “to

persuade you that the foreknowledge of our destinies is not only quite

useless to us in avoiding them, but that it will even lead us to the means to

bring us to our doom; without that impertinence and untimely activity and

interference in the work of the superior powers, we would never have

gotten into this mess. Had the druid, my father, not placed my nativity, I

would have been spared all the unspeakable sufferings and insults that he

drew to me only by the means by which he wanted to prevent my alleged

misfortune. So let yourselves be warned by Alboflede’s experience: Watch

yourselves, if you would foresee your fate without sanction. Let the gods

prevail and patiently await what they have decided about your love and

your luck!”

While that the old magician amused her young guests in such a way

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and her story rich in miracle (which they took for a fairy tale) crowned with

such wise teachings, the night had broken unnoticed. Alboflede had hardly

taken off the triple collar, which usually covered her neck with during the

days, when the sparkling necklace spread a new day a hundred steps in

diameter, and the old person stood there in a shine of beauty and youth

before the surprised eyes of both lovers, which they nearly turned to the

ground. “You see,” she said to them, “that I have told no fairy tale, as you

probably liked to imagine it.”

The young people blushed. They were not philosophers enough to

take the miracle they saw with the eyes for a fairy tale of her own

imagination, so they just let it be, and were content to stare at Alboflede

with big eyes, or rather the goddess of the beauty who had so unexpectedly

taken her place.

Suddenly an Adonis of sixteen years arrived, his appearance as

beautiful as the most beautiful angel whom Guido Reni has some day

painted. Between the two of them, they served the small group the most

delightful refreshments from golden bowls. Alboflede told them that he

was a sylph, and this sylph was the only being with which she shared the

pleasure of solitude on her small island. The young Selma herself confessed

that, except for the handsome Arbogast, her lover, she had never seen

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anything that compared with this sylph. But the truth of the matter was

that she considered her handsome Arbogast through the eyes of love, that

is, with blind or at least blinded eyes. Indeed, one had to be so taken in

order to find a comparison between them not ridiculous.

Hardly had the real or alleged sylph (they dared not decide ourselves

if he was one or the other) left himself again when the two lovers renewed

their first request so insistently, that Alboflede saw all the trouble she had

brought on herself had been for nothing. “Are you thus,” she said smiling,

“like all young people? The teachings and warnings of wisdom slither from

your ears, like tones without sense and meaning. You want to experience

everything and become wiser at your own expenses. Very well then! Step

in this circle,” she continued as she drew a circle around them with an ivory

rod. “I want you to strike the book of destiny, and you should hear the

outcome of your love.”

Immediately the beautiful sylph came again to his mistress, in one

hand a golden censer, and with the other he offered a large book that was

edged with golden studs and rich with precious stones. She took the book

from his hand, and when she had cast some grains from a diamond box into

the censer, a lovely, softly stunning steam rose from it and in a moment

filled the whole area. “Now hear your destiny,” she said to the lovers who,

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stood shaking before her, wrapped in a cloud of fragrance. She struck the

book and read in a loud voice, “You will be separated!”

The poor souls, who were already tormented with all these annoying

ceremonies a while ago, had to hold tightly to each other to keep from

sinking to the ground before the pain of this awful prophecy.

“But not for long? Not forever?” asked Selma in a suffocated voice.

“What can we do to get back together again?” asked Arbogast.

“While you seek each other on opposite paths, you will unexpectedly

find yourselves,” read Alboflede from another page. She then locked the

book again and returned it to the sylph, who disappeared with it.

The lovers fell at the feet of the beautiful magician and thanked her

for granting her request. “We submit to our destiny,” they said. “However

great we expect our suffering to be, whatever one desires, one also will

suffer for what one loves!”

“You will experience this,” said Alboflede.

“But we will get each other back,” shouted the lovers. “Such delight!

We will find each other and be happy!”

“We want to hope so,” said Alboflede.

“We must separate, so wants our unrelenting fate," cried the lovers as

they fell into each other's arms. "Every moment longer that we wait delays

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the blessed hour of reunion.”

“Romantic souls!” said Alboflede with a gentle, regretful look. “So

stand for your hike, you eastward while you head west out there, and trust

that Alboflede will be with you!”

She allowed to them here to embrace each other once again and

again. Finally they broke loose of each other with a stream of tears, and

after they had taken leave of Alboflede, they started with tottering steps

their suffering ways: eastward him, westward her, not without the other,

for as long as they were able, they looked around and threw each other

kisses at a distance.

But they had hardly gone away, each on their own winding road, a few

hundred steps in the forest, the garden of Alboflede. They embraced at the

stroke of midnight, walking away when something fell over from a mossy

bank. By the actions of the beneficent magician, they passed through all the

adventure in a magical dream, so their silly resolution would come to an

end if Alboflede had not found a way to defeat them. Arbogast and Selma

both dreamed the same dream. It started at the moment of their parting

from Alboflede and led them through muddled and mostly disagreeable

occurrences. After a ten-year separation (how it seemed to them), both

were in a big town where Selma had the unexpected pleasure of finding her

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beloved Arbogast again—in the arms of another.

The magician had so arranged it that both lovers believed they went

away from each other at the same time. On the winding roads of her forest

of desire, they were gathered again, so near that they were separated at the

moment because they were overpowered by the numbing of magic slumber;

only a light wall of myrtles and roses separated them. At her sign, the sylph

carried the sleeping Arbogast up the mossy bank, where Selma was dozing

alone. Indeed, the ten-year dream, in which they believed to have passed

an infinite number of romantic adventures, lasted no longer as a single

hour. Alboflede, who during this time always sat facing the dreaming

Selma, was the first person who fell in her view. Before the fright and

displeasure, she found her lover after such a long separation in a stranger’s

arms; now she awoke, and without noticing that she had only dreamed it

all, she broke into the most bitter complaints and reproaches about her

unfaithful lover. At this very moment Arbogast also awoke, but not without

great confusion. Selma and the magician were witnesses to the crime to

which he thought he pleaded guilty, but he was intent to not let himself be

thrown by the advantage his lover was assured to have on him.

“Avenge me of this unfaithful one, great fairy,” shouted the incensed

Selma as she threw herself at Alboflede’s feet.

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 “Such impertinence!” shouted Arbogast, his passion for Selma also set

on fire. “You have the gall to accuse me of my infidelity, do you?”

“If I have you,” shouted Selma, “not in these accursed arms…”

“And without you wanting to know anything about me, was I not a

galley slave serving on the brigantine? Wasn’t it there that I saw with my

own eyes that you could be led without resistance by the captain of the

pirates into his cabin?” screamed Arbogast.

"How, my children,” cried Alboflede with a surprised smile, “in these

moments, as I have brought you together again after such a long and

painful separation, in the blessed moments of reunion, when my only fear

was that from love and delight that you would die in each other’s arms, are

your greetings the bitterest reproaches? ”

“Oh, if you knew only everything, great fairy,” both shouted as if from

one mouth.

“I know more than you imagine,” answered Alboflede. “And you can

only thank me that all of this was only dreamed by you. It would have

actually happened to you, in all honesty, if I had not been cleverer than you.

Your romantic journey, which you were about to take, would not go out of a

district of two hundred steps or the span of a single hour.

“Once again, my children, you have only dreamed and have not left

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this garden. Give each other your hands and forgive each other, not what

you have not done, but for how you would have acted, if I, less kindly,

would have revealed to you the results of your impertinence and your haste.

Turn back now to yourselves! Your dream will shortly leave behind only

weak traces in your soul. It protects you, as long as you live, from the

brainless impatience to want to pick the fruits of your destiny before they

are ripe. Love each other, be steadfast and faithful, suffer patiently what

you cannot change without exposing yourself to great ills, and always hope

the best for the invisible powers in whose lap the future lies.”

With these words Alboflede left both lovers by themselves. They

thanked her for her kindness and promised obedience. Soon after her

departure, they were actually separated, but they remembered of the words

of Alboflede and her dream, and waited as patiently as possible for what the

gods would have decided about them. In short, the obstacles they

considered insurmountable disappeared; they were again united, loved

each other, and were happy.

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 Lulu, or the Magic Flute
In a forest not far from Mehru, the capital of the kingdom of

Khorasan, stood an old castle that hardly had its equals in glory. It was

built through sorcery, as the legend went, by the ancient king Jamshid, the

founder of the empire. However, since his death it had remained

unoccupied, for his successors, the spirits that hid in it, would not stop.

They preferred, in all fairness, a peaceful sleep in that exquisite dwelling in

which they were thrown from their beds at night.

This castle had been inhabited for many years by a fairy was feared by

the inhabitants of that area. Indeed, here some who wanted to spy out her

lonely dwelling from nosiness felt bad, as she was so cruel and cried out for

blood that even the walkers their forest stayed away.

She knew how to assume any shape, but liked to appear in a beam of

glory, which dazzled more strongly than the brightest sunlight. This was

her finest but also her most dangerous shape. Whoever she saw either lost

one’s mind for some time or, if one opened one’s eyes too far, probably

became totally blind on the spot. The people called her the radiant fairy,

and described her beauty as supernatural, although no one could say that

he had seen her face.

Meanwhile, at the Court of Mehru, there was, of course, one who did

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not believe most of this. However, just once in his long reign, he could not

remember, that the king had a fearful mind on the hunt in these woods.

The son of the king, called Lulu, took little after his father. He liked

to hunt, especially in these woods. This he did, not only from curiosity for

the opportunity to meet the radiant fairy, but because many of the wild

animals had become abundant since the time this miracle woman had lived

there. To avoid meeting her on the path, he kept far from her castle, that

one in the middle of the forest on a beautiful hill and clearly far away,

always at a proper distance.

“I do not fear her,” said he. “I want to provoke her, but not though

my nosiness. If she wants to prove to me what property is hers, she might

visit me.”

For one in the forest, only wandering out hunting, it was not hard to

avoid being close to the castle, as all animals inside the forest were shy

except for the songbirds. Even in the heat of the hunt, when they could no

longer escape, they stopped and preferred to kill than exceed the borders of

her tolerance, which surrounded the castle.

By this temperance Lulu spent some years in which the fairy’s

appearance of was avoided. He made such an example of courage for the

courtiers, they all wanted to accompany him. Even the king wanted to

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show that he was not afraid and spent a day on a large hunt. The whole

court went into the forest as soon as the morning dawned. One stretched

nets, one blocked all ways out, and made such a roar that some old rascal,

who for many years had guarded the harem, shook in his heart from fear.

Another relied on the large number of marksmen and believed, because the

spirits appeared only to people who were alone, then by this tumult the

whole court was in no danger.

Lulu, however, wanted on this solemn day to show his courage and

kill a lion or a tiger with own hands. He went deeper into the forest than he

ever had before. He seemed not to care about a lot of smaller animals such

as foxes, badgers, lynx, and let them run pass unhindered until he met a

huge tiger, which chased a cute white gazelle.

“That is death!” cried Lulu, and hurriedly ran behind them. The small

gazelle made leaps so clever, it hopped so quickly and easily, sometimes

left, sometimes right, that the great tiger arrived everywhere too late. It ran

uphill and downhill through various back roads that Lulu had not been on.

Often it seemed the tiger would catch it; however it was swifter than a bird,

soon before it, soon behind it. Lulu was always eager, and his companions

had lost him, and he himself did not know where he was or stood.

In any case, he was in the middle of the pleasure garden, not far from

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the fairy palace. The tiger and the gazelle had disappeared in the thicket.

He was still frightened, and wanted to just turn round again, when the

doors of the magic castle opened up and the fairy stepped out in her

garments of light.

Her outfit was whiter than the snow in bright sunshine and flashed,

flickering as a dazzling mirror; but more than all the rest, her face beamed.

Both her eyes poured out thick streams of a reddish light in all directions,

as if the morning sun, three times brighter than it is when rising in a clear

sky above the seas, floated dazzlingly before her forehead.

Lulu had hardly seen the first ray of the erupting clarity gush when he

covered his face with both hands and went towards the fairy with his eyes

closed. Then he noticed that she was near him by the rushing of her

garment. He knelt down and pleaded, "Great fairy, do not be angry at a lost

person, who desecrated your realm against his will with his footsteps. You

know, I did not come from curiosity, for I am shy of the heavenly maiden.”

“I like your modesty,” replied the fairy with a gentle voice, touching

his forehead with her hand. “Arise, my son! Open your eyes without fear,

for my glory is not perishable like yours. If you want to obey me, then you

must repent your errors, which you carry into the realm of fairy Perifirime.”

Lulu turned his eyes up and saw a woman full of majesty and quiet

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dignity, who smiled at him with loving, blessing seriousness. The mere

sight of her high beauty did him good, as if a spirit of new life flowed into

his veins. A resting army shined on her threatening brow. Her big, blue

eyes looked into hidden depths and frightened him with solemn shivers,

while the gentle smile of her mouth again was drawn up for him with

childlike love.

“Order your servant, you divine one,” he exclaimed, and laid his

hands folded on his chest. “My heart and my arm are yours.”

“I’ve known you for a long time, my son,” she said. “I was a trusted

friend of your mother, the one who sometimes visited me in my solitude.

Come with me so I can tell you what to do.”

She gave him her hand and led him in silence to the castle. The gate

opened itself. A carriage, shaped like a cloud, floated out and settled down

in front of them. They got in. The carriage rose, and flew as gently and fast

as a swallow over the forest.

“The service that I desire from you,” began the fairy, “does not require

strength as much as wisdom, for violence against my powerful enemies will

not injure them much. When I tell you the what’s most important about the

situation, you yourself will understand:

“Not far from here on a high cliff lives a magician who, many years

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ago, stole an exquisite little piece of jewelry, its value and strength beyond

all comparison. This jewelry is a piece of gilded fire-steel, which the spirits

of all elements and all the world obey. Any spark that I struck was a

powerful spirit, in an arbitrary shape as my slave who as for my orders. I

received it from the hand of you father’s tribe, of the wise king Jamshid,

and received absolute power; everything possible, what is only intended or

desired to be, was done in a few moments on my least hint.

“No enemy knew the security that I enjoyed. The magician

Dilsenghuin noticed this carelessness and found means, to steal the steel

from me through cunning fraud. Compared to me, his hand is far less

powerful than mine, so I have reason enough for this loss to be deplored,

especially as I know that only a male youth of age, whose heart has not yet

felt the power of love, can bring back this symbol of my authority.

“For a long time I have looked among the children of men of this age

for such a young man in vain. One lacked courage, wisdom from others,

most of innocence. You have passed the exam and you are proved as the

innocent, which I expected.”

Lulu shut his eyes and the fairy went on:

“This magician now, to whom I want to send you, despite all his

cunning arts is not perceptive; only the love of a maiden, whom he

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imprisoned against her will, made him so suspicious, vigilant, and cautious

that only the brightest can fool him. In your natural shape, he would never

trust you; he would grasp at once who you are and your efforts would be

lost. So take this flute. It has the power to win for each listener love and all

passions, which the player is able to excite or calm. Also take this ring; it

gives you any shape you want, young or old, after you turn its diamond in-

or outwards. If you’re in danger, and throw it from you; it will become a

flying messenger who calls for my help.

“The rest I must leave to your own wisdom, since I cannot predict

exactly the dangers and the behavior of the magician. See, over there

stands the house of the magician behind the mountains! I cannot

accompany you further; he would like to notice me otherwise in the

distance. Travel safely and be happy! The best of what I have is given to

the winner as a reward.”

When the fairy said this, she let down the carriage behind a

mountaintop. Lulu got out and walked boldly to the wizard's home, while

the fairy in her carriage vanished behind the clouds.

When he had climbed the mountain and stepped off the highest peak,

a graceful valley opened before him that resembled the gardens of paradise.

A wide stream, coming from the distant mountains, flowed from evening to

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morning in small and large curves through the flowery meadow, now

gently, now rushing down. On both sides stood small hills with fruit trees

like dense forests and covered wild bushes, around which the current

meandered like a snake and formed many small islands. The green knolls

and hills rose gradually higher and higher and were finally a series of

wooded mountains, the valley surrounded on all sides. The first thing his

eyes fell upon was a palace, standing in the middle of the valley on a hill,

and sparkling under the sun like smoothed steel against the mountains.

Lulu turned his ring inwards and got the appearance of an old, white-

bearded man whose back was bent like a crook. He climbed the mountain

and approached the front of the castle, which towered like a monster, on

which neither stairs nor entrance was found. The high steel rock on which

the buildings stood was so slick and rugged that one could not go one

moment without thinking about what might come up.

When he had seen it all around, he sat a few hundred paces from it

under a lemon tree, put the flute to his mouth, and began to blow. Almost

without noticing, he was enchanted by its sound, for he had never heard

such tones as it made with each breath. When he breathed softly, then it

sounded like the lisp of high peaks, where the evening wind whispers, or as

if every nightingale in the valley sang a sweet lullaby to the sounds of a

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crying nymph. He breathed again heavily, and like this a thousand

harmonious choirs swept down from all the mountains, as if the thunder

roared over their heads and a buzzing raged in all the depths.

Lulu loved the gentle thing. He soon piped like the gentle cooing of a

turtledove, attracting the love of her husband; then like the frightened

sound of a nightingale who sings a funereal song to the lost sweetheart.

The birds of the valley gathered on the surrounding trees and listened to

him. The deer and gazelles came from the nearby forests, gazing at him and

straining their ears, so friendly, as if they understood the meaning of his

playing.

Alone in the palace on the steel rocks everything still seemed to lie in

deep sleep. Lulu sought in vain with his eyes, but there was nobody to see

and the windows were all closed. “They may have hard ears,” he thought,

and breathed as if he was lost in his enthusiasm, several times greater into

his flute than before. Game and poultry were frightened by the rolling

echoes, and the castle window rattled loudly, as if an earthquake poured

from its foundation pillars.

The magician opened a window and cried out, “Why did a tooter wake

me up so early in the morning? Can you find somewhere else to whistle

than under my windows? Wait! Gray head, I will show you the way, if I

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come out!”

“Just come out,” thought Lulu, and he blew a lively little tune, as he

would to attract maidens at a merry dance.

The magician stood with an open mouth at the window, his brown

eyes closed, the ears up and sharpened, like a hare that hears the horn of

the hunter. The flute, meanwhile, had its effect. His suspicions vanished,

the little tune got to him without his knowing, always sweeter and more

alluring to him, until finally it became so merry around his heart, that he

could no long withstand his curiosity. “Whoever the local thief may be,

must the trill strike so beautifully?” he said, slammed his window shut,

threw his caftan on, opened a small back door and crept through quietly.

Lulu stepped back half-frightened as he suddenly saw the magician in

his nightclothes before him. He had a big, gigantic body, hands and feet a

little rough, with thick lips, bloated cheeks, a hanging belly, and still other

features which attested to his appetite. He blinked his small eyes, like those

of a cat, had a turned-up nose, light red hair, and a thick handlebar

mustache.

“You don’t pipe badly, old man,” he began. “Tell me who you are and

how you came here. I want to make you my castle piper if you’re not yet

spoken for.”

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 “I thank you for the honor,” said Lulu. “I do not go gladly into

employment. A real musician plays for fun rather than on command. My

lord does not resent me,” he continued, turning his flute around like a

wheel between his fingers. "I am an old fellow, but free air and free playing

thus I need as food and drink. I’ve wandered now forty years from one

country to another, asking wherever I go if anyone desires my art. I have

admirers happy with my playing, so I go far unhindered. Besides, nothing

comes to me what belongs to a happy life. Yes, I could collect treasures, if I

were only allowed to accept the smallest gift, nothing but a good hosting.

For as had my mentor, an old dervish, who practiced the same craft, I must

be sworn to promise, and rightly so. Why does someone who travels

constantly need great treasures? One already has enough, if it is enough

from one day to the next. It would also not be nice with such a noble art, as

mine is, to want to expand, for without bragging, my art is one of the

noblest, of which none other approaches in excellence.”

“Don’t exaggerate,” broke in the magician. “Those who do not know

you would think you could wake the dead with your pipe.”

“Not quite,” Lulu answered. “But briefly, with my flute-playing I can

calm the anger of a woman. I make the stubborn tame, the coy loving, the

willful I drive the moods and whims out. In short, it releases one more than

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she wants; I make her happy. In this good occupation, I have become gray.

My lord will allow me, therefore, I hope, forgiveness, if I decline his

honorable request to lock me up in his iron tower in old humility.”

“Look at the old fox!” cried the magician, laughing. “How people can

lie!”

“Sir,” Lulu broke in himself, “Such delicate talk embitters me. What,

a fox? Me? So don’t let me come! Did I do something my lord desires? I

blew my morning song into this beautiful meadow and would already be far

away, if my lord had not stopped me by his request. My lord quarrels with

his servant; he left me unscolded.” With these words he stuck its flute in

his pocket, took his staff, and started to go.

The magician took him by the arm and held him back. “Understand it

was only a joke, old man! Who, because of one word of this, would be so

sensitive? Stay and pipe another one. In fact, your pieces are incomparably

amusing.”

Lulu was persuaded and pulled out his flute again. “My lord is a

considerable man,” he said while screwing the pieces together. “Only he

can believe me, that I am not accustomed such treatment. Everywhere

where I go, I would receive love and respect. Old and young, they went to

meet me. One gives me gifts, I would be deliciously entertained, and men,

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usually those up in years as my lord is here, those have always treated me as

their best friend.”

As he so spoke, he positioned the flute and blew so strongly and

merrily, as if he wanted to encourage the stones to run a race. His pipe,

with each touch, had so many sounds that one would have sworn that all

trees and bushes of the valley sang from full throats. The birds fluttered as

if drunk from one tree to another, quite enthusiastic with this merry

wedding song, hopping and trilling, like a boy with a little bird caught in his

crook.

“Truly,” said he, as Lulu followed, “you have a strong breath, but let’s

see if I can also blow.” He took the pipe, held it to his mouth, inflated both

cheeks, and breathed inside with all his might. But heaven help, it gave

such a shriek! The howl of hungry wolves and the gabble of a flock of snow

geese passing was harmony compared to the shrill, whistling voice, which at

first touch came at once from the flute. Lulu held his ears, the birds flew

away screaming, and the deer ran so fast at this, as if the horrors of the

hunt would be dropping them.

“Phooey! That doesn’t sound good,” said the magician. “There, you

have your pipe again. From whom did you get it?”

“From an old dervish, sir, an old juggler. He was called Kardan, had

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gone through the whole world, was able to transform into all sorts of

animals, and had this flute carved himself, as he said. I was a beggar-boy.

When he took me off the road, he taught me the fingerings and gave me the

flute as he died. Since then I have used it according to his instructions. For

that I must repeat it still to the grave, he was a charitable man; he gave

more than he took.”

“Can you also teach me a little of the fingerings?” the magician

interrupted the old man talkatively.

“If my lord wants me, why not? For one does not learn such playing

in a few moments, my lord himself probably sees. I am not jealous with my

art. I just cannot stay, for I have vowed to the ever-loving dervish to sleep

each night in a different place, so quite a lot of good will be given to many

unfortunates.”

“So I probably have to take you with me,” began the magician, “if I

want to try your flute on my wife. Listening for once! Can you tell me

about how much time you need to make a coy one loving?”

“After the coy one is,” said Lulu. “For the one, an hour, for the others,

two, three, even more probably, an ample half-day, but never that was she

so coy as she wants.”

“Well, that’s just enough! Can you keep your word? Then come with

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me. But on the express condition that you do not talk with my wife. You

pipe a few fragments before her, and if her anger is quenched, then you

again go on your way without a long argument.”

“Sir, I must not pipe in your castle,” dropped Lulu indignantly. “If my

lord wants to be so jealous, then I’d rather not deal with him. In my life I

have blown for so many and diverse women of high and low station, but

really! I never did anything so disgraceful, not even in my youth, as

beautiful as I was back then. In words, if I do not trust my lord, then he can

make his own wife tender. And with that, good day!”

“Ho ho!” cried the magician. “One may well say however, how one

wants to know she will be kept in a fine house! Believe me, old man, this

ostentatiousness of waiting for one who pipes for food and drink is not for

the best. But enough of that! Just come in here; we want it done well.”

The magician struck the steel rock with his rod. Two doors, whose

joints one did not notice from the outside, opened by themselves and closed

behind them by themselves again. They climbed a broad spiral staircase,

went through some gloomy passageways, then through many locked doors,

until they came last into a roomy hall, to which a large, inside window

locked with iron bars gave the necessary light.

Nine maidens dressed in white sat there in a half-circle behind ivory

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spinning wheels and spun with great zeal. In the middle was the tenth

before a black marble table with a golden bobbin, who wound again from

what the other nine had spun the previous day. A little fat dwarf, about

three feet high, was the overseer. He waddled with a slender switch in hand

around the spinning wheels and lashed the spinners on the fingers if they

dropped the thread or did not stretch well enough.

“Sit there in that corner, old man, and play a piece,” said the magician

as they stepped inside. “We want to see what your art can do. The girls are

as rigidly stubborn as they look. I am ever more stringent, they are more

defiant than ever, especially those with the black hair, the ones that spin

slowly. But just be patient! My previous niceness has come to an end!

From now on the spools get bigger every day and the golden bobbin gets

heavier. Every day as usual, neither the meal nor sleep are thought of until

the nine spools are fully spun and delicately wound out. It will show who

lasts the longest in this contest, I with my spirits or the beautiful Sidi with

her girls. Now play, old man. The hardworking girls have not danced for a

long time.”

The girls began to sigh. Some moved their lips, like one who wants to

scold but nevertheless does not dare. Others, who were more softhearted,

let secret tears fall. The beautiful bobbin-winder alone seemed not to fear.

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She turned with a calm motion, gave the magician a scornful look, and fixed

their eyes on the flute player, but because she saw the old man, she

indifferently looked away again.

Lulu, peeking at the bobbin-winder, met her black eyes, which

illuminated him like two bright stars. He began to tremble, and the flute

would not work. He named one piece after another, and hesitated until the

magician suggested that he should play.

Again he quickly thought, put the flute to his mouth, and blew the

mournful song of a prisoner who sighed for freedom in one’s darkening

dungeon. The flute called and enticed, like the voice of the anxious mother

who searches for her lost favorite; she clucks so fearfully, she coos so

tenderly, as if with each sound from the human heart she groans a loud

sigh. The wheels slowed; the girls forgot to pull the thread. Hot tears

trickled over their cheeks, and their bosoms throbbed, uneasy as from fear.

The beautiful Sidi let the bobbin rest and stood; her face towards turned

Lulu, now lost into the sweet memory of her childhood. Meanwhile, the

magician and his fat dwarf stared with open mouths and widened eyes like

pictures of the dead.

The song altered the melody and switched unsignaled to a cheerful

tempo, which rose by and by to the speed of a rising dance. In the same

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way the wheels of the spinners also rolled on; they ran so fast and purred so

loud, as if a living spirit was driving it from inside. Likewise the piece

gradually fell down again to the slow and languishing, until it lost itself,

slowly sighing. All wheels stood still, the spinners took deep breaths, and

the bobbin-winder seemed to wake from a beautiful dream.

The magician at once again reflected and exclaimed, “Listen, old man,

the clucks and coos are good for nothing; that you must cure yourself. The

girls cry and sigh by themselves. Such sweet piping makes them only more

moody. Stay with me in this happy place, which exhilarates the mind and

makes the blood fresh.”

“Ah! My lord does not understand!” broke in Lulu with his angry

courage disguised. “So who has told him what is good in my art and is not

good? Either my lord gives the orders or he finds another playing man!

Then short and good, I blow what one chooses for me!”

“Don't get so hot-headed, old man,” replied the magician. “One does

not scold you for saying one’s opinion. So what do you think,” he continued

softly, “what should your pipes have fixed?”

“Now that again is a sensitive question,” Lulu continued. “However,

my lord can look at the maiden herself! Isn't she much more friendly and

gentle than she was before? Didn't my lord notice how she dried her eyes

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during the playing? This is a good sign. Repentance is always accompanied

in the maiden by tears. Through two or three little fragments of the last

kind, she will become as tender as a turtledove. Just where the reprimands

and the commands are concerned, I can't stand that. It would be better if

my lord would help me with the essentials. With permission to say so, it

spoils everything I do well.”

“Why?” the magician asked in annoyance.

“Ah!” Lulu replied, “when has my lord ever heard that someone

forced a maiden to be loving? Love is acquired only by love; compulsion,

however, arouses hatred and makes one stubborn. The fat dwarf there with

the long switch, as well as the large spinning wheels and the heavy spool,

are good for nothing. ‘Excellent bedclothes, my lord!’ That doesn't stand

him in good truth. Doesn't my lord have a more beautiful robe? An

intelligent man, who wants to please, must always appear in his most

beautiful decoration, for the girls love only the beautiful. My lord must cure

these two deficiencies, otherwise we will never come to the end.”

“Truly, old man, this time you’re right,” the magician was happy to

answer, and patted him kindly on the shoulder. “You are an educated lover;

one must follow you. Play on still for these loving ones; my dwarf will have

dressed me immediately.”

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 Lulu acted as if he zealously pursued the thing, already beginning on

the flute and nodding as one who may not hesitate. The magician seized

the dwarf by the arm and hurried with him to the hall outside.

When the maidens saw themselves alone, they became freer and also

whispered each other. But they continued away undauntedly, for they

could not hesitate if they wanted to finish their heavy day’s work before

sunset.

Lulu barely heard the hall door snap when he turned down his ring,

and in his true form rushed to advise to the bobbin-winder. She cried

loudly and let the spool fall from fear, for instead of the white-bearded bent

little man, she saw slim, rosy cheeks before herself. He leaned against her

with boldness and whispered to her, “Be confident, beautiful Sidi. I want to

free you and your maidens from this dungeon if you tell me how I can seize

the spirit steel. Have confidence in me; I do not deceive you. I am called

Lulu, the son of the king of Khorasan, and was sent here by a powerful fairy

to free you. Quickly, tell me if you know where the magician hides the

gilded fire-steel.”

The bobbin-winder trembled with fear when she heard the prince talk

this way. Her cheeks paled and grew hot for a few moments. “Hide, young

man,” she called fearfully. She supported herself by one of her maidens

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who stood around her, scared of everything. “Ah! Hide yourself! Flee! If

the monster finds you, then you are lost, for none can make his spirits

protect you.”

“Be calm, my love,” said Lulu and pressed her hand lovingly to his

chest. “I have not come here to flee, but to free you. Just tell me where I

can find the spirit steel.”

“Oh!” cried the bobbin-winder, who recovered from her tender fright

again. “If you don’t know any other advice, know then you came to your

misfortune here. The magician carries it day and for night on his chest, and

if he sleeps, then he allows himself of a crowd of strong spirits that he calls

for with that steel. They must fill all doors, guarding in the highest summit

of the tower. No one has yet found him sleeping. Even the dwarf, his

trusted friend favorite, who my friends occasionally interrogate, confesses

that he does not know where and for how long his master sleeps. Just like

us, in the evening the magician locks him in an isolated chamber, the iron

door only reopened in the morning.”

The beautiful bobbin-winder began to be afraid. She pulled her hand

back and said, “I do not understand how you’ve gained his trust. You’re the

first stranger we’ve see here in the last three years. You want to cheat me.

You think just like the monster. He wants to try with cunning what he

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cannot compel by force. Tell me, are you one of his spirits?”

“Let this harmful mistake go, my love,” Lulu let out. “Fear nothing; I

am what I told you. A powerful fairy has guided me here. Under the guise

of an old person, which this ring gives me, I promised the magician that my

flute-playing would turn your hatred into love. He seemed to believe me

and took me inside. In order to remove him for some time, I advised him to

put on a more beautiful garment. Now he decorates himself in order to

please you, and will soon return. So be friendly to him if you want to help

carry out my plan. Don’t be worried about being left behind. I free you or

leave my life, because without you and your love, life would be hated by

me.”

Lulu seized her again by the hand, caressing, and continued, “Do not

hold back, beautiful Sidi. Can you give me some details to help find the

fire-steel? Then hurry. The fiend would like to surprise us; he has

forbidden me to talk to you.”

“I have said everything that I know,” she answered. “But if I should

believe you, then call me the fairy who gave you the ring and the flute.”

Lulu was just about to answer. Suddenly one of the girls, who on a

signal from the bobbin-winder had waited before the hall door, came in out

of breath and proclaimed, “The magician is coming.” In an instant all

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chairs were filled and all wheels including the bobbin making such a quick,

purring movement that one hardly heard Lulu’s flute by the hall door, it

was so stealthy, like a cricket’s chirping,

The magician wanted to call to the one who already stepped inside,

“Old man, why don’t you pipe?” But he heard the quiet lisping, and held his

tongue for Lulu’s tender melodies.

The maidens all looked at him in surprise; even the bobbin-winder

could not stop herself from making a secretive glance at him. He was quite

richly decorated, like a sultan in his splendor. His head was covered by a

fiery red turban with a string of pearls wound around four times. A violet-

blue caftan, embroidered with gold, reached almost to his feet and was held

together by a golden belt. From it hung an expensive saber, its grip

sparkling with diamonds. Around his neck and down over the chest, a long

string of large pearls hung; in the same way his red knee-high boots were

trimmed with pearls as well. At just a sign, the spirits of the fire-steel had

produced these fineries. Just as fast they had to dress him in it. Although

nobody could escape from his iron tower (so he believed), nevertheless, it

was not advisable to leave the old flute-player alone with the virgins.

Hence, the dwarf had hardly assured him that nothing more was absent,

and that he was resplendent like a king when he hurried back into the hall.

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 Lulu went to meet him and praised his fine taste, but especially his

beautiful manners. “If my lord now proceeds more gently with the

maidens,” he said, “their earlier coyness will soon be forgotten.”

“Do you think that your art has worked somewhat?” the magician

asked with a satisfied smile.

“Indisputably, it must have done much,” gave Lulu for an answer.

“Little annoyance over the earlier harshness will still remain. But that lets

itself be easily fixed with a meal or another good opportunity.”

“We want to see,” said the magician, and approached the bobbin-

winder with small, gentle steps. He kissed her on the cheeks and asked in a

sweet voice, “Well, are you still angry at me, little stubborn one? If you will

love me a little, then our conflict at once will at an end. Tell me, sweet little

one, are you reconciled with me?”

Lulu stood behind the magician and the dwarf, turned towards the

bobbin-winder. He put the flute under his arm, turned down his ring, and

looked at the maiden with tender glances. The bobbin-winder saw the

prince again in his shape of young man before herself; she blushed, became

frightened, and turned her eyes down modestly.

The magician regarded this as shyness, took it as a good sign, and

continued in his flirting with her. “I see it,” said he. “You’re not angry. You

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let my love of fairness happen. You give way to my longing. Is not it, my

little dove?”

Lulu put his right hand on his chest during this speech and also asked

for approval. His fiery eyes spoke so clearly and so urgently that the

beautiful bobbin-winder was soon convinced.

“If I wanted to love you now,” she said with downcast, beaten eyes,

“can I hope that you will free me and my maidens from this hated slave

labor?”

Lulu raised up signs of his inalienable loyalty, both hands to the sky.

But the magician thought, “His point is of value,” and cried out in his joy,

“You will no more thread bobbins, dear little fool. Your maidens will only

be devoted to your service if you promise me, today or tomorrow, to be my

wife.”

“Give me evidence of your love through deeds,” she said, and looked

sneakily at Lulu, his arms spread out before them. “That way you will have

no reason to complain about my ingratitude.”

On this assurance, the magician was beside himself in joy and wanted

to embrace the beautiful Sidi. But Lulu, driven by jealousy, turned his ring

and blew into his flute with quick fierceness. The magician moved

backwards in fright, and the girls raised a fearful cry. It was no different

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than if the whole iron tower collapsed, crackling, from a strong

thunderclap. Even Lulu was shocked by the terrible noise and quickly

made a few lovely trills; the wrath of the magician, who went for the saber

handle, instantly calmed again.

“Old local thief,” he screamed at him, “who told you to blow so

terribly?”

“Forgive me, my lord,” gave Lulu for an answer, “I did a wrong

fingering, and in such cases, you see, my flute is sensitive.”

“If you love your throat, then watch yourself against such fingerings

and pay attention, old man! That I suggest to you!”

“Do not anger, my lord,” said the beautiful Sidi, and she stroked the

magician’s chin. “The old man blew so much that was gentle and lovely

that we can probably forgive him this only bad loud one. His flute must

have marvelous forces. It has made me earlier so softhearted that I am

unwilling to weep. With such a delicate work of art, in which the slightest

touch feels great, caution may be needed. The old man will be careful in the

future.”

The magician hardly knew how to hide his joy, for the beautiful Sidi

had never treated him so gently and flattering. “I am no longer angry, my

sweet little love,” he said, and he blinked as tenderly as he could with his

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small eyes. “I forgive him, because you ask for it. You see how lenient I am

against you; so will you be, I hope, as agreeable with me? Do not let us

longer delay, since for once we are on the right path. My happiness is

complete. Give me your hand, as you gave me your heart, and let our

marriage be this very day.”

Sidi was silent and turn down her eyes. “My lord, allow me only two

days to recover from my previous grief. Such a festive day requires

preparation.”

“What do you need, relaxation, dear little fool? No one can see you’ve

been harmed. You glow like a young rose, and your dear eyes shine as

brightly as clear pearls. Come, give me your hand! The necessary

preparations will be made by my spirits in a few moments.”

“Sir,” she replied,“give me only this single day, to quiet the uneasiness

of my heart. If you love me like you say, then you will not deny me the

fulfillment of such small requests.”

“Again the old stubbornness?” the magician broke in severely. “Why

delay when it can happen today? I am tired of giving in and just once I

want to show I am the lord of my house.”

He pulled the fire-steel from his bosom and struck it. The countless

sparks sprayed about, like those one drives out from a glowing iron on the

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anvil with heavy hammers. So they went to the first gentle strike with

power from the fire-steel, and turned into a crowd of marksmen with

flashing guns, surrounding the magician in a close arrangement. “Half of

you,” said he, “roam through the area and bring me everything, what is

going on, urgent messages. He other half, fill the castle on the inside and

the outside. Up!”

The marksmen vanished like lightning, and the magician struck a

second time. A crowd of richly dressed male and female slaves came out of

the sparks, tread in humble postures there around him, expecting his

orders, for all spirits and fairies were under the rule of this steel. “You,” he

said to the male slaves, “leave here, light up the hall, and prepare the meal.

But you”—he turned to the female slaves—“bring the princess and her

maidens beautiful clothes and exquisite jewelry. Away!”

In a moment wheels, bobbins, chairs and marble tables had

disappeared. On the walls opened up six large windows, and in the middle

of the hall stood an ivory dining table covered with magnificent eating

utensils.

Lulu watched the magician like a falcon and observed his every

movement while the latter struck and hid the steel again. The beautiful

Sidi, however, stood trembling in a corner and wept at her own misfortune,

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what she gotten through her own fault. At birth, her mother had given her

gift to her, the ability to resist every act of violence by loathing of her will.

The preservation of this beautiful gift was based on the serious condition

that she never find love. As long as she met this condition, she was safe

before every enemy.

Even in the iron tower she was free in all things, except for the escape.

She wound her bobbin not because she had to, but out of love of her

maidens. The magician, who knew of this gift, was clever enough to punish

the girls instead of the princess if the nine spools from the previous day

were not wound up each evening up to the last thread. The spools were so

large that the girls were allowed no moment to pause if they wanted to

finish all their spinning in one day. They did not even get anything to eat if

they had not produced the spinning. The good Sidi would have rather

wound her hands raw herself at the heavy spool before she would have left

her friends to undeserved suffering. The magician hoped to tire her and

make her more yielding by this clever compulsion. However, the princess

remained steadfast, and always let him wait in vain for the weariness he

hoped for.

He would have gladly been stricter with the girls if his spirits, which

were held within limits by higher powers, would have obeyed his strict

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commands. The princess seemed to notice this powerlessness and

answered his threats with mocking contempt. At last such a rage overcame

him that he swore by his fire-steel that the girls should spin and wind until

Sidi would decide to marry him.

Thus they spun and wound for nearly three years, and the magician

began to abandon all hope, until the old flute player appeared. Since

everything had happened to move the princess to love, and the old man

boasted of the power of his flute, the magician thought it at least worth an

attempt. The flute player kept his word, and the princess lost her gift, not

by the flute, like the sorcerer believed, but by Lulu’s appearance in the

shape of his youth. In the fright of the surprise, the beautiful Sidi forgot

how dangerous his appearance could be. She saw the young hero who

courageously spoke of their relief with heartfelt joy, and before she thought,

she lost the beautiful gift of her mother.

The magician noticed the loss, as he wanted to hug her and did not

feel the resisting force any longer; otherwise, if he approached the princess,

he was violently shoved back. It was self-love alone to attribute his

beautiful decorations with the largest part of this change. It did not occur

to him that the princess fell in love with the old man and not with him.

Because he feared the fairy, his enemy, would interfere with her power and

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cunning if he delayed the marriage; thus he decided to use his advantage

and carry out the wedding without delay. To give his eagerness an apparent

pretense, he acted as if he were angry with the princess. He called his

marksmen and slaves more for his security than for the grandeur.

The beautiful Sidi felt her guilt. Soon she was angry with the flute

player, as if he was, by his undesired appearance, the sole cause of her

misfortune. Soon she apologized to him again and scolded only herself and

her weakness.

To her, since she had seen the prince, the magician had become ten

times more hated still in her eyes. She could hardly stand to lift her eyes

towards him, and yet she would certainly have to marry this ugly monster.

From whom should she hope for rescue?

Lulu had promised her something more daring than seemed credible,

since she knew that the magician had settled any violent attack beforehand

with his fire-steel. She hardly dared to think about her mother. Already the

fairy with her help had stayed away for three years. She could or would not

want to help as it was now, after a mistake that seemed so worth punishing,

and the good Sidi thus painfully repented, still less to await.

But it was the fairy who had sent the flute player, and so was to be

feared, for she had frustrated her mother's help with the loss of her gift.

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Who should she turn to now? He would have ridiculed her tears, and his

unexpected victory would have only been more annoyingly gloated.

Lost in these sad thoughts, she stood there with downcast eyes and

cried. Meanwhile the female slaves came and they brought back the bridal

jewelry towards the opening. She was frightened, as if her death sentence

would be spoken, and followed pale and trembling after the slaves.

Meanwhile, the magician took the old man by the arm and withdrew

into a corner window. “Listen, old man!” said he. “So far I am rather

pleased with you. You have removed the anger and the coyness; only the

affection is still lacking. This characteristic is quite necessary in marriage

and well-being, as you would know from your long experience. Let us

therefore consider how we can help address this shortcoming as soon as

possible. What if you play some sweet melodies during the meal? What do

you think about that idea, old man?”

“What should I think about this?” Lulu replied. “Yes, it is my own

idea, which I earlier told my lord. As it seems, my lord gladly gives out his

ideas to other people.”

The magician was not ashamed and continued with the same

boldness. “As always, so much the better if it is your own idea, for it would

be happier to let it out! But only once! Thanks to you I am guilty; what you

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ask for your services?”

“I have already said to my lord,” returned the flute player, “that I

accept nothing but some good hospitality.”

“Good, old man! Once I see that my bride, by your gentle flute

playing, has become so gentle, then you and my dwarf will be especially

remembered. However, after the meal one from my marksmen will

accompany you over the mountains.”

“Thank you very much!” Lulu broke in. “For such hospitality, I move

no fingers. What? Not even a night? Does my lord think I am accustomed

to sleep in open fields? That would be me! The sun is just right for

walking. Before I let myself be disgracefully shown the door, I’d rather go

myself.” And after this he grabbed his staff and wanted to go.

The magician only saw that, during the discussion, the princess had

left with her maidens. His palace was so bolted on all sides by spirits and

other magical works that, without his will, no gnat found a free way out.

But he was still afraid of escape during his absence; the princess wanted the

help of the fairy, showing only a great dislike for him. He was already ready

to pounce and wanted to chase after her, while the old flute player in his

earlier defiance got worse and spoke of his leaving. He was yielding at first

due to cunning; he was now so reckless that he had him in his power.

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 “Hey there!” he called to the marksmen in furious anger. “Let him go

to hard punishment, the old man from the hall! And to you, old man, I say,

you didn't do what I told you, so I’ll let my spirits split an overhanging cliff

and jam you in there with both arms. There you will starve and whimper

until the vultures and crows overcome you. That’s your lesson!”

With these words he hurried away. Lulu had no greater desire than to

seek out the beautiful Sidi, and through his presence to prevent any

accident from happening to her. He set his flute to his lips and quickly

made a lasting, sweet trill. The marksmen and the slaves stood gathered

together, staring at him, and let him go unhindered. He was already at the

door when the dwarf grabbed him by his garment; a loud clamor erupted

and all forces held back from him. Lulu wanted to break loose because he

was worried about the noise, so he turned to a trill in a taunting little piece.

Soon it buzzed like a swarm of angry bees; soon it growled like a chained

dog when it sees a stranger.

The marksmen and slaves were wild, gritting their teeth and making

fists. The dwarf scolded those who did not hold back the old man, and

there he stopped their angry gestures in answer of his abuse, as he was

severe and threatened them with his switch, which he often used to punish

on the magician's command. This made him even wilder. They went all

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over him here, threw him up high and also threw him to each other. As a

balloon flies from one hand to the other, here ascends, there falls down, and

never rests on the earth, so flew the dwarf from the strong arms of the

spirits from one end of the hall to the other, without himself still making a

loud noise. For they propelled with such force and speed, he did not know

how it happened.

“There the master warden may dance, however!” said Lulu, laughing

and slipping after the magician. He went through a long picture gallery,

which was curved like a horseshoe and ended with a spiral staircase. He

still considered which way he should take when he heard quiet speech from

a nearby room, its door open a little. He stepped out from behind the door

and looked through the gap.

The magician had one of the female slaves by the hand and just said,

“Do not be jealous, dear Barsine! Our previous friendship will not be

reduced by this marriage. You know that we both are not very safe until the

cunning Perifirime reconciles with me. How cruel she would be to avenge

herself on you if the steel, which you robbed from her secretly, came into

her hands again! Without mercy, she locked you in a hard pebble, and

would have let you languish in there forever. But if I married her only

beloved daughter, then both of us are saved. What would she gain if she

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then wanted to be angry with me? Each suffering which she did me would

fall back on her own daughter. She herself must reconcile with me. She

must leave me the spirit steel willingly and must also not avenge if she does

not want to enrage me, since I have persuaded you to be disloyal to her.

Can’t you afterwards be just as good with me, like so far?”

“All good!” the fair one broke in sighing. “I only fear you will love the

princess more than me; she is beautiful.”

“Fear nothing, dear Barsine. Hasn’t she already spent three years in

my palace without my love for you diminishing? Had I also many wives like

the Sultan of India, you would nevertheless always remain the dearest.

Little Barka, your son, I want to instruct in my knowledge, and some day he

will be my only heir. Only right after the meal, do as I told you, so our plot

cannot go wrong. However, I will lock up the girls and carry away the old

man; then there will be no restraints on being with you. Now I want to see

what Perifirime does so that she does not surprise us with her cunning.

Meanwhile, go to the hall; I will come back immediately.”

“The flute playing may not be too weak here if he doesn’t want to

come too late!” thought Lulu, and he held his breath, for it lisped now so

quietly that he hardly heard it. Finally they left under more friendly signs

from each other. The fairy called for the princess. The magician, however,

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ran through the door, behind which Lulu was pressed into the corner. With

each step he skipped up four stairs of the spiral staircase and rushed to the

battlements of the tower, where he took his telescope and looked at the

forest castle of the fairy Perifirime.

It held a large, level table with two kings. They joked and laughed

with their guests and did not seem to punish anything offense. “Before

today, I am sure,” cried Dilsenghuin as he withdrew his telescope and

quickly climbed down from the battlements.

Without a doubt, in a large mirror that hung before it, the fairy

watched what happened in the iron tower, and just now she laughed at the

ball game, that the spirits played with his dear son Barka.

Meanwhile Lulu ran. As he saw coming the princess with her

maidens and the fairy, quickly ahead, he himself did a nice run and sat

down in an earlier corner. The spirits lost their wrath, threw the dwarf on

the sofa and stood, as the women stepped in from the other side, one after

the other, soon after the magician, in such good order as if nothing

occurred. The dwarf had not suffered much injury except being very tired.

As he was ambitious and was ashamed before the girls, he placed himself as

if he had slept during the time. He crept silently down from the sofa, made

a fist for the old man, and struck at the spirits in passing by with his switch.

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 The beautiful Sidi shined, like the evening star which steps with its

lovely playmate from gloomy clouds and pleased the careful sailor with his

light. A rose-red hat of plaited palm leaves was set on only half of her dark

brown hair. A dress of same color, which a white caftan flowed around

easily, seemed to make her free stature still freer and prouder. The old

flute-player’s heart beat as hard as if he himself would be the bridegroom.

“What should I compare her to?” he said to himself. “As the lily

among the flowers of the meadow, so she is among the fairies and maidens

alone. Did this young rose break the monster before my eyes? Should I

suffer patiently, as he himself who was pleased with his thefts? No, as I so

truly live, he should not still your lovely sighs, you darling one! Dry your

tears, you flower of beauty! As long as Lulu breathes, you are free.”

Thus said the old flute player to himself, and he pondered how he

could conquer the steel. He soon gabbed the sword and wanted to split the

skull of the magician. Soon he wanted to excite an angry dispute among the

spirits through screaming sounds and then quickly seize the monster by the

throat. “If he again thinks about the power of the fire-steel…” he thought,

and he tried to think of something else.

Meanwhile the magician had approached the princess. “My beautiful

Sidi has cried, so I see,” he said, smiling. “What does my sweetheart cry

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about? Perhaps over the lost gift of your dear mother? Let yourself be

happy, my little dove! I want it by another, better gift that is fitting to the

wedding. If my Sidi loves me, then I will see all her wishes fulfilled with

joy. Come, my child, and be merry. From now on, the spooling and

spinning is at an end.” With these words he took her by the hand and led

her to the table. Her nine maidens were to the right and left and the

magician at the side of the princess. The spirits and fairies brought he

meals, and the gave the magician one.

“Now, old man,” began the magician, “you have heard my previous

speech, so play on. Something gentle and moving, as my dear bride is glad

to hear it.”

Lulu had gotten one of those completely tender looks from the

beautiful Sidi. His spirit flew on the wings of love blossoming on meadows,

to the lands of the immortals, where eternal joy resides. With a merry

gesture he put the flute to his mouth and breathed as happily as if he

wanted to call out to the sad Sidi, “Loved one, rejoice with me! I have found

the means of freeing you!”

The little song hopped and floated so easily, like the wave of the brook

that trickles from the rocks, like the midges and gnats in the sunshine. A

sick person who heard it would have sprung from his bed and danced! A

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saint would forget his vows and kiss his beautiful neighbor in joyous

ecstasy. The spirits and fairies brought the food with hopping footsteps,

turned themselves hand-in-hand in floating rings around the table, and

slipped inside and outside with light jumps. The maidens extended their

hands to each other and greeted one another with sweet singing. The

magician drank one cup after the other and drank himself into a merry

drunkenness. Even the sad Sidi forgot her suffering and laughed over the

common enthusiasm.

The fat dwarf alone was ill. He made a few clumsy leaps, but joy did

not come to him from the heart. Each rough footstep he did reminded him

of his rib pain, which the old man applied. To avenge himself for it, he

thought about a ruse; he could rob the old man of the flute and make him

hated by the magician. As he was rarely refused anything, he was

confident that he could also make no wrong request this time, even if he did

not know how closely he was related to him.

“Dear lord,” he began as Lulu caught up with him while he stroked

the magician's mustache. “If I had the delightful flute, then I could blow

you a little song like that every evening. I want to learn the fingerings soon

if one of the spirits will teach them to me. Then you could be rid of the

defiant old man that you, my dear good lord, were so scared of a while ago.”

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 “Look at me, cunning boy!” the magician proclaimed laughing. “What

does he have here for a happy thought! Let me kiss you for this idea, my

son, which you have not said in vain to me! I do not know where I could

further need the false flute. Have you heard it, old man? You should give

my pipe to my boy here. He has a cunning head, and he will soon learn to

blow it.”

“That I think well,” Lulu gave for an answer. “If only I could find

sustenance without my flute! I have neither friends nor acquaintances; I

am old and can no longer work. My flute gives me bread and shelter;

should it be taken from me, then I would yet starve in my old days.”

“Sell your beautiful finger ring,” cried the dwarf, grinning. “It seems

much more valuable. For the few years that you still have to live, it is

already sufficient.”

“Right, my son!” cried out the magician with a loud giggle. “The ring

I have not even seen yet, but do show, old man! Is it beautiful? Where did

you get it from? Is it a gift from your wife?”

Lulu was shocked over this unexpected blow, and did not know what

he should do. The ring was stuck on his left thumb, which was covered

under the flute when playing. As he carefully hid his left hand, so the

magician had not noticed it. The dwarf, however, was aware of it, as Lulu

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wanted to pull it off by the hall door. “If I refuse to show the ring,” he said

to himself, “then the monster becomes suspicious. I want to approach so he

turns it or pulls on it, and then I am discovered. Here nothing helps but a

bold attempt, whether or not the flute has another hidden power.”

He stepped towards the magician a few steps nearer, as if outraged

over his request, and said with an indignant gesture, “My lord, this is an

ungrateful way to deal with me! I carried out important services on this

maiden for my lord, was obedient and pleasing, have rejected all gifts, and

instead of rewarding, even my poor property is taken from me. That is not

nice! They should be ashamed of my lord! Why did I enter the doorway?

Had I heard of a man who kept his house so tightly locked, should I not be

afraid of the same injustice? Who wants to argue with him and his spirits

now? Not me! His dwarf may take the flute. I will blow a single song and

then I will go my way.”

He held the flute before his eyes, regarded it sadly, and continued, “So

am I to leave you, you favorite of my heart? Should I be separated from at

my age, you faithful companion of my life? Oh, where I can find another

friend of your love and loyalty? Like two spouses, as fortune and

misfortune have tested, we were devoted to each other. All the feelings of

my heart I told to you. You understood my quiet thoughts and tuned all my

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feelings. As a friend in tender conversations, you delighted and comforted,

so you returned each breath to me with rich profits, and sang joy to me and

sang comfort to me. Through you, I was welcome among the people, was

praised and honored. Your sweet singing acquired me friends who

accepted me, won me benefactors who hosted the stranger. But now the old

man wanders alone and must swelter in misery. Who will take care of me

without you? What will be his food and drink? Who will give him a soft

bed at night? Travel well, you joy of my youth, you comfort of my old age,

and now you sing a sweet song to me for the last time!”

The magician sat there like one who did not know whether to laugh,

be angry, or be ashamed. But the beautiful Sidi, taking Lulu's deception as

the truth, wept about him and herself. Meanwhile, the flute sang a sweet

lullaby. It swung so slowly, it shook so sleepily up and down, as young

seeds are blown by faint breezes, like blossoms that in the drop go up and

float down. The guests leaned back, their eyes began to blink, and their

heads fell to their chests; they nodded to, they nodded fro, and bit-by-bit

they slumbered. The marksmen held their rifles in their arms, the slaves

carried full dishes in their hands, and all stood quite petrified with closed

eyes there.

Lulu stopped, kissed his flute, and said, “So you have not left me yet,

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you dear, sweet singer! In the hardest conflict you have helped me, when I

already doubted your assistance! Thank you! Each one of your tones is a

song of praise for the artist who created you!”

So Lulu spoke of the joy in his heart as his piece of daring had

succeeded so well. Meanwhile, the magician snored so loudly, as if he

wished that the other patrons to wake up again. His head hung so low on

his chest that he touched his belly with his long chin. Lulu came to him,

grabbed him by the chest, and looked for the steel, which was stuck in a

small leather bag on the left side of the caftan. He took it out so gently and

carefully that the magician was not touched.

It was a gilded double grip that was held together by a delicate spring

and which separated on the one side a piece of steel, and on the other a

polished flint. As Lulu just looked at it, he touched the spring by accident.

At once the spirits awakened, regarded each other in surprise, and made

gestures as if they were waiting on Lulu's commands. He even pondered

whether to kill the monster or if his punishment should be left to the fairy;

meanwhile, the beautiful Sidi stirred in slumber. In the meantime he forgot

the magician, turned his ring, and completely woke up the sleeping lady.

As she opened her eyes, the handsome youth who had made her heart

suffer so much was situated at her feet. His arms were spread out towards

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her, and he called towards her with looks full of love, “You are free,

sweetheart! I have disarmed the fiend! See here the token of my victory!”

The beautiful Sidi was speechless; she saw her rescuer with tender

gratitude. She leaned even closer and dropped unexpectedly into his arms.

She forgot spirits, magicians and dwarf and kept her silence for a long

embrace, until the sweet delight gradually receded and the binding of her

tongue was free again.

“What do I do?” said the princess, beginning to be frightened. “Won’t

my mother be angry if I love you without her consent? Get up! At least I

would not make a mistake, laying blame on anyone, on purpose. Bring me

to her. She will receive you very lovingly if she heard that I have you to

thank for my being freed.”

“Where, my love?” he asked.

“To the fairy Perifirime, my mother.”

“How!” cried Lulu. “To the fairy Perifirime? My love Sidi is her

daughter? Now I’m happy! She has even sent me to you. I got this flute

from her and this ring. From her I have the most beautiful of all promises!”

“So my love-rich mother forgave me!” cried out the beautiful Sidi as

the tears of joy trickled over her cheeks. “Oh, how I have frightened myself!

I believed she completely forgot about me, as she let me sigh in my prison

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for such a long time for her help. So that you understand, dear Lulu, as

pleased as I am about her reconciliation, I must tell you how I came to be in

the power of this monster:

“My father Sabalem, the king of Kashmir, in his youth was very

beautiful. You will also know that he is praised very much for his wisdom

and justice by all tongues. When he already approached the manly age, his

emirs and viziers were unable to move him into a marriage. He seemed to

despise all earthly women; at least none themselves could boast of his love.

He gave all women who he found in the palace their freedom, and

transformed the harem into a courtroom, where he appeared daily and

spoke justice.

“Perifirime, the queen of the fairies, heard of his wisdom. She

became curious and visited him in the guise of a young stranger who

watched his court services. The intelligent discussions of the stranger

pleased him; he grew dearer to him daily, and finally trusted him with the

secret thoughts of his heart. The fairy loved him more and more, also grew

dear to him, and appeared to him in her true shape.

“During the bliss that they both enjoyed, the fairy forgot to watch the

spirit steel, the symbol of her authority, with her usual care. The magician

had strived after that steel for a long time, and persuaded one of her female

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slaves to steal the same from her. With this steel, the fairy lost the greatest

strength of her power.

“The most powerful of the fairies and spirits, whom the magician did

not know how to force, began much serious trouble: they caused swift wars

among the humans, infuriating one people against another, and the queen

had to be silent about it. From grief she went to a lonely forest castle,

where she herself educated and taught me, her only child. She taught me

all sorts of useful and beautiful arts that she invented. However, she did

not want to teach me about her unearthly wisdom, because, so she said, it

would not help me, but could probably do much harm.

“When I was twelve years old, she told me the story of my birth and of

her loss. She said to me, as the magician is in continual fear, she wanted to

snatch away the steel again at the next opportunity and punish him for his

deceit. Therefore, he would muster all cunning to bring me into his power,

in order to force my mother to approve an arrangement.

“She did everything that she could to protect me before his attacks.

But if I was not careful, once I fell into his hands, then she could not free

me. Within the castle garden, he could not hurt me; I should only not dare

to be outside the same boundaries. The time of his power was six years; if I

would endure this time in accordance with her instruction, then I would

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have nothing more to fear from him.

“I was accustomed to obey my mother absolutely. For three years I

had fulfilled her instructions precisely. When I believed that I could not go

missing any longer, I was convinced of the opposite of my assumptions by

my misfortune.

“One evening, when my mother was visiting a neighboring queen, I

went walking in the garden with my girls, and we saw a raven hopping a few

steps ahead of us. It seemed not to care, fluttering carelessly from one

flowerbed to another, and it picked my beautiful flowers or bit them from

the stems.

“I was enraged about the insolent bird, and with my girls ran up to it

to scare it away; but when we came close to it, then it fluttered elsewhere,

screaming. We took unexpected pleasure at this childish play and threw

things and ran after it for so long until, without being careful in the twilight,

already too far over the low turf that surrounded the garden, we were

outside.

“I was shocked as I became aware of it, and cried to my maidens that

they should turn around quickly just as the magician stepped out of the

bushes, the steel fastened on him, and with a terrible voice he cried, ‘Out!

Hunters, out! The pigeons have flown!’ Each spark was a strong man, I

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was taken with my girls and carried through the air!”

While the princess related this, the dwarf staggered back and forth,

standing on his weak feet, bumping so forcefully against a chair around his

nose that he woke up. He rubbed his eyes and stretched his painful limbs

as he noticed the strange young man, the one standing with the princess at

a window, and he stopped.

He knocked against his master several times and yelled for a long

time in his ears until he reflected. The magician wanted to yawn and

stretch as the dwarf showed him the two in the window. This sight made

him angry. He jumped up, pulled his sword, and ran so furiously at Lulu

that this was hardly enough time to fight back.

Like lightning, the shooters stood with spears held ready towards

Lulu; however, the slaves of the magician fell on his arms and held him so

tightly that he could not move. The princess made such a loud scream that

the maidens all awoke at once, and with the same clamor got out of their

seats. Lulu thought about his ring, pulled it off, and threw it away.

When the magician saw that his steel was lost, he was friendly and

said good words. “You have deceived me,” he said. “Be fair and give me the

steel back. I will let the princess and her girls leave with you in peace.

Without my will, my rock does not open itself.”

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 “My lord will remember that I was promised a night at his camp with

him,” replied Lulu. “I hope he will keep his word.”

The magician trembled with fury and still considered what he should

do, while the ceiling of the room disappeared like a fog, and the fairy

Perifirime, shining like the morning sun, got out of her cloud carriage.

The magician hardly saw her, so he quickly changed from fear into a

falcon and shot up beside the cloud carriage. The fairy was bent sideways;

she hit him with her hand on his head and said, “This form does not suit

you. As you fear the light, so stay true to your nature and become a night

bird.” Suddenly the hawk was a black-gray eagle-owl. The bright light of

fairy blinded his eyes. He bumped his head on all the walls, and finally

went violently through a window, where he felt free air, and flew away with

a bloody head.

Meanwhile, the carriage sank down gently and vanished like thin

smoke in the corners of the room. The fairy stood there elated as all who

remained were under a mild glow. Lulu and Sidi knelt like children in

reverence before her. Sidi showed her guilt in the eyes, kept fearfully low,

and expected a reprimand.

But the fairy embraced her and, rich in love, said, “You have suffered

enough for your innocent mistake, my daughter. I was never angry with

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you and would have helped you sooner if I could have. With all my power I

stand under the high compulsion of the eternal force that heaven and earth

obey. They weigh with justice and punished my fault through you. I

suffered much, for I did not have much more hope for your freedom than

you. Lulu is the first mortal that my flute obeyed. He broke a bond through

his good genius which neither strength nor cunning could break. I

promised the victor the best that I can give, so it is up to him whether he

wants to have my Sidi.”

Lulu showed his gratitude through a tender kiss on the hand. The

fairy raised him up and said, “Come this way, my children. Your fathers are

waiting for you in my castle, and have both desired your union.”

With these words she turned to the spirits and cried, “Barsine, where

are you?” The untrue one came out trembling, fell to her knees and wept.

But the fairy went on, “You are already punished well enough by the eternal

memory of your offenses, for you erred not out of spite, but out of being

naïve. I forgive you. Go, and be more faithful in the future. Also those of

you remaining are dismissed from your services for today. Go forth and

rejoice with me on this happy day.”

The spirits disappeared and began to build an enormous cart with

twelve seats that took up the better part of the room. They were just about

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to get in when the maidens pulled out the dwarf, who had hidden himself

under the table, and placed him before the fairy.

“I might have wanted to spare you,” said she, “if I could hope for

better of you. But I know you’ll never abandon your malice, for you have

your father’s disloyal nature. Take him instead from society!”

She made a small movement with her hand. In a moment the dwarf

became a light brown screech owl that was moved by a hidden power

through the hole that his father, the eagle-owl, had left, flying out without

trouble. They got in. The carriage lifted up by itself and floated several

times the iron tower around. The fairy took the flute and set it by her

mouth. A lovely ringing of little silver bells sounded, like the singing of a

harmonica, but so varied and often, as if each tone through her fingering

became fourfold. She went through a lot of chords, that by and by ended

themselves, ringing of all at the same time in a jumble that seemed to

announce the confusion of the elements.

The carriage had not yet circled three times around the tower, which

the mighty spirits had built for eternity, when it collapsed in on itself with a

loud noise, and the ground was covered with a large pile of dust and sand.

The carriage took a cheerful swing, like a ship that sailed by good

winds through the air, and came in a few minutes to the forest castle. There

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the two kings of Khorasan and Kashmir received their fortunate heirs with

joy.

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