“Young man, you appear to be a stranger; where do you come from? where are you travelling to? and what is your occupation?” Manssur replied: “I am a traveller, and the caravan of misfortunes has brought me to this country.” The bath-keeper then asked him: “Did you happen to meet on your way a camel-rider named Baba Fys?” He replied: “We were companions, but in the desert we were attacked by wild beasts, who bit off his ears, and therefore he has returned to Kabúl.” On hearing this the heart of the bath-keeper became hot as a blacksmith’s furnace, seething from the flames of grief, and he exclaimed: “What more distressing news could you tell me? He is my brother; the camel was my property; and I borrowed the price of the silk. I must of necessity go home to-night and consult my relatives on this affair; and as the vazír, who is the owner of this bath and is at present sick, intends to come here in the morning, I was ordered to warm the bath well. Do you therefore put fire into it, and to-morrow I will pay you for your trouble. Take care, however, to stir up the fuel from time to time, so that the bath may become properly heated.” After giving these instructions to Manssur, he departed to his house. But as Manssur was fatigued and glad to be in a warm place, he soon fell asleep; and on awaking he found the fire was extinguished, so he got up, and in his anxiety and inexpertness he stirred the fire so as to break part of the floor above it, in consequence of which the water in the reservoir rushed down and completely put out the fire again, at the same time scalding Manssur, who fled from the place in great fear. When the vazír arrived at the bath in the morning he began to tremble from the cold, and his malady so increased that he fainted. His attendants immediately seized the bath-keeper, who asserted, in excuse, that it was all the fault of the fireman, who had run away. But the vazír suddenly dying in consequence of having caught cold, his son gave orders that both the bath-keeper and the fireman should be put to death.
Manssur, however, had made good his escape from Gaznín, and was journeying towards Lahore when he fell in with a caravan, of which one of the merchants engaged him as his servant. As Manssur was well acquainted with his duties, he diligently guarded his master’s goods, and soon gained his confidence. When the caravan had entered into one of the pargannas of Lahore, as all the provisions were exhausted, each merchant gave his servant a quantity of goods to exchange for victuals. Manssur bartered the goods he had received from his master very profitably, and returned with various kinds of provisions before any of his companions, at which his master was so well pleased that he said to him: “I hear that there are many wealthy persons in this parganna. Take therefore some goods of high price and dispose of them, and I will give you half the profits.” Accordingly, Manssur selected merchandise of nearly the value of five hundred tománs,[18] which he sold for a thousand and returned. His master gave him three hundred tománs, saying: “Let this sum be the capital of your business, which you will in a short time increase and be thus enabled to return to your own country.” Shah Manssur gratefully received the merchant’s generous gift, and, having bought suitable goods, again repaired to the parganna, and hawked them about till he arrived at the gate of an elegant and magnificent mansion, which he concluded to be the property of some noble or grandee, and thought the owner might possibly buy all his stock of merchandise. So he deposited his wares in the shade of a wall and leaned against it, watching the door of the house. Presently a maiden resembling a húrí[19] in stature, with the serenity of the moon in her countenance, and with bewitching eyes, came out of the house with a pitcher in her hand for the purpose of taking water from the river; and Shah Manssur thus addressed her: “I am at your service—
The glances of your eyes are wonderful;
Whoever beholds them is on the top of felicity.”
But the maiden replied:
“This is not the place where every caravan stops;
The lion of every desert is here distrusted.”
Having thus spoken the damsel went her way, leaving Shah Manssur disappointed. But after a while she returned and inquired of him: “Why do you stop here?” He answered: “I am waiting on rosy-cheeked ladies, and my heart is stored with all sorts of services for them.” Quoth the damsel: “Bring your goods into the house that I may buy them.” So he took up his wares and followed the girl, who walked very rapidly. They passed through a corridor with several doors, and arrived in the court-yard of the mansion, which was a great and lofty edifice of much beauty, having many apartments elegantly furnished, but untenanted. When he had looked around and rested himself for a while, he perceived that the maiden had disappeared. At last he concluded it would be best for him to leave the place; but as he was roaming from one apartment to another he lost his way, and finding no way of exit became frightened, yet continued his search until he reached a hall from the ceiling of which a golden disk was suspended by chains encrusted with precious stones. On both sides of the disk small globular bells were dangling, and upon it there was a phial of glass. The statue of a lion of marble bound in chains occupied one side of the apartment. While Shah Manssur viewed this scene with amazement, the same girl entered with a rod in her hand. As he was about to address her, she exclaimed: “Ha! madman, you have walked into the trap at last!” and struck the lion so that he began to roar, and the disk, the chains, and the little bells shook and jingled, accompanied by great noises, shoutings, and lamentations, which terrified Shah Manssur, who anxiously wished to make his escape. Meanwhile the phial on the disk emitted a green substance mingled with flames, which ascended into the air and filled the apartment with darkness: Shah Manssur almost fainted; and when the smoke and the flame had subsided, a viper lifted its head out of the phial, from which it finally emerged and entered the mouth of the lion. Soon after this the lion sneezed, and from his brains a spider escaped, which gradually increased in size until it became as large as a sheep; when it made a still greater effort its skin burst, from which an old hag of miserable aspect, dreadful as a goblin and ugly as a satyr, came forth, embraced Shah Manssur very ardently, kissed him, and emitted from her cadaverous mouth a disgusting liquid which covered his face. Her putrid breath was like burning sulphur, and made him cough and almost give up the ghost. This dreadful hag, however, doubled her caresses, and would not leave him until he fainted away. When he came to his senses he cried out piteously: “O most gracious lady, deliver me from this calamity!” But she replied: “Your request cannot be gratified;” and then, giving him a substance to smell at, he again became unconscious.
Thus Shah Manssur continued during nearly forty days in the grasp of misfortune. The wretched hag made her appearance once every day, tormenting him, and causing him to faint for the gratification of her wicked lust. One day, however, when she was about the same business, she pulled out a mirror from her pocket and looking into it with great consternation, was suddenly transformed into a spider, crawled into the mouth of the lion, whence she again issued in the form of a serpent, ascended to the disk and disappeared in the phial. Then Shah Manssur went into the court-yard and tried whether he could escape from the place. There the girl met him and said: “I am astonished that she has not thrown you into a trance;” upon which Manssur told her all that had occurred, and the girl said: “She has a foe in Jábolká, whose machination she learns from that mirror, because whenever he attempts to ruin this wicked fairy his figure appears in it, and the accursed one departs to combat him.” Then exclaimed Shah Manssur bitterly: “O cruel and merciless woman! the torments which I have suffered in this house are the consequences of my having by your coquetry been decoyed into it; and now perhaps you will be compassionate enough to let me depart.” The damsel replied: “Young man, I have, like yourself, been caught in this shoreless whirlpool, and have been made the instrument of alluring poor victims, whom she was in the habit of using for the gratification of her wicked desires and afterwards destroying. Whenever I disobeyed her she punished me severely. Her name is Hennána the Witch, and she is a descendant of the sorcerers of the time of Kolyas, whom the accursed Pharaoh sent against the Lord Moses (salutation to him).[20] This iniquitous wretch keeps a similar establishment in Hindústán: she is able, like the wind, to transport herself in a moment from the eastern to the western parts of the world, and to carry the flames of misfortune to all places.”
Shah Manssur then asked the girl: “How did you fall into her power?” She replied: “Know that my father is
