TWILIGHT LAND

roared and bellowed till the earth shook and the sky
grew dark overhead. But all was of no avail; into the
jar he must go, and into the jar he went. Then the
Wise Man stoppered the jar and sealed it. He wrote
an inscription of warning upon it, and then he buried it
in the ground.

“Now,” said Aben Hassen the Wise to the Talisman
of Solomon, ‘have I done everything that I should?”

“No,” said the Talisman, “thou shouldst not have
brought the jar of golden money and the jar of silver
money with thee; for that which is evil in the greatest is
evil in the least. Thou fool! The treasure is cursed!
cast it all from thee while there is yet time.”

“Yes, I will do that, too,” said the Wise Man. So he
buried in the earth the jar of gold and the jar of silver
that he had brought with him, and then he stamped the
mould down upon it. After that the Wise Man began
his life all over again. He bought, and he sold, and he
traded, and by-and-by he became rich. Then he built
himself a great house, and in the foundation he laid the
jar in which the Demon was bottled.

Then he married a young and handsome wife. By-
and-by the wife bore him a son, and then she died.

This son was the pride of his father’s heart; but he
was as vain and foolish as his father was wise, so that all
men called him Aben Hassen the Fool, as they called the
father Aben Hassen the Wise.

Then one day death came and called the old man
and he left his son all that belonged to him—even ie
Talisman of Solomon.

Young Aben Hassen the Fool had never seen so much
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