THE SECOND CALENDER. 715

lodging, in a city where we never had been before. Our good
fortune, however, having conducted us to your door, we took the
liberty of knocking ; you have received us with so much benevo-
lence and charity that we cannot sufficiently thank you. This,
madam, is what you desired me to relate; this was the way in
which I lost my right eye ; this was the reason I have my beard
and eyebrows shaved, and why I am at this moment in your
company.

“ Enough,” said Zobeidé; “ we thank you, and you may re-
tire whenever you please. The calender excused himself, and
entreated the lady to allow him to stay and hear the history of
his two companions, whom he could not well abandon, as well
as that of the three other persons of the party.

The history of the first: calender appeared very surprising to
the whole company, and particularly to the caliph. The pre-
sence of the slaves, armed with their scimitars, did not prevent
him from saying in a whisper to the vizier, “As long as I can
remember, I never heard anything to compare with this history
of the calender, though I have been all my life in the habit of
hearing similar narratives.” He had no sooner finished than
the second calender began, and addressing himself to Zobeidé,
spoke as follows.

SSS

THE HISTORY OF THE SECOND CALENDER, THE
SON OF A KING.

CZ|O obey your commands, madam, and to inform you by
what strange adventure I lost my right eye, is to give
you an account of my whole life.

I was scarcely more than an infant when the king,
my father, (for I too am a prince by birth,) observing that I pos-
sessed great quickness of intellect, spared no pain in its cultiva-
tion. Hecollected from every part of his dominions whoever was
famous for science, and a knowledge of the fine arts, for the pur-
pose of instructing me. I no sooner knew how to read and write,
than'I learnt by heart the whole of the Koran, that admirable
book, in which we find the basis, precepts, and regulations of oyr