the city. Thereupon she demanded a dower of fifty dinars and
naming a deputy caused the knot be knotted and she came to him
about evening time and he went in to her. But when it was the
supper hour he called as was his wont to his black handmaiden
saying "Fetch the fringed table-cloth," and she fared forth and
fetched it bringing also three biscuits and three onions, and as
soon as the meal was served up all three sat down to it, the
Kazi, the slave-girl, and the new bride. Each took a biscuit and
an onion and ate them up and the bride exclaimed "Allah requite
thee with wealth. By Allah, this be a wholesome supper." When the
judge heard this he was delighted with her and cried out,
"Extolled be the Almighty for that at last He hath vouchsafed to
me a wife who thanketh the Lord for muchel or for little!" But he
knew not what the Almighty had decreed to him through the wile
and guile, the malice and mischief of women. Next morning the
Kazi repaired to the Mahkamah and the bride arose and solaced
herself with looking at the apartments, of which some lay open
whilst others were closed. Presently she came to one which was
made fast by a door with a wooden bolt and a padlock of iron: she
considered it and found it strong but at the threshold was a
fissure about the breadth of a finger; so she peeped through and
espied gold and silver coins heaped up in trays of brass which
stood upon Kursi-stools and the nearest about ten cubits from the
door. She then arose and fetched a long wand, the mid-rib of a
date-palm,[FN#210] and arming the end with a lump of leaven she
pushed it through the chink under the door and turned it round
and round upon the money-trays as if sewing or writing. At last
two dinars stuck to the dough and she drew them through the
fissure and returned to her own chamber; then, calling the
negress, she gave her the ducats saying, "Go thou to the Bazar