the bird which was brought to thee by the servant boy.'"[FN#377]
Quoth she, "'Tis well," so he gave her the two fowls and took
from her the cock which her husband had slaughtered. Then he
returned to the bakery, and when he was private he opened the
belly of the cock and found therein a signet-ring with a
bezel-gem which in the sun showed one colour and in the shade
another. So he took it up and hid it in his bosom, after which he
gutted the bird and cooked it in the furnace and ate it.
Presently the Jew having finished his business, returned home and
said to his wife, "Bring me the cock." She brought him the two
fowls and he seeing them asked her, "But where be the first
cock?" And she answered him, "Thou thyself sentest the boy with
these two birds and then orderedst him to bring thee the first
cock." The Jew held his peace but was sore distressed at heart,
so sore indeed that he came nigh to die and said to himself,
"Indeed it hath slipped from my grasp!" Now the Fisherman's son
after he had mastered the ring waited until the evening evened
when he said, "By Allah, needs must this bezel have some
mystery;" so he withdrew into the privacy of the furnace and
brought it out from his bosom and fell a-rubbing it. Thereupon
the Slave of the Ring appeared and cried, "Here I
stand[FN#378]-between thy hands." Then the Fisherman's son said
to himself, "This indeed is the perfection of good fortune," and
returned the gem to his breast-pocket as it was. Now when morning
morrowed the owner of the bakery came in and the youth said to
him, "O my master, I am longing for my people and my native land
and 'tis my desire to fare and look upon them and presently I
will return to thee." So the man paid him his wage, after which
he left him and walked from the bakery till he came to the Palace
of the Sultan where he found near the gate well nigh an hundred