Page:Arabian Nights Entertainments (1728)-Vol. 3.djvu/87

Words, but all the People fell into a Fit of Laughter, and cried out, He’s a Fool, he’s a Madman. There were ſome however that pitied him becauſe of his Youth; and one among the Company ſaid to him, My Son, you muſt certainly be crazed, you do not conſider what you ſay. Is it poſſible that a Man could yeſterday be at Balſora, the ſame Night at Cairo, and next Morning at Damaſcus? Sure you are aſleep ſtill; come rouſe up your Spirits, What I ſay, anſwer’d Bedreddin Haſſan, is ſo true, that laſt Night I was married in the City of Cairo. All thoſe that laugh’d before, could not forbear laughing again, when he ſaid ſo, call your ſelf to mind, ſays the ſame Perſon that ſpoke before, you have ſure enough dreamt all this, and that Fancy ſtill poſſeſſes your brain, I am ſenſible of what I ſay, anſwer’d the Young Man. “Pray can you tell me how it was poſſible for me to go in a Dream to Cairo, where I am very certain I was in Perſon, and where my Bride was ſeven times brought before me, each time dreſs’d in a different Habit, and where I ſaw an ugly Hump-back Fellow, to whom they intended to give her. Beſides I want to know what is become of my Gown, my Turban, and the Bag of Sequins I had at Cairo.”

Tho’ he aſſur’d them that all theſe things were Matter of Fact, yet they could not forbear to laugh at him; which put him into ſuch a Confuſion, that he knew not well what to think of all thoſe Adventures.

Day-light which began to appear in Schahriar’s Apartment, impoſed Silence on Scheherazade, but next night the reſum’d her Story.

SIR, ſaid ſhe, after Bedreddin Haſſan had confidently affirm’d all that he ſaid to be true, he roſe up to go into the Town, and every one that followed him, call’d out, A Madman, a Fool. Upon this ſome look’d out at their Windows, ſome came to their Doors, and others join’d with thoſe that were about him, calling out as they did, Madman, but not knowing for what. In this Perplexity of Mind the young Gentleman happen’d to come before a Paſtry-Cook’s Shop, and went into it to avoid the Rable.

This Paſtry-Cook had formerly been Captain to a Troop of Arabian Robbers, who plunder’d the Caravans; and though he was become a Citizen of Damaſcus, where he