band in bringing
them to prison, because they chose to converse in a garden, being
lawfully wedded people; in witness whereof, she called upon the
Bekdji (watchman) and the Imam (priest) of the district and several of
her neighbors.

Poor Hadji was dumfounded, and, accompanied by his better half, left
the prison, where he had expected to stay at least a year or two,
saying: "Truly thou art a wonderful woman, Mashallah."

HOW THE JUNKMAN TRAVELLED TO FIND TREASURE IN HIS OWN YARD

In one of the towers overlooking the Sea of Marmora and skirting the
ancient city of Stamboul, there lived an old junkman, who earned a
precarious livelihood in gathering cinders and useless pieces of iron,
and selling them to smiths.

Often did he moralize on the sad Kismet that had reduced him to the
task of daily laboring for his bread to make a shoe, perhaps for an
ass. Surely he, a true Mussulman, might at least be permitted to ride
the ass. His eternal longing often found satisfaction in passing his
hours of sleep in dreams of wealth and luxury. But with the dawning of
the day came reality and increased longing.

Often did he call on the spirit of sleep to reverse matters, but in
vain; with the rising of the sun began the gathering of the cinders
and iron.

One night he dreamt that he begged this nocturnal visitor to change
his night to day, and the spirit said to him: "Go to Egypt, and it
shall be so."

This encouraging phrase haunted him by day and inspired him by night.
So persecuted was he with the thought that when his wife said to him,
from the door, "Have you brought home any bread?" he would reply, "No,
I have not gone; I will go to-morrow;" thinking she had asked him,
"Have you gone to Egypt?"

At last, when friends and neighbors began to pity poor Ahmet, for that
was his name, as a man on whom the hand of Allah was heavily laid,
removing his intelligence, he one morning left his house, saying: "I
go! I go! to the land of wealth!" And he left his wife wringing her
hands in despair, while the neighbors tried to comfort her. Poor Ahmet
went straight on board a boat which he had been told was bound for
Iskender (Alexandria), and assured the captain that he was summoned
thither, and that he was bound to take him. Half-witted and mad
persons being more holy than others, Ahmet was conveyed to Iskender.

Arriving in Iskender, Hadji Ahmet roamed far and wide, proceeding as
far as Cairo, in search of the luxuries he ha