gether with the scorpion that was
Goorelka, vanished. Day was on the baldness of Shagpat.

CONCLUSION

So was shaved Shagpat, the son of Shimpoor, the son of Shoolpi, the son
of Shullum, by Shibli Bagarag, of Shiraz, according to preordainment.

The chronicles relate, that no sooner had he mastered the Event, than men
on the instant perceived what illusion had beguiled them, and, in the
words of the poet,--

The blush with which their folly they confess
Is the first prize of his supreme success.

Even Bootlbac, the drum-beater, drummed in homage to him, and the four
Kings were they that were loudest in their revilings of the spouse of
Kadza, and most obsequious in praises of the Master. The King of the City
was fain to propitiate his people by a voluntary resignation of his
throne to Shibli Bagarag, and that King took well to heart the wisdom of
the sage, when he says:

Power, on Illusion based, o'ertoppeth all;
The more disastrous is its certain fall!

Surely Shibli Bagarag returned the Sword to the Sons of Aklis, flashing
it in midnight air, and they, with the others, did reverence to his
achievement. They were now released from the toil of sharpening the Sword
a half-cycle of years, to wander in delight on the fair surface of the
flowery earth, breathing its roses, wooing its brides; for the mastery of
an Event lasteth among men the space of one cycle of years, and after
that a fresh Illusion springeth to befool mankind, and the Seven must
expend the concluding half-cycle in preparing the edge of the Sword for a
new mastery. As the poet declareth in his scorn:

Some doubt Eternity: from life begun,
Has folly ceased within them, sire to son?
So, ever fresh Illusions will arise
And lord creation, until men are wise.

And he adds:

That is a distant period; so prepare
To fight the false, O youths, and never spare!
For who would live in chronicles renowned
Must combat folly, or as fool be crowned.

Now, for the Kings of Shiraz and of Gaf, Shibli Bagarag entertained them
in honour; but the King of Oolb he disgraced and stripped of his robes,
to invest Baba Mustapha in those royal emblems--a punishment to the
treachery of the King of Oolb, as is said by Aboo Eznol:

When nations with opposing forces, rash,
Shatter each other, thou that wouldst have stood
Apart to profit by the monstrous feud,
Thou art the surest victim