of whom
I once spoke to you has been here,' said your mother, 'and has given
your boy this present.' 'And was it the old witch also who swept away
the clouds and left this fragrance of roses and pinks behind her?' said
I with an incredulous laugh. 'But she might have left him something
better than this whistle: say a purse full of gold, a horse, or
something of the kind.' Your mother besought me not to jest, because
the fairies, if angered, would transform their blessings into
maledictions. To please her, and because she was sick, I said no more;
nor did we speak again of this strange occurrence until six years
afterwards, when, young as she was, she felt that she was going to die.
She gave me then the little whistle, charging me to give it to you only
when you had reached your twentieth year, and before that hour not to
let it go out of my possession. She died. Here now is the present,"
continued Benezar, producing from a little box a small silver whistle,
to which was attached a long gold chain; "and I give it to you in your
eighteenth, instead of your twentieth year, because you are going away,
and I may be gathered to my fathers before you return home. I do not
see any sensible reason why you should remain here another two years
before setting out, as your anxious mother wished. You are a good
and prudent young man, can wield your weapons as bravely as a man of
four-and-twenty, and therefore I can as well pronounce you of age
to-day as if you were already twenty; and now go in peace, and think,
in fortune and misfortune--from which last may heaven preserve you--on
your father."

Thus spake Benezar of Balsora, as he dismissed his son. Said took leave
of him with much emotion, hung the chain about his neck, stuck the
whistle in his sash, swung himself on his horse, and rode to the place
where the caravan for Mecca assembled. In a short time eighty camels
and many hundred horsemen had gathered there; the caravan started off,
and Said rode out of the gate of Balsora, his native city, that he was
destined not to see again for a long time.

The novelty of such a journey, and the many strange objects that
obtruded themselves upon his attention, at first diverted his mind; but
as the travelers neared the desert and the country became more and more
desolate, he began to reflect on many things, and among others, on the
words with which his father had taken leave of him. He drew out his
whistle, examined it closely, and put