misfortune resulted from a spell, this was rather
difficult, but he would do his best, and at any rate he could promise
that before my fifteenth birthday I should be freed from the enchantment
if I could get a man who would swear to marry me as I was.

'As you may suppose, this was not easy, as my ugliness was such that no
one would look at me a second time. My nurse and I were almost in
despair, as my fifteenth birthday was drawing near, and I had never so
much as spoken to a man. At last we received a visit from the wizard,
who told us what had happened at court, and your story, bidding me to
put myself in your way when you had lost all hope, and offer to save you
if you would consent to marry me.

'That is my history, and now you must beg the king to send messengers at
once to Granada, to inform my father of our marriage, and I _think_,'
she added with a smile, 'that he will not refuse us his blessing.'

Adapted from the Portuguese.

_THE JOGI'S PUNISHMENT_

ONCE upon a time there came to the ancient city of Rahmatabad a jogi[1]
of holy appearance, who took up his abode under a tree outside the city,
where he would sit for days at a time fasting from food and drink,
motionless except for the fingers that turned restlessly his string of
beads. The fame of such holiness as this soon spread, and daily the
citizens would flock to see him, eager to get his blessing, to watch his
devotions, or to hear his teaching, if he were in the mood to speak.
Very soon the rajah himself heard of the jogi, and began regularly to
visit him to seek his counsel and to ask his prayers that a son might be
vouchsafed to him. Days passed by, and at last the rajah became so
possessed with the thought of the holy man that he determined if
possible to get him all to himself. So he built in the neighbourhood a
little shrine, with a room or two added to it, and a small courtyard
closely walled up; and, when all was ready, besought the jogi to occupy
it, and to receive no other visitors except himself and his queen and
such pupils as the jogi might choose, who would hand down his teaching.
To this the jogi consented; and thus he lived for some time upon the
king's bounty, whilst the fame of his godliness grew day by day.

[Footnote 1: A Hindu holy man.]

Now, although the rajah of Rahmatabad had no son, he possessed a
daughter, who as she grew up became the most beautiful creature that eye
ever rested upon. Her father had l