on his journey. He had not walked far, when the
castle suddenly appeared before him, though a moment before not a trace
of it could be seen. 'How am I to get in?' he thought. 'I dare not
knock, lest the ogre should hear me. Perhaps it would be best for me to
climb up the wall, and wait to see what will happen.' So he did, and
after sitting on the top for about an hour, a window above him opened,
and a voice said: 'Dschemil!' He looked up, and at the sight of
Dschemila, whom he had so long believed to be dead, he began to weep.
'Dear cousin,' she whispered, 'what has brought you here?'
'My grief at losing you.'
'Oh! go away at once. If the ogre comes back he will kill you.'
'I swear by your head, queen of my heart, that I have not found you
only to lose you again! If I must die, well, I must!'
'Oh, what can I do for you?'
'Anything you like!'
'If I let you down a cord, can you make it fast under your arms, and
climb up?'
'Of course I can,' said he.
So Dschemila lowered the cord, and Dschemil tied it round him, and
climbed up to her window. Then they embraced each other tenderly, and
burst into tears of joy.
'But what shall I do when the ogre returns?' asked she.
'Trust to me,' he said.
Now there was a chest in the room, where Dschemila kept her clothes. And
she made Dschemil get into it, and lie at the bottom, and told him to
keep very still.
He was only hidden just in time, for the lid was hardly closed when the
ogre's heavy tread was heard on the stairs. He flung open the door,
bringing men's flesh for himself and lamb's flesh for the maiden. 'I
smell the smell of a man!' he thundered. 'What is he doing here?'
'How could any one have come to this desert place?' asked the girl, and
burst into tears.
'Do not cry,' said the ogre; 'perhaps a raven has dropped some scraps
from his claws.'
'Ah, yes, I was forgetting,' answered she. 'One did drop some bones
about.'
'Well, burn them to powder,' replied the ogre, 'so that I may swallow
it.'
So the maiden took some bones and burned them, and gave them to the
ogre, saying, 'Here is the powder, swallow it.'
And when he had swallowed the powder the ogre stretched himself out and
went to sleep.
In a little while the man's flesh, which the maiden was cooking for the
ogre's supper, called out and said:
'Hist! Hist!
A man lies in the kist!'
And the lamb's flesh answered:
'He is your brother,
And cousin of the other.'
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