r Labakan, who expected no such reception; they
bruised and beat him with smoothing-irons and yard-sticks, pricked him
with needles, and pinched him with sharp shears, until he sank down,
exhausted, on a heap of old clothes. As he lay there, the master
ceased, for a moment, from his blows, to ask after the stolen
garments: in vain Labakan assured him that he had come back on that
account alone, to set all right; in vain offered him threefold
compensation for his loss; the master and his journeymen fell upon him
again, beat him terribly, and turned him out of doors. Sore and
bruised, he mounted Murva, and rode to a caravansery. There he laid
down his weary lacerated head, reflecting on the sorrows of earth, on
merit so often unrewarded, and on the nothingness and transientness of
all human blessings. He went to sleep with the determination to give
up all hopes of greatness, and to become an honest burgher. Nor on the
following day did he repent of his resolution, for the heavy hands of
his master, and the journeymen, had cudgelled out of him all thoughts
of nobility.

He sold his box to a jeweller for a high price, and fitted up a
workshop for his business. When he had arranged all, and had hung out,
before his window, a sign with the inscription, LABAKAN, MERCHANT
TAILOR, he sat down and began with the needle and thread he had found
in the chest, to mend the coat which his master had so shockingly
torn. He was called off from his work, but on returning to it, what a
wonderful sight met his eyes! The needle was sewing industriously
away, without being touched by any one; it took fine, elegant
stitches, such as Labakan himself had never made even in his most
skilful moments.

Truly the smallest present of a kind fairy is useful, and of great
value! Still another good quality had the gift; be the needle as
industrious as it might, the little stock of thread never gave out.

Labakan obtained many customers, and was soon the most famous tailor
for miles around. He cut out the garments, and took the first stitch
therein with the needle, and immediately the latter worked away,
without cessation, until the whole was completed. Master Labakan soon
had the whole city for customers, for his work was beautiful, and his
charges low; and only one thing troubled the brains of the people of
Alexandria, namely, how he finished his work entirely without
journeymen, and with closed doors.

Thus was the motto of the chest which promis