ould choke down a few crumbs of bread, not enough for a
sparrow. His indignation was aroused, but his curiosity also. He looked
daggers; but he was a still man, kept his counsel to himself, and set
himself to study out the solution of this problem.

One night, when his wife stole away from his side,--she thought he was
asleep, did she?--he followed her with the stealthiness of a cat; and,
oh horrible! tracked her steps to a graveyard, where she began to cut
and carve; and he then discovered, to his great loathing, that he had
been married to a ghoul!

Amina came home after a good feast. Sid was snoring away, apparently in
the profound depths of sleep, hiding away from any Caudle lectures. He
was about as sound asleep as a weasel. Breakfast passed off most
charmingly without a word said by any one; and he walked round to the
khan to scrutinize some figs.

'How does the lady?' said Ben Hadad, sarcastically.

'Very well indeed, I thank you,' replied Sid.

The dinner-bell rang, down they sat, and out came the bodkin. It did
not, however, 'his quietus make.'

'My dear,' he said, smothering up his Arabian fury, 'do you not like
this bill of fare, or does the sight of me take away your taste for
food? Could you obtain a better meal even at the Bagdad St. Nicholas?'

No answer.

'All well,' said he; 'I suppose that this food is not so toothsome to
you as dead men's flesh!'

Thunder and furies! A more dreadful domestic scene was never beheld. The
lovely Amina turned black in the face, her eyes bulged out of her head,
she foamed at the mouth, and, seizing a goblet of water, dashed it into
the face of the unfortunate man.

'Take that,' said she, 'and learn to mind your own business.' Whereupon
he became a dog, and a miserable dog at that.

Many adventures he then had. For full particulars, see the Arabian
Nights. He used to fight for a bone, or lick up a mouthful from a
gutter. He had not the spirit to prick up his ears, or to wag or curl up
his tail, if he had one--for, shortly after his transformation, the end
of it was wedged into a door by his wife, and he was cur-tailed.

Happy is he who gets into trouble by necromancy, who can get out of it
by the same. The devil rarely bolts and unbolts his door for his own
guests. He is not wont to say, 'Walk in, my friend,' and afterward,
'Good-by.' But it so turned out in the case of Sid Norman, because he
had not been knowingly bewitched; and Mrs. Amina Ghoul Sid Norman
l