vernor had
counted on the money, so the afflicted man could only preserve his
liberty at the expense of a large sum of money. Again heartily cursing
the slippers, in order to effectually rid himself of them, he threw them
into an aqueduct at some distance from the city, persuaded that he
should now hear no more of them. But his evil genius had not yet
sufficiently plagued him: the slippers got into the mouth of the pipe
and stopped the flow of the water. The keepers of the aqueduct made
haste to repair the damage, and, finding the obstruction was caused by
Abu Kasim's slippers, complained of this to the governor, and once more
was Abu Kasim heavily fined, but the governor considerately returned him
the slippers. He now resolved to burn them, but, finding them thoroughly
soaked with water, he exposed them to the sun upon the terrace of his
house. A neighbour's dog, perceiving the slippers, leaped from the
terrace of his master's house upon that of Abu Kasim, and, seizing one
of them in his mouth, he let it drop into the street: the fatal slipper
fell directly on the head of a woman who was passing at the time, and
the fright as well as the violence of the blow caused her to miscarry.
Her husband brought his complaint before the kazi, and Abu Kasim was
again sentenced to pay a fine proportioned to the calamity he was
supposed to have occasioned. He then took the slippers in his hand, and,
with a vehemence that made the judge laugh, said: "Behold, my lord, the
fatal instruments of my misfortune! These cursed slippers have at length
reduced me to poverty. Vouchsafe, therefore, to publish an order that no
one may any more impute to me the disasters they may yet occasion." The
kazi could not refuse his request, and thus Abu Kasim learned, to his
bitter cost, the danger of wearing his slippers too long.

III

THE YOUNG MERCHANT OF BAGHDAD; OR, THE WILES OF WOMAN.

Too many Eastern stories turn upon the artful devices of women to screen
their own profligacy, but there is one, told by Arab Shah, the
celebrated historian, who died A.D. 1450, in a collection entitled
_Fakihat al-Khalifa_, or Pastimes of the Khalifs, in which a lady
exhibits great ingenuity, without any very objectionable motive. It is
to the following effect:

A young merchant in Baghdad had placed over the front of his shop,
instead of a sentence from the Kuran, as is customary, these arrogant
words: "VERILY THERE IS NO CUNNING LIKE UNTO THAT OF MAN,