One night Harun-ar-Rashid was quite sleepless, and said to his vizier,
Jaafar, the son of Yahya, the Barmekide: 'I cannot sleep this night; I
feel oppressed, and do not know what to do.' The servant Masrur, who
happened to be standing near, burst out laughing at these words, and
the Khalif continued: 'What are you laughing for? Do you mock me or
wish to show your levity?' Masrur said: 'I swear by your relationship
to the Prince of Apostles that I have done this unwittingly; but last
evening I was near the castle, and walked to the bank of the Tigris,
where I saw many persons assembled around a man who made them laugh,
and just now I recollected some of his words, which caused me to
smile; his name is Ben Almugazeli, and I crave pardon from the
Commander of the Faithful.' Then Rashid said: 'Bring him here this
moment.' Accordingly Masrur went to Ben Almugazeli and said to him:
'The Commander of the Faithful wants you.' He replied: 'To hear is to
obey!' And Masrur continued: 'But on the condition that if he presents
you with anything, one-fourth of it will belong to you, and the rest
to me.' The man rejoined: 'No, I must have one-third of it and you the
other two-thirds.' Masrur would not agree to this proposal, but at
last consented after a great deal of haggling. When he was admitted
and had made his salutations, the Khalif said: 'If you make me laugh I
shall give you five hundred dinars, but if not I shall give you three
blows with this sock.' Now Ben Almugazeli said to himself: "What is
the odds if I get three strokes with the sock?" because he thought it
was empty. Accordingly he began to jest and to play tricks at which
low people might have laughed, but not Rashid, who did not even smile.
The man was first astonished, then grieved, and at last frightened
when Rashid said: "Now you have deserved the blows." He then took up
the sock and twisted it, but at the bottom there were some balls, each
of which weighed two drachms. When he had struck Ben Almugazeli once,
the latter yelled pitifully, but recollecting the condition Masrur had
imposed upon him, he exclaimed: "Mercy, O Commander of the Faithful,
listen to two words of mine." He said: "Speak what you like." The man
continued: "I have promised Masrur to let him have two-thirds of the
bounty I might receive, and to keep one-third for myself, and to this
he agreed only after much bargaining. Now the Commander of the
Faithful has decided that the bounty shall consist