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Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net








                      _THE "CHANDOS CLASSICS."_



                            EASTERN TALES



                                  BY

                          MANY STORY TELLERS



        COMPILED AND EDITED FROM ANCIENT AND MODERN AUTHORS BY

                            MRS. VALENTINE

       _Author of "Sea Fights and Land Battles," &c., &c., &c._



                     WITH  NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS






                                LONDON

                        FREDERICK WARNE & CO.

                        BEDFORD STREET, STRAND

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PREFACE.

[Illustration]


In compiling this volume of Eastern Tales, the Editor has been careful
to select only those best suited to youthful readers. They have been
gathered from both ancient and modern, French, Italian, and English
sources, and therefore offer great variety of style and subject.

In the stories taken from the Tales of the Genii, an omission of a few
words has been made, to fit them for their place in this volume.

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CONTENTS

[Illustration]

                                                          PAGE

JALALADDEEN OF BAGDAD                                      1

THE STORY OF HASCHEM                                      40

THE PANTOFLES                                             73

STORY OF THE PRINCE AND THE LIONS                         78

THE CITY OF THE DEMONS                                    95

JUSSUF, THE MERCHANT OF BALSORA                          104

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS                                       169

THE ENCHANTERS; OR, MISNAR, THE SULTAN OF INDIA          200

SADIK BEG                                                306

HALECHALBE AND THE UNKNOWN LADY                          309

THE FOUR TALISMANS                                       341

THE STORY OF BOHETZAD; OR, THE LOST CHILD                366

URAD; OR, THE FAIR WANDERER                              499

ALISCHAR AND SMARAGDINE                                  524

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EASTERN TALES.

Jalaladdeen of Bagdad.

[Illustration]


Once upon a time there lived in the city of Bagdad a young man called
Jalaladdeen. It was not his native place; but, in his early days, his
father had taken up his abode there. He was, however, little
acquainted with the town, in which he had grown up a sturdy youth; for
his father inhabited a small house in one of the suburbs, and lived a
very retired and frugal life. They managed their household affairs,
and cultivated their small garden, without the aid of any domestics.

One day the father, feeling his end approaching, called for his son
once more to his bed-side before his death, and said to him,
"Jalaladdeen, my dearest son, thou seest that I have arrived at the
bourne of my earthly career: now I should joyously quit this life,
were it not for the thought that I must leave thee here alone. After
my death, thou wilt find that thou are not so poor as thou mayest have
conceived, and that too with good reason, from our hitherto contracted
habits of life. Nevertheless, guard against the impression that thou
art in possession of inexhaustible riches. Reflect that a year has
three hundred and sixty-five days, and that the smallest expenditure,
when it occurs daily, will in the end amount to no inconsiderable sum.
Pay careful heed, therefore, to these my instructions, and be
contented with the necessaries of life. Provide that which is
indispensable to thy subsistence; but beware of purchasing
superfluities. Man's wants increase daily, if he do not accustom
himself in his early days to practise self-denial. But shouldest thou
ever be so unhappy as to neglect these my sincere cautions, and
consequently fall into poverty, I have only this piece of advice left
for thee:--Take this rope, fasten it to the nail in yonder wall, and
pull stoutly three times."

After these words, with his latest strength he drew a new rope from
under the head of his bed, and presented it to Jalaladdeen: the next
moment he expired.

So remarkable was the last lesson of the dying father to Jalaladdeen,
that he carefully preserved the rope. The care of the funeral of the
deceased, and the grief for the loss of his parent, and his own
abandonment in the world, occupied Jalaladdeen's mind for the first
week; but soon the household matters demanded his attention, and he
speedily found his father's words verified. One day he discovered in a
chamber which his father had always kept locked, and which he himself
had never before entered, a great quantity of gold and jewels. He
still, however, persevered in his accustomed solitary and frugal life
in the same manner as before the death of his father. He fetched his
daily provisions for himself, worked in his garden, and dressed his
own food. One day it happened that as he went to fetch a piece of meat
from his butcher, he passed a house