Sir,
replied poor Alcouz, I am the most innocent man in the world, and
am undone if you will not hear me patiently: nobody deserves more
compassion. Sir, replied one of the domestics, will you listen to
a robber, who enters people's houses to plunder and murder them?
if you will not believe us, only look upon his back. Upon which
they showed it to the judge, who, without any other information,
immediately commanded one hundred lashes to be given him with a
bull's pizzle over his shoulders, and caused him afterwards to be
carried through the town on a camel, with one crying before him,
Thus are such men punished as enter people's houses by force!
After treating him thus, they banished him from the town, and
forbade him ever to return to it. Some people, who met him after
the second misfortune, brought me word where he was; and I went
and fetched him to Bagdad privately, and gave him all the
assistance I could.
The caliph, continued the barber, did not laugh so much at this
story as at the other: he was pleased to bewail the unfortunate
Alcouz, and ordered something to be given me. But, without giving
his servants time to obey his orders, I continued my discourse,
and said to him, My sovereign lord and master, you see that I do
not speak much; and since your majesty has been pleased to do me
the favour to listen to me so far, I beg you would likewise hear
the adventures of my two other brothers; I hope they will be as
diverting as those of the former.
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