uent speech; and her father said to her, “Bring meat for
our guest, by whose visit a blessing hath betided us[273]:” whereupon
she brought him two great fishes, each the bigness of a lamb, and the
Merman said to him, “Eat.” So he ate for stress of hunger, despite
himself; because he was tired of eating fish and they had naught else
save fish. Before long, in came the Merman’s wife, who was beautiful of
form and favour and with her two children, each having in his hand a
young fish, which he craunched as a man would craunch a cucumber. When
she saw the fisherman with her husband, she said, “What is this
No-Tail?” And she and her sons and their sister came up to him and fell
to examining the back parts of Abdullah of the Land, and saying, “Yea,
by Allah, he is tailless!”; and they laughed at him. So he said to the
Merman, “O my brother, hast thou brought me hither to make me a butt and
a laughing-stock for thy children and thy consort?”——And Shahrazad
perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

[Illustration]


        Now when it was the Nine Hundred and Forty-sixth Night,

She resumed, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that Abdullah of the
Land said to Abdullah of the Sea, “O my brother, hast thou brought me
hither to make me a butt and a laughing-stock for thy children and thy
consort?” Cried the Merman, “Pardon, O my brother! Those who have no
tails are rare among us, and whenever one such is found, the Sultan
taketh him, to make fun of him, and he abideth a marvel amongst us, and
all who see him laugh at him. But, O my brother, excuse these young
children and this woman, for they lack wits.” Then he cried out to his
family, saying, “Silence!”; so they were afraid and held their peace;
whilst he went on to soothe Abdullah’s mind. Presently, as they were
talking, behold, in came some ten Mermen, tall and strong and stout, and
said to him, “O Abdullah, it hath reached the King that thou hast with
thee a No-tail of the No-tails of the earth.” Ans