United States or Belize ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Upon this intelligence the sultan of Casgar sent an officer to the place of execution. "Go," said he, "with all expedition, and tell the judge to bring the accused persons before me immediately and bring also the corpse of poor hunch-back, that I may see him once more."
He was mightily surprised, when, by the light of his lantern, he descried a man standing upright in his chimney; but being a stout man, and apprehending it was a thief or a robber, he took up a large cane; and, making straight up to the hunch-back, Ah, said he, I thought it was the rats and the mice that ate my butter and tallow! and it is you that come down the chimney to rob me, is it?
In one of her mad freaks a boon-companion happened to offend her. He was a little hunch-back, and a fellow-drunkard; but without a moment's hesitation, Maggie seized him and pushed him head-foremost down the old-fashioned wide sewer of the Scotch town. Had not some one seen his heel's kicking out and rescued him, he would surley have been suffocated.
The Jewish physician prostrated himself before the sultan's throne, and addressed the prince in the following manner: "Sir, if you will be so good as to hear me, I flatter myself you will be pleased with a story I have to tell you." "Well spoken," said the sultan; "but if it be not more surprising than that of little hunch-back, you must not expect to live."
Ah, you crooked hunch-back! cried he; would to God you had robbed me of all my fat, and I had not found you here! had it been so, I would not have been now so much perplexed for the sake of you and your nasty hunch. Oh! the stars that twinkle in the heavens give light to none but me in this dangerous Juncture!
While the executioner was making ready to impale the tailor, the sultan of Casgar, wanting the company of his crooked jester, asked where he was; and one of his officers told him; "The hunch-back, Sir, whom you inquire after, got drunk last night, and contrary to his custom slipped out of the palace, and went strolling about the city, and this morning was found dead.
"This," said the purveyor to the sultan of Casgar, "is the story that the Bagdad merchant related in a company where I was yesterday." "This story," said the sultan, "has something in it extraordinary; but it does not come near that of the little hunch-back."
The sultan of Casgar's purveyor had never noticed the little man's hump-back when he was beating him, but as soon as he perceived it, he uttered a thousand imprecations against him. "Ah, thou cursed hunch-back," cried he, "thou crooked wretch, would to God thou hadst robbed me of all my fat, and I had not found thee here.
When she was gone, I carried the hunch-back up stairs, and laid him upon the uppermost step, and then my wife and I made the best of our way home. The doctor coming, threw the corpse down stairs, and concluded himself to be the author of his death. This being the case," continued he, "release the doctor, and let me die in his stead."
Now, there is a Grecian urn erected in the centre of a lonely field; now there is a woman weeping at a tomb; now a very commonplace old gentleman in a white waistcoat, with a thumb thrust into each arm-hole of his coat; now a student poring on a book; now a crouching negro; now, a horse, a dog, a cannon, an armed man; a hunch-back throwing off his cloak and stepping forth into the light.
Word Of The Day