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Updated: June 8, 2025
In the reign of the caliph Haroon al Rusheed, there lived at Bagdad a very rich merchant, who, having married a woman advanced in years, had but one son, whom he named Abou Hassan, and educated with great restraint: when his son was thirty years old, the merchant dying, left him his sole heir, and master of great riches, amassed together by much frugality and close application to business.
The caliph Haroon al Rusheed was one day suffering from depression of spirits, when his faithful and favourite grand vizier Jaaffier came to him. This minister finding him alone, which was seldom the case, and perceiving as he approached that he was in a very melancholy humour, and never lifted up his eyes, stopped till he should vouchsafe to look at him.
You are indeed my son Abou Hassan, and are much in the wrong to arrogate to yourself the title which belongs only to our sovereign lord the caliph Haroon al Rusheed, especially after the noble and generous present the monarch made us yesterday.
He was an authority on the tribe of the Ghawazee, proving, to their satisfaction and his own, their descent from the household of Haroon al Rashid. He was, therefore, welcome among them. But he had found also, as many another wise man has found in "furrin parts," that your greatest safety lies in bringing tobacco to the men and leaving the women alone.
The characters of this letter were of azure, and the contents as follows: "The king of the Indies, before whom march one hundred elephants, who lives in a palace that shines with one hundred thousand rubies, and who has in his treasury twenty thousand crowns enriched with diamonds, to caliph Haroon al Rusheed.
Noor ad Deen consented to what the caliph had proposed; and there being every thing necessary for writing in the hall, the caliph wrote a letter to the king of Bussorah; at the top of which he placed this form, "In the name of the most merciful God," to shew he would be absolutely obeyed. "Haroon al Rusheed, son of Mhadi, sends this letter to Zinebi, his cousin.
Ah! cruel Haroon al Rusheed! what a mortification do you put upon me, in making me the executioner of your vengeance, obliging me to persecute persons who have not offended you." The guards whom the king had ordered to search for Ganem, came and told him their search had been vain. He was fully convinced of this; the tears of those two women would not leave him any room to doubt.
He had acted for a long time in this manner, when, one afternoon, a little before sunset, as he sat upon the bridge according to custom, the caliph Haroon al Rusheed came by, but so disguised that it was impossible to know him; for that monarch, though his chief ministers and officers of justice acquitted themselves of their duty very punctually, would nevertheless inform himself of every thing, and for that purpose often disguised himself in different ways, and walked through the city and suburbs of Bagdad, sometimes one way and sometimes another.
I bless heaven that I am the cause, and the happy witness of your being alive; would to God, that, taking advantage of this false report, you would share my fortune, and go far from hence to reign in my heart! But whither does this pleasing transport carry me? I do not consider that you are born to make the greatest prince in the world happy; and that only Haroon al Rusheed is worthy of you.
However, fond as they were of each other, their respect for the caliph kept them within due bounds, which still heightened their passion. Whilst Fetnah, thus snatched from the jaws of death, passed her time so agreeably with Ganem, Zobeide was not without some apprehensions in the palace of Haroon al Rusheed. "My consort," said she, "loves Fetnah more than ever he did any of his favourites.
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