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Updated: May 1, 2025
The peppercorn had been dropped some time, the horsemen advanced, and no one appeared to her succour. "Alas!" said Urad, "why has Houadir deceived me? Neither her advice, nor her magical peppercorns, can save me from these cruel robbers. O genius, genius! why hast thou forsaken me in my severest trials!"
"For," said the provident Houadir, "when it shall please the Prophet to snatch me also from you, my dear Urad will then have only the peppercorns to assist her." "And how, my kind governess," said Urad, "will those corns assist me?"
Urad, in her despair, again put her hands into the bag whence she had fatally resigned the peppercorns, and felt about in agony for her lost treasure. And now finding none, and perceiving that the genius Houadir attended not to her cries, she was drawing out her hand when, in a corner of the bag, she felt one peppercorn, which had before escaped her search.
From this time Houadir became a useful member of the family of Nouri, and Urad was daily instructed by the good old stranger in the pleasures and benefits of a virtuous, and the horrors and curses of an evil, life. Little Urad was greatly rejoiced at the lessons of Houadir, and was never better pleased than when she was listening to the mild and pleasing instructions of her affable mistress.
But now, Urad," continued the Sultan, "ere you proceed in your requests, let me make one sacrifice to chastity and justice, by vowing, in the presence of the good genius Houadir, to dismiss my seraglio, and take thee only for my wife." "So noble a sacrifice," answered Urad, "demands my utmost returns; wherefore, beneficent Sultan, I release thee from any further compliance with my requests."
The inconsolable Urad had now her most difficult lesson to learn from the patient Houadir; and scarcely did she think it dutiful to moderate the violence of her grief.
Why, then, had Urad so great an opinion of her own judgment as to confide in the false appearance of the son of Houadir when she might have consulted her faithful monitors?
"O pious Houadir," replied Urad, "just are thy precepts: it was Allah that created my best of parents, and Allah is pleased to take her from me; far be it from me, though an infinite sufferer, to dispute His will; the loss indeed wounds me sorely, yet will I endeavour to bear the blow with patience and resignation."
Urad, though somewhat confounded at Houadir's embrace under the appearance of a man, yet with great humility thanked her benefactor; and the son of Houadir, turning to the left, led Urad into a little by-path, so concealed that few, if any, might ever find its beginning.
"But, O Houadir, O Nouri!" said the afflicted virgin to herself, "never shall Urad seek, in the arms of a lover, to forget the bounties and precepts of so kind a mistress and so indulgent a parent."
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