is forty piastres, but the other oil is worth only thirty.’ He said to him: ‘No, this oil is first-class!’ When he saw the oil, he was pleased and took it; he carried it into his house and prepared lunch and ate, he and the brigand. After he had eaten (the brigand) rode back to the cave; his companions asked him if he had found the fellow who knows (their) place. [He replied: ‘Yes.’ The shêkh said to them: ‘We must go down into the village and have our revenge on the thief], but I want to put you into the jars.’ They said to him: ‘Good.’ [So he put them into the jars and ordered that] ‘each should take his weapon with him, and when I give the signal[1] to each you must be awake in order to kill the man, and we will recover our money.’ They said to him: ‘All right!’ He put each of them into a jar and loaded them on the camels, and proceeded to go to the village. When he reached the shop he said: ‘Peace be to you!’ (The shopman) replied: ‘To you be peace!’ He added: ‘Have you brought some oil?’ He said to him: ‘Yes.’ He replied: ‘Good! go and carry it into the house.’ When he had carried them into the house and had introduced them into it, he made for him a sumptuous dinner. After they had dined the brigand slept. When the owner of the house came in to the women’s apartment his wife said to him: ‘My cousin, we must see what is in the jars: perhaps the brigands about whom you were talking, perhaps it is they.’ He said to her: ‘All right, my cousin!’ They took an iron rod and struck the jar; the man who was in the jar cries out: ‘I am awake!’ They seized him, they killed him. When all of them were killed the woman said to him: ‘Is the man who is outside asleep?’ He answered: ‘Yes.’ She said to him: ‘Go and kill him also!’ After he had killed them all he loaded
- ↑ This must be the general sense of the verb, a derivative from which is ramûs, a word used by the Nile sailors to denote a raft on which pottery used to be floated and rowed down the Nile from the village of Ballas. It has no connection with the verb ramash, “to wink.”
