Page:Swahili tales.djvu/187

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MOHAMMED THE LANGUID.
167

Abalmathfár was left, and two men of his kinsmen, and half the crew. And they were bound, to be killed in the morning.

"But when night was come, the monkey arose and unbound itself first, and then unbound the Sheikh Abalmathfár, and then unbound his kinsmen who were left, until it had unbound them all. When the Sheikh saw that they were unbound, they fled and went away to their ship, and they found it still sound, it was not yet broken up, and they hoisted their sail and fled. And they went over the sea on their journey home.

"And the people who were in the ship used to dive for pearls. And when the monkey saw the people diving for pearls, it plunged in with them. And the Sheikh said, 'I have lost all the luck of that poor man.' But when the people returned, it too returned with them. And it had brought pearls; and its pearls were better than other people's. And it threw them down at the feet of its master.

"Then he said to the company, 'Since we should not have escaped, had it not been for this monkey, let each one then give twelve hundred deenars, and let us take them to its master as each man's ransom for his life.' And they gave them, and Sheikh Abalmathfár collected them, and put with them the pearls that the monkey had got. And the profits of my five dirhems be put in chests and locked them, and wrote on them the mark of Mohammed the Languid.

"So they journeyed until they reached the country of Bussorah, and they fired their cannons and landed.

"My mother heard that Sheikh Abalmathfár was come, and she came and told me, 'Go out and go and see Sheikh Abalmathfár, and give him the hand of safety.' And I told her, 'I cannot go, come and take me up.' And she