exertions, she could not hinder the sultan’s beard from being burned, and his face scorched, nor a spark from entering my right eye, and making it blind. The sultan and I looked for nothing but death, when we heard a cry of “Victory, victory!” and instantly the princess appeared in her natural shape; but the genie was reduced to a heap of ashes.
The princess approached us and hastily called for a cupful of water, which the young slave, who had received no hurt, brought her. She took it, and after pronouncing some words over it, threw it upon me saying, “If thou art become an ape by enchantment, change thy shape, and take that of a man, which thou hadst before.” These words were hardly uttered, when I again became a man in every respect as I was before my transformation, except for the loss of my eye.
I wished to express to the princess my thanks, but she prevented me by saying to her father: “Sire, I have gained the victory over the genie; but it is a victory that costs me dear. I have but a few minutes to live; the fire has pierced me during the terrible combat, and I find it is gradually consuming me. This would not have happened, had I perceived the last of the pomegranate seeds, and swallowed it, as I did the others when I was changed into a cock; the genie had fled thither as to his last intrenchment, and upon that the success of the combat depended. This oversight obliged me to have recourse to fire, and to fight with it as I did, between heaven
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