Page:Fairy Tales Their Origin and Meaning.djvu/136

of the Korân. By degrees the air was darkened, as if night were coming on, and the whole world seemed to be vanishing. And in the midst of the darkness the Genie, the son of the daughter of Eblis, appeared in the shape of a huge, terrible lion, which ran at the Princess as if to devour her. But she sprang back, and plucked out a hair from her head, and then, pronouncing two or three words, she changed the hair into a sharp scythe, and with the scythe she cut the lion into two pieces through the middle. The body of the lion now vanished, and only the head remained. This changed itself into a large scorpion. The Princess changed herself into a serpent and attacked the scorpion, which then changed into an eagle, and flew away; and the serpent changed itself into a fierce black eagle, larger and more powerful and flew after it. Soon after the eagles had vanished the earth opened, and a great black and white cat appeared, mewing and crying out terribly, and with its hairs standing straight on end. A black wolf followed the cat, and attacked it. Then the cat changed into a worm, which buried itself in a pomegranate that had fallen from a tree over-hanging the tank in the court, and the pomegranate began to swell until it