is to let me go in peace, for you must allow it would be a great hardship for a man to be driven about like a donkey." The poor oil merchant, seeing no other remedy for his misfortune, consented to release the man, and before long they parted company, each going his own way.
When the oil merchant found himself alone, without his ass and his jars of oil, he lamented his sad lot, and wished he had never come across an enchanted donkey. He made up his mind to go and see his godfather, to tell him what had occurred, by which he was left without the means of earning his living, and to ask him at the same time to lend him some money to buy another donkey at the next fair.
His godfather was sorry to hear of his sad plight and readily lent him the money required.
The oil merchant, much comforted, went to the fair next day. He had not been there long when he saw his own beast held by a student, who, though he was the man that had carried away the beast, was unknown to him. The merchant, believing that the man had again transformed himself into a donkey, went up to the student and asked to be allowed to tell the donkey a secret, which was only intended for it to hear.
The student, though much amused at the poor man's simplicity, replied with a grave face that he
