Now, I am inclined
to think, if we could hear their stories, we should find that one is a
prudent and the other an imprudent character."
"Where do these men live?" interrupted the sultan. "I will hear their
histories from their own lips before I sleep."
"Murad the Unlucky lives in the next square," said the vizier.
The sultan desired to go thither immediately. Scarcely had they entered
the square, when they heard the cry of loud lamentations. They followed
the sound till they came to a house of which the door was open, and where
there was a man tearing his turban, and weeping bitterly. They asked the
cause of his distress, and he pointed to the fragments of a china vase,
which lay on the pavement at his door.
"This seems undoubtedly to be beautiful china," said the sultan, taking
up one of the broken pieces; "but can the loss of a china vase be the
cause of such violent grief and despair?"
"Ah, gentlemen," said the owner of the vase, suspending his lamentations,
and looking at the dress of the pretended merchants, "I see that you are
strangers: you do not know how much cause I have for grief and despair!
You do not know that you are speaking to Murad the Unlucky! Were you to
hear all the unfortunate accidents that have happened to me, from the
time I was born till this instant, you would perhaps pity me, and
acknowledge I have just cause for despair.
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