NOTES AND QUESTIONS
Discussion. 1. What kind of boy was Aladdin? What caused the magician to notice him? 3. What did the magician do to make Aladdin and his mother like him? 4. How did he force Aladdin to obey him? 5. What did Aladdin see when he raised the stone? 6. What directions did the magician give Aladdin before he descended the steps? 7. Explain the magician's anxiety to get the lamp before he helped Aladdin up from the cavern. 8. How was Aladdin rescued from the cavern? 9. How did he discover the power of his lamp? 10. What effect did his good fortune have upon him? 11. What use did Aladdin make of the fruit he had gathered? 12. How did Aladdin persuade his mother to see the Sultan? 13. Why did the Sultan permit Aladdin to marry his daughter? 14. How and where was Aladdin's palace built? 15. Where had Aladdin left the lamp when he went on his hunting trip? 16. How did the magician gain possession of it? 17. How did Aladdin regain the lamp? 18. Class readings: Page 156, line 9, to page 160, line 4 (5 pupils). 19. Outline for testing silent reading. Tell in your own words the story of Aladdin, using the following topics: (a) the boyhood of Aladdin; (b) Aladdin's pretended uncle; (c) the visit to the cave; (d) Aladdin's return to his mother; (e) Aladdin and the Princess. 20. Find in the Glossary the meaning of: province; prudence; bewilderment; abashed; extinguish; transparent; enchantment; dungeon; Genius; Sultan; magnificence; bounties; cornice; transport. 21. Pronounce: dessert; nephew; niche; fatigue; hideous; imaginable; porcelain; vizier; gorgeous.
ALI BABA AND THE OPEN SESAME
(Ed.—This story, in it's original, uncondensed version, in addition to many others, can be found at the web site https://www.gutenberg.org, searching in the index for the title Arabian Nights.)
In an old town of Persia there lived two brothers, Cassim and Ali
Baba.
Cassim married a wife who owned a fine shop, a warehouse, and some land; he thus found himself quite at his ease, and soon became one of the richest men in the town. Ali Baba, on the other hand, had a wife no better off than himself, and lived in a very poor house. He supported his family by cutting wood in the forest, and carrying it on his asses to sell about the town.
One day Ali Baba went to the forest, and had very nearly finished cutting as much wood as his asses could carry, when he saw high in the air a thick cloud of dust, which seemed to be coming toward him. He gazed at it for a long time, until he saw a company of men on horseback, riding so fast that they were almost hidden by the dust.
Although that part of the country was not often troubled by robbers, Ali Baba thought that these horsemen looked like evil men. Therefore, without thinking at all what might become of his asses, his first and only care was to save himself. So he climbed up quickly into a large tree, the branches of which spread out so close and thick that from the midst of them he could see everything that passed, without being seen.
The robbers rode swiftly up to this very tree, and there alighted. Ali Baba counted forty of them, and saw that each horseman took the bridle off his horse and hung over its head a bag filled with barley. Then they took their traveling bags, which were so heavy that Ali Baba thought they must be filled with gold and silver.
With his bag on his shoulder, the Captain of the thieves came close to the rock, at the very spot where the tree grew in which Ali Baba had hidden himself. After the rascal had made his way through the shrubs that grew there, he cried out, "Open Sesame!" so that Ali Baba distinctly heard the words. No sooner were they spoken than a door opened in the rock. The Captain and all his men passed quickly in, and the door closed again.
There they stayed for a long time. Ali Baba was compelled to wait in the tree with patience, as he was afraid some of them might come out if he left his hiding-place. At length the door opened, and the forty thieves came out. After he had seen all the troop pass out before him, the Captain exclaimed, "Shut Sesame!" Each man then bridled his horse, and mounted. When the Captain saw that all were ready, he put himself at their head, and they rode off as they had come.
Ali Baba did not come down from the tree at once, because he thought they might have forgotten something, and be obliged to come back, and that he should thus be caught. He watched them as long as he could; nor did he leave the tree for a long time after he had lost sight of them. Then, recalling the words the Captain had used to open and shut the door, he made his way through the bushes to it, and called out, "Open Sesame!" Instantly the door flew wide open!
Ali Baba expected to find only a dark cave, and was very much astonished at seeing a fine large chamber, dug out of the rock, and higher than a man could reach. It received its light from a hole in the top of the rock. In it were piled all sorts of rare fruits, bales of rich merchandise, silk stuffs and brocades, and great heaps of money, both silver and gold, some loose, some in large leather bags. The sight of alt these things almost took Ali Baba's breath away.
But he did not hesitate long as to what he should do. He went boldly into the cave, and as soon as he was there, the door shut; but since he knew the secret by which to open it, this gave him no fear. Leaving the silver, he turned to the gold which was in the bags, and when he had gathered enough for loading his three asses, he brought them to the rock, loaded them, and so covered the sacks of gold over with wood that no one could suspect anything. This done, he went to the door, and had no sooner said the words, "Shut Sesame," than it closed.
And now Ali Baba took the road to the town; and when he got home, he drove his asses into the yard and shut the gate with great care. He threw off the wood that hid the gold and carried the bags into the house, where he laid them down in a row before his wife, who was sitting upon a couch.
When he had told the whole story of the cave and the forty thieves, he emptied the sacks, making one great heap of gold that quite dazzled his wife's eyes. His wife began to rejoice in this good fortune, and was going to count over the money that lay before her, piece by piece.
"What are you going to do?" said he. "Why, you would never finish counting them. I will dig a pit to bury it in; we have no time to lose."
"It is right, though," replied the wife, "that we should know about how much there may be. I will go and borrow a small grain-measure, and while you are digging the pit, I will find how much there is."
So the wife of Ali Baba set off and went to her brother-in-law, Cassim, who lived a short way from her house. Cassim was away from home, so she begged his wife to lend her a measure for a few minutes. "That I will with pleasure," said Cassim's wife. She went to seek a measure, but knowing how poor Ali Baba was, she was curious to know what sort of grain his wife wanted to measure; so she put some tallow on the bottom of the measure in such a way that no one would notice it.
The wife of Ali Baba returned home, and placing the measure on the heap of gold, filled it over and over again, till she had measured the whole. Ali Baba by this time had dug the pit for it, and while he was burying the gold, his wife went back with the measure to her sister-in-law, but without noticing that a piece of gold had stuck to the bottom of it.
The wife of Ali Baba had scarcely turned her back, when Cassim's wife looked at the bottom of the measure, and was astonished to see a piece of gold sticking to it. "What!" said she, "Ali Baba measures his gold! Where can the wretch have got it?" When her husband Cassim came home, she said to him, "Cassim, you think you are rich, but Ali Baba must have far more wealth than you; he does not count his gold as you do; he measures it." Then she showed him the piece of money she had found sticking to the bottom of the measure—a coin so ancient that the name of the prince engraved on it was unknown to her.
Far from feeling glad at the good fortune which his brother had met with, Cassim grew so jealous of Ali Baba that he passed almost the whole night without closing his eyes. The next morning before sunrise he went to him. "Ali Baba," said he, harshly, "you pretend to be poor and miserable and a beggar, and yet you measure your money"—here Cassim showed him the piece Of gold his wife had given him. "How many pieces," added he, "have you like this, that my wife found sticking to the bottom of the measure yesterday?"