Black Tales for White Children

by C. H. Stigand; Nancy Yulee Stigand

He answered, "No, by Allah, I returned it just as he gave it to me."

So the Sultan commanded the skin to be brought, and then he called for the oil merchant to bring forth his two bottles of oil.

When he compared the oil in the skin with that in the bottles he found that it was like that of the lighter colour.

So the Sultan said to the man, "How is this now, that if you received this three years ago and have not opened it since, that the oil in the skin is oil of this year?"

Then was the man exceedingly afraid, and he trembled, for he knew that he had put fresh oil in the skin.

So the Sultan sent soldiers to his house, who found there the dinars he had secreted away, and they were restored to their owner.

Then the Sultan turned to the oil merchant and asked him, "Now is this man truly as he says a poor man?"

So the oil merchant replied, "Yes, truly, my master, he is a very poor man, and I wish to do him no harm."

So the Sultan said, "Then shall I pardon him of his offence."

So the Sultan pardoned the accused, and gave to the oil merchant a reward, in that he had shown him a way to prove the guilt of the merchant's friend.