Types of Prose Narratives: A Text-Book for the Story Writer

by Harriott Ely Fansler

"Upon this table a thousand one-eyed kings have eaten and a thousand kings each sound in both eyes. All of them have quitted the world and taken up their abode in the burial grounds and the graves."

The Emeer Moosa and his companions took this table with them and went forth from the palace. Then they proceeded on their journey and traveled for three days, when they came to a high hill. On the top of the hill was a horseman of brass with a spear in his hand. The spear had a flat, wide head, and it was so bright that it almost dazzled the eyes of the Emeer and his companions. Nevertheless they looked at it closely, and they were astonished at finding the following words inscribed upon it:

"O thou who comest unto me, if thou know not the way that leads to the City of Brass, rub the hand of the horseman, and he will turn, and then will stop, and in whatever direction he faces when he stops, travel in that direction without fear, for it will lead thee to the City of Brass."

When he read this the Emeer Moosa rubbed the hand of the horseman. Immediately the figure turned round with the speed of lightning, and when it stopped it faced a different direction from that in which they had been traveling. The party therefore turned to the way pointed out by the brazen horseman, and proceeded on their journey. One day they came to a round pillar of black stone, on the top of which appeared the upper half of the body of a black giant, or genie, with the lower part sunk down in the pillar. He was an object frightful to behold. He had two huge wings and four arms. Two of the arms were like those of a man, and the other two were like the legs of a lion. He had hair upon his head like the tails of horses, two eyes like two burning coals, and he had a third eye in his forehead, like the eye of a lynx, from which sparks of fire shot forth.

When the Emeer Moosa's party saw this genie they almost lost their senses through fear, and they turned round to flee away, but the Emeer told them that in the state in which he was he could do them no harm. Then Abdes-Samad drew near to the pillar, and raising his voice he said to the genie, "O thou person, what is thy name, what is thy nature, and what has placed thee here in this manner!" Immediately the genie answered saying, "I am a genie and my name is Dahish." [And then he told them his nature and what had placed him there.]

And then Abdes-Samad said to the genie in the pillar, "Are there in this place any of the genies confined in bottles of brass from the time of Solomon?" He answered, "Yes, in the sea of El-Karkar, where dwell some of the descendants of Noah, whose country the deluge did not reach. They are separated from the rest of the sons of Adam." "And where," said Abdes-Samad, "is the way to the City of Brass, and the place in which are the bottles? What distance is there between us and it?" The genie answered, "It is near."

The party then proceeded in their journey, and in a little while they saw in the distance a great black object, and in it there seemed to be two fires corresponding with each other in position. "What is this great black object," asked the Emeer Moosa, "and what are these two corresponding fires?" "Be rejoiced, O Emeer," answered Abdes-Samad; "it is the City of Brass, and this is the appearance of it that I find described in the book of hidden treasures—that its wall is of black stones and it has two towers of brass, which resemble two corresponding fires; hence it is named the City of Brass."

Hastening on they arrived at the city, and they found that it was strongly fortified, and that its buildings were lofty, rising high into the air. Its walls were one hundred and twenty feet high, and it had five and twenty gates. They stopped before the walk and endeavored to find one of the gates, but they could not. Then Emeer Moosa said to Abdes-Samad, "I do not see any gate to this city." Abdes-Samad answered, "I find it described in the book of hidden treasures that it has five and twenty gates, and that none of them may be opened but from within the city."

Then the Emeer Moosa took Talib and Abdes-Samad with him, and they ascended a mountain which was close by. And looking down upon the city, they saw it was greater and more beautiful than anything they had ever beheld. Its palaces were lofty, its domes were shining; rivers were running within it, and there were delightful gardens with trees bearing ripe fruit. But they did not see a human being within its walls. It was empty, still, without a voice, or a cheering inhabitant but the owl hooting in its gardens, and birds skimming in circles in its areas, and the raven croaking in its great streets.

After coming down from the mountain they passed the day trying to devise means of entering the city. At last it occurred to them to make a ladder, and the Emeer called to the carpenters and blacksmiths and ordered them to construct a ladder covered with plates of iron. This work occupied a month, and when it was finished, the ladder was set up against the wall, and one of the party ascended it. When he reached the top he stood, and, fixing his eyes towards the city, clapped his hands and cried out with a loud voice, "Thou art beautiful!" Then he cast himself down into the city and was killed. Seeing this the Emeer Moosa said, "If we do this with all our companions, there will not remain one of them, and we shall be unable to accomplish the wish of the Prince of the Faithful. Let us depart and have no more to do with this city." But one of them answered, "Perhaps another may be more steady than he." Then a second ascended, and he did the same as the first, and then a third, and a fourth, and a fifth, and they continued to ascend by that ladder to the top of the wall, one after another, until twelve men of them had gone, acting as the first had acted.