But Flower o' the World was not to be deceived by such specious words.
"Tell me then," she said, "if it was you who stole my glorious Nightingale, where did you find him hanging in his golden cage?"
The oldest prince could not answer this, so he said at random:
"I found his golden cage hanging in the cypress tree that grows in the garden of your palace."
"Enough!" cried the Princess.
She clapped her hands and when her guards appeared she said to them:
"Have this man executed at once and let his head be sent to the Sultan with the message: This is the head of a liar and a coward! Send me at once your son who stole my glorious Nightingale Gisar or I will march against your city!"
The Sultan was greatly shocked to receive this message together with the head of his oldest son.
"Alas!" he cried, calling his second son, "would that I had listened to you when you insisted that it was you and not your brother who actually did the deed! Unhappily I listened to your brother! See now the awful result of this mistake! Go you now to this heartless Princess whom men call Flower o' the World or else our poor defenseless city will have to pay the penalty."
So the second prince was taken to the tent of the Warrior Maiden and she put to him the same questions and he fared even worse than his brother had fared. So his head, too, was sent to the Sultan with this message: