The ten Viziers alone, far from participating in the public happiness, were thrown into a dark dungeon, where the remorse of their consciences anticipated the punishment which, at the end of the thirty days that had been appointed for feasting, they were doomed to suffer. At length, by the orders of the Sovereign, they were brought to the foot of the throne, which was now become so formidable to them. Aladin was seated at his father's right hand. They turned away their guilty eyes, and after a silence that imposed respect and terror, Bohetzad thus addressed them:
"Pretended supports of my throne!" said he to them, "ministers so jealous of my glory! behold this criminal whom, with so much cruel obstinacy and such distinguished eagerness, you pursued. I ought to have sent him to punishment without hearing him! by listening to his stories, I exposed my glory, my safety, and the peace of my subjects! Justify yourselves if you can: you have liberty to speak."
In vain did the King endeavour to make these guilty ministers open their mouths. They were seized with a mortal coldness; their eyes, fixed on the ground, could not be drawn from it; their lips quivered; their feeble limbs bent under their knees and seemed ready to fail them.
"Speak," said Aladin to them in his turn: "where now is that attachment to the rules of justice which rendered you so eloquent against the son of a chief of the robbers, whose mere mistake was in your eyes a crime which ought to be expiated by the most infamous punishment? Are your courage and your zeal for the glory of the kingdom annihilated? Guilt weighs you down, remorse preys upon you, and you are confounded with shame."
"Your sentence, already written in heaven," resumed Bohetzad, "is about to be executed on earth. On the scaffold where my son was to suffer let these ten wretches finish their days, and let the public criers announce this decree to the people."
The order was instantly executed.
Bohetzad then leading back his son to the palace, continually renewed the tender proofs of his affection.
"Ah, dear son!" would he say, "how were you so little intimidated by the death which threatened you as to recollect all the circumstances you related? Whence have you drawn those numerous maxims and judicious reflections which can only be the fruit of experience and study?"
"Sire," replied Aladin, "it was not I who spoke, but Heaven which inspired me. In my infancy I had not been neglected; and since the happy moment in which I had the good fortune to be placed near your Majesty, I have been perfected in wisdom. The woman, whom I took for my mother, early directed my attention to the divine Koran, by whose sacred precepts, she told me, I ought to regulate my conduct. And that which will appear most extraordinary to you, sire, is, that her husband, led away by the force of habit, brought up in guilt almost from his infancy, and not hesitating in the least to plunder caravans, should yet be afraid of breaking his word. He was a faithful husband, a kind master to his slaves, to me more than an affectionate father, and of all men the least greedy of plunder. He cherished me; and as at that time I was not so well informed as I am at present, I honoured him as a benefactor and loved him as a parent."
"Enough respecting him, my son," replied the King. "Returning from the awful scene they have just beheld, and warned by the signal which the Muezzins have sounded from the tops of the mosques, the people are about to fill them. Order my treasurer to follow you; let plentiful alms and charity everywhere accompany your steps, and announce, in a suitable manner, the heir, whom, for the prosperity of my empire, Heaven has restored to my arms."