The cadi, hearing these words of the Princess Djouher-Manikam, felt a great confusion in his heart. He went out of the palace and returned home full of trouble and emotion. When it was day, the cadi sent a letter to the King Haroun-er-Raschid at Mecca. It was thus conceived: "Your Majesty left me to be guardian of his kingdom, his palace, and his daughter. Now, the Princess Djouher-Manikam desires to marry me. This is the reason why I send this letter to your Majesty." Thus spake the cadi in his letter.
When it reached the prince and he had read it, he immediately summoned his son Minbah-Chahaz. He came in haste, and the King gave him a cutlass and said, "Return to Bagdad and slay your sister, because she will bring shame upon the family by marrying now."
Minbah-Chahaz bowed before his father. Then he set out to return to his own country.
Arriving at the end of his journey, he entered the city, and went up to the palace of the Princess Djouher-Manikam. She was filled with joy and said, "Welcome, O my brother!"
Minbah-Chahaz answered, "O my little sister, our parents will remain for the great pilgrimage."
The brother and sister thus chatting together, the Princess Djouher-
Manikam said, "O my brother, I wish to sleep."
"It is well, my sister," answered Minbah-Chahaz; "sleep while your brother combs his little sister's hair." And the princess Djouher- Manikam slept.
Her brother then took a cushion, which he slipped under the head of the young virgin his sister; then he thought in his heart: "If I do not execute the commands of my father, I shall be a traitor to him. But, alas, if I kill my sister, I shall not have a sister any more. If I do not kill her, I shall certainly commit a crime against the most high, because I shall not have obeyed the order of my father. I will fulfil then my father's will. It is a duty obligatory on all children. What good are these subterfuges?" His resolution thus confirmed, he bound his handkerchief over his eyes and directed his cutlass against his sister's neck. But at that instant, by the will of God the most high, a little gazelle came up and, by the power of God the most high, placed its neck upon the neck of the princess Djouher-Manikam, saying, "I will take the place of the princess Djouher-Manikam." And the little gazelle was killed by Minbah-Chahaz. That done he unbound his eyes and saw a little gazelle lying dead with its throat cut, by the side of his young sister the princess Djouher-Manikam.
At this sight, Minbah-Chahaz was stricken with astonishment. He thought in his heart: "Since it is so with my sister, she must be entirely innocent, and cannot have commited the least fault. Nevertheless, although I am confident that she was calumniated by the cadi I must tell my father that I have killed her."
Minbah-Chahaz set out then for Mecca, to find the prince his father. When he had arrived at Mecca he presented to his father the cutlass still stained with blood. The King Haroun-er-Raschid cried, "Praise be to God, the Lord of the worlds. Our shame is now effaced, since you have poniarded your sister and she is dead." Such were the deeds of this first story.