"O my old woman, give me your daughter in marriage."
She called her daughter. "Take a club," she said to her, "and we will give it to him until he cries for mercy."
The daughter brought a club and gave Ou Ali a good beating. Ali, who was watching the herd, came at nightfall and met his friend.
"Did the old woman accept you?" he asked him.
"She accepted me," answered Ali. "And is the herd easy to watch?"
"From morning till night I have nothing to do but to repose. Take my place to-morrow, and mount one of the oxen."
The next day Ou Ali said to the old woman, "To-day I will take care of the herd." And, on starting, he recommended Ali to ask the old woman for her daughter's hand.
"It is well," answered Ali. Ou Ali arrived in the fields; one of the oxen seized him with his horns and tossed him into the air. All the others did the same thing. He regained the horse half dead. Ali, who had remained at the house, asked the old woman for her daughter's hand. "You ask me again?" said she. She took a club and gave it to him till he had had enough. Ou Ali said to Ali: "You have played me a trick." Ali answered him: "Without doubt they gave me the stick so hard that I did not hear the last blow."
"It is well, my dear friend. Ali owes nothing to Ou Ali."
They went away. The old woman possessed a treasure. Ou Ali therefore said to Ali: "I will put you in a basket, for you know that we saw that treasure in a hole." They returned to the old woman's house. Ali goes down into the hole, takes the treasure, and puts it into the basket. Ou Ali draws up the basket, takes it, abandons his friend, now a prisoner, and runs to hide the treasure in the forest. Ali was in trouble, for he knew not how to get out. What could he do? He climbed up the sides of the hole. When he found himself in the house, he opened the door and fled. Arriving at the edge of the forest he began to bleat. Ou Ali, thinking it was a ewe, ran up. It was his friend.