The First Voyage
On his first voyage he one day met with a Turkish ship, in which he heard weeping. So he called to the sailors on the Turkish vessel: “I pray you, tell me why there is such sorrow on board your ship!” And they answered: “We have many slaves whom we have captured in various parts of the world, and those who are chained are weeping and lamenting.” Thereupon the young man said: “Pray, O brethren, ask your captain if he will allow me to ransom the slaves for a sum of money?” The sailors gladly called their captain, who was willing to bargain, and in the end the young man gave his ship with all its cargo to the Turk, in exchange for his vessel containing the slaves.
The young man asked each slave whence he came, and gave to all their freedom, and said that each might return to his own country.
Among the slaves was an old woman who held a most beautiful maiden by the arm. When he asked whence they came, the old woman answered through her tears: “We come from a far-away country. This young girl is the only daughter of the tsar, whom I have brought up from her infancy. One unlucky day she was walking in the palace gardens, and wandered to a lonely spot, where those accursed Turks saw her and seized her. She began to scream, and I, who happened to be near, ran to help her, but alas! I could not save her, and the Turks carried us both on board this galley.” Then the good nurse and the beautiful girl, not knowing the way to their own country, and having no means of returning thither, implored the young man to take them with him. And this he was quite willing to do; indeed, he had immediately fallen in love with the princess, and he now married the poor homeless maiden, and, together with her and the old woman, returned home.
On their arrival, his father asked where his galley and its cargo were, and he told him how he had ransomed the slaves and set them at liberty. “This girl,” said he, “is the daughter of a tsar, and this old woman is her nurse; as they could not return to their country I took them with me, and I have married the maiden.” Thereupon his father grew very angry, and said: “O foolish son, what have you done? Why did you dispose so stupidly of my property without my permission?” and he drove him out of the house.
Fortunately for the young man, a good neighbour offered him hospitality, and, with his wife and her old nurse, he resided for a long time near by, endeavouring, through the influence of his mother and friends, to persuade his father to forgive him.
The Second Voyage
After some time the father relented, and received his son again in his house, together with his young wife and her nurse. Soon after, he purchased a second galley, larger and finer than the first, and loaded it with merchandise wherewith his son might trade to great profit, if so be that he were wise.
The young man sailed in this new vessel, leaving his wife and her nurse in the house of his parents, and soon came to a certain city, where he beheld a sorrowful sight. He saw soldiers busied in seizing poor peasants and throwing them into prison, and he asked: “Why, brethren, are you showing such cruelty to these unfortunate people?” And the soldiers replied: “Because they have not paid the tsar’s taxes.” The young man at once went to the officer and said: “I pray you, tell me how much these poor people must pay.” The officer told him the amount due, and, without hesitation, the young man sold his galley and the cargo, and discharged the debts of all the prisoners. He now returned home, and, falling at the feet of his father, he told him the story and begged that he might be forgiven. But his father grew exceedingly angry this time, and drove him away from his house.
What could the unhappy son do in this fresh trouble? How could he beg, he whose parents were so well-to-do? Old friends of the family again used their influence with his father, urging that he should take pity on his son and receive him back, “for,” said they, “it is certain that suffering has made him wiser, and that he will never again act so foolishly.” At length his father yielded, took him again into his house, and prepared a third galley for him, much larger and finer than the two former ones.