him under Ebn Thaher’s absence.  I am very glad, said he to the jeweller, to find in you a reparation of my loss:  I want words to express the obligations I am under to you.  I pray God to recompense your generosity; and I accept your obliging offer with all my heart.  Believe it, continued he, that Schemselnihar’s confident came to speak to me concerning you; she told me that it was you who advised Ebn Thaher to go from Bagdad; these were the last words she spoke to me when she went away, and had almost persuaded me of it.  But do not resent it; for I doubt not but she is deceived, after what you have told me.  Prince, replied the jeweller, I have had the honour to give you a faithful account of my conversation with Ebn Thaher.  It is true, when he told me he would return to Balsora, I did not oppose his design, but said he was a wise and prudent man; and, that this may not hinder you from putting confidence in me, I am ready to serve you with all imaginable zeal; which though you do otherwise, this shall not hinder me from keeping your secret religiously according to my oath.  I have already told you, replied the prince, that I would not believe what the confident said; it is her zeal that inspired her with this groundless suspicion, and you ought to excuse it, as I do.

They continued their conversation for some time, and consulted together of convenient means to continue the prince’s correspondence with Schemselnihar:  they agreed to begin by disabusing the confident, who was so unjustly prepossessed against the jeweller.  The prince engaged to undeceive her the first time she returned, and to entreat her to engage herself to the jeweller, that she might bring the letters, or any other information, from her mistress to him.  In fine, they agreed that she ought not to come so frequently to the prince’s house, because she might thereby give occasion to discover that which was of so great importance to conceal.  At last the jeweller rose, and, after having again prayed the prince of Persia to have an entire confidence in him, retired.

The jeweller, returning to his house, perceived before him a letter which somebody had dropped in the street; he took it up; and, not being sealed, he opened it, and found that it contained as follows: 

Letter from Schemselnihar to the Prince of Persia.

I am informed by my confident of a piece of news which troubles me no less than it does you:  By losing Ebn Thaher, we have indeed lost much; but let this not hinder you, dear prince, thinking to preserve yourself.  If our confident has abandoned us through a slavish fear, let us consider that it is a misfortune which we could not avoid.  I confess Ebn Thaher has left us at a time when we need him most; but let us fortify ourselves by patience against this unlooked-for accident, and let us not forbear to love one another constantly.  Fortify your heart against this misfortune.  Nobody can obtain what they desire without trouble.  Let us not discourage ourselves, but hope that Heaven will favour us; and that, after so many afflictions, we shall come to a happy accomplishment of our desires.  Adieu.