You would not, it is true, have acquired so much renown, but you
had been still alive, and not have cost your mother so many
tears." While she uttered these words, she wept bitterly, and
her two attendants moved by her grief, mingled their tears with
hers.

Whilst they were all three in this manner vying in affliction,
the sultan came into the closet, and seeing them in this
condition, asked Pirouzè whether she had received any bad news
concerning Codadad? "Alas! sir," said she, "all is over, my son
has lost his life, and to add to my sorrow, I cannot pay him the
funeral rites; for, in all probability, wild beasts have devoured
him." She then told him all she had heard from the surgeon, and
did not fail to enlarge on the inhuman manner in which Codadad
had been murdered by his brothers.

The sultan did not give Pirouzè time to finish her relation, but
transported with anger, and giving way to his passion, "Madam,"
said he to the princess, "those perfidious wretches who cause you
to shed these tears, and are the occasion of mortal grief to
their father, shall soon feel the punishment due to their guilt."
The sultan having spoken these words, with indignation in his
countenance, went directly to the presence-chamber where all his
courtiers attended, and such of the people as had petitions to
present to him. They were alarmed to see him in passion, and
thought his anger had been kindled against his people. Their
hearts were chilled with fear. He ascended the throne, and
causing his grand vizier to approach, "Hassan," said he, "go
immediately, take a thousand of my guards, and seize all the
princes, my sons; shut them up in the tower used as a prison for