1826. | Haroun, the Lonely Man of Shiraz. 18] 
excellent fruits in due season. To their children be more than their 
father, for he would have made them the ministers of evil, but let it be 
thy task to make them the ministers of good; they are as yet uncor- 
rupted by the sins of their father, being innocently young, and may 
become the olive-branches of thy table, and the examples of the young 
yet unborn, Go now, bring forth a twentieth part of thy treasures; 
be wise in husbanding them, be wary in concealing them; be generous, 
above all things, in their use, especially to the poor, whom thou, who 
hast pined with poverty, must naturally pity, knowing what wretches 
suffer in their need. Be not lifted with pride, nor poor with too much 
riches, and thus shalt thou be as great as thou hast ever dreamed to be, 
and as happy as heaven can render thee on earth, and blessed with the 
blessed hereafter. Arise, Haroun, from thy reverent posture, and go 
and be happy thyself, and make the poor and miserable happy !” 
_ Here the good genius ceased, and Haroun, as he still dreamed, made 
many a holy promise to the strict performance of her will, and arose, 
as he thought, from the ground, and being motioned to depart for his 
home, he touched his forehead reverently with both hands, again bowed 
his face to the earth, and when he lifted his eyes once more to gaze 
upon the beautiful and beneficent Being, she was gone like the dew from 
asun-kissed stone. He started at this so violently that he awoke, and 
on looking about him, beheld that the chamber was illumined by a 
light that did not seem the light of day—it was more beautiful ; 
and he heard audibly a faint hum as of receding music, which died 
gradually away like the last sighs of an expiring perfume. He could 
hardly believe that he had dreamed, but rather imagined that he had 
had audience of the good spirit’s minister where he then lay, and not in 
the valley of his vision. However, whether delusive dream or waking 
certainty, he resolved to examine further into the river, and leaping up 
hastily from his couch, and slipping on his pelisse, slippers, and cap, 
he left the house alone and quietly, and bent his way eagerly to 
the river’s bank, as fast as impatience, that fast-footed mule, could 
carry him. 
It was not yet sunrise, although it was early day, and no one was yet 
abroad. Arrived at the spot of all his hopes, he prostrated himself, 
and breathed a hasty prayer, then stripping himself in a moment, he 
dived like a diamond-slave to the bottom, where swimming under water 
downward toward the sea, the first object which he met with was the 
dead body of the robber, lying entangled among the weeds. He recol- 
lected the diamonds he had snatched from him yesterday, and so deter- 
mined to bring him again up to the light: this was soon done, and he 
dragged him on shore ; the dagger was still fast clutched in one hand, 
and the diamonds in the other. Haroun forced open his death-frozen 
fingers, and extracted the glittering prisoners, and then left him on the 
shore as if newly washed up, with the dagger still pointed in his hand, 
which would confirm the story of his death. He looked with pity on 
him, the terror of the honest and the slayer of the harmless, and 
could hardly forbear shedding a tear over his lifeless body, as terrible in 
death as it was in life. He then plunged again into the stream, and 
.explored the bed of it for some time without success, when, just as he 
.was beginning to despair, and, wearied with fatigue, had crawled up the 
-bank, intending to search no farther, convinced that his dream was all 
‘adelusion, he beheld, a little lower down, a small golden-scaled fish 
