The Magic Turban, the Whip and the Carpet

Once, in the times when time was not time, there were two brothers. Their mother and father died, and they divided all their wealth between them. The elder brother opened a shop and began to work. But the younger brother was a little bird-brained; he ate, drank and wandered about, and in the end nothing was left in his hands. Then he began asking his brother for money, and when that was gone he asked again. So he lived off his brother's back.

At last the elder brother grew tired of this waste. He turned all his wealth into gold and boarded a ship to go to another country. But the younger brother sensed this, secretly boarded the ship and hid. As soon as the sails were set the two brothers came face to face. The elder brother was very angry, but what could he do? When the ship reached Egypt the elder brother said to the younger, "You wait here, I'll go and buy two mules and come back," and he went off and never came back.

The younger brother waited and waited, and at last he set out to look for his brother. He walked and walked; for six months he tried to cross a field, but when he looked back he saw he had not walked even the length of an ear of wheat. He walked faster still, and at last on top of a hill he came upon three young men who were quarrelling. "Why are you quarrelling?" he asked.

The youngest of them explained: "We are three brothers. Our father died and left us a turban, a whip and a carpet. Whoever puts the turban on his head becomes invisible. Whoever sits on the carpet and strikes it once with the whip flies like a bird and goes wherever he wishes. And we simply can't decide which of us should have which." All three shouted, "All three should be mine!" and began quarrelling again.

The young man said: "You'll never agree like this. I'll make an arrow out of this piece of wood and shoot it. Whoever brings back the arrow first, let all three be his." He shot the arrow, and the three brothers ran after it. But meanwhile the clever young man put the turban on his head, sat on the carpet, struck it once with the whip and said, "Hop, hop! Take me to wherever my brother is!" When he opened his eyes he was in front of a great city.

As he wandered through the city, the sultan's crier was calling out: "The sultan's daughter disappears from the palace every night! Whoever finds out where she goes, the sultan will give him his daughter and half his kingdom!" The young man said, "I'll find out!" They took him to the palace. At night he lay down beside the princess's room and pretended to sleep. The girl thought he was asleep, took the candle and went out through a secret door.

At once the young man put on his turban and followed her. In front of the door stood a giant jinni with a golden shield on his head. The girl sat on the shield. Because he was invisible, the young man jumped onto the shield too; the jinni nearly toppled over. "My sultana, you are very heavy today," said the jinni. "Nonsense, I'm neither bigger nor smaller than yesterday," said the girl.

The jinni flew and took them to a garden whose branches were of silver and diamond. The young man broke off a branch and put it in his pocket. The trees began to moan: "There is a human here, tormenting us!" Then they came to a garden whose branches were of gold and jewels. The young man broke off a branch there too; the earth and sky shook. The girl and the jinni were frightened, but they could not understand what was happening.

At last they reached a peri palace beyond a bridge. They brought the girl diamond slippers; the young man took one of them. The girl asked for another pair, and he took one of those too. The girl grew cross and walked barefoot. They entered a room where the Peri Padishah sat. The Peri Padishah asked the girl why she was late. The girl told him of the strange things that had happened on the way. The peri told her, "You were imagining things," and sent for sherbet. A servant brought the sherbet in a diamond bowl, but the young man nudged the servant's hand and the bowl fell and broke. The young man put a piece of it in his pocket.

The table was laid, and since the young man was hungry he began to eat with them. The food disappeared as if three people were eating, and the forks and spoons vanished too. At last the Peri Padishah said, "Now go home." Trembling, the girl climbed onto the jinni's shield and returned to the palace. But the young man took a sword from the wall and defeated the wicked Peri Padishah who had been bringing the girl to this palace against her will. Earth and sky groaned: "Woe to us, a human has defeated our padishah!" At once the young man sat on his carpet, struck it once with his whip and returned to the palace.

When the girl got back she found the young man snoring in his room. "Oh you baldhead, what a night I've had!" she muttered. In the morning she said to him, "Prepare to die, you found out nothing." The young man said, "I'll give my account to the sultan, not to you." He was brought before the sultan and said: "Let all the people of the city gather, and then I will tell." Inside he was thinking, "Perhaps I'll find my brother among the crowd."

The whole city gathered. The young man told everything: the jinni's shield, the silver and diamond garden, the peri palace, the Peri Padishah. The girl cried, "Don't believe him, father, he's lying!" The young man took from his pocket the diamond branch, the jewelled branch, the golden slipper, the piece of the broken bowl and the spoons. Everyone was astonished. Just then the young man saw among the crowd the brother he had been searching for for months. He leapt down from the platform, ran through the crowd and threw his arms around his brother.

His brother told him all that had happened to him too. The young man said to the sultan, "Give your daughter and half your kingdom to my brother. The magic turban, the whip and the carpet are enough for me, so long as I can live beside my brother." The princess was gladdest of all to be free of the Peri Padishah. One day the peri had carried her off from her room and bewitched her, and had been having her brought to him every night. Joyfully the girl agreed to marry the elder brother. There was a wedding of forty days and forty nights.

I was at that wedding too. I asked the cook for so much pilaf, and they piled so much pilaf into my palm, that I'm still limping! Three apples fell from the sky: one for the one who told the tale, one for the one who listened, and one for the young man who searched for his brother to the other end of the world.