A Man once gave his wife a dirham to buy rice; so she took it and went to the rice seller, who gave her the rice and began to jest with her and ogle her, for she was dowered with beauty and loveliness, saying, "Rice is not good but with sugar which if you will have, come in with me for an hour." So, saying, "Give me sugar," she went in with him into his shop and he won his will of her and said to his slave, "Weigh her out a dirham's worth of sugar." But he made the slave a privy sign, and the boy, taking the napkin, in which was the rice, emptied it out and put in earth and dust in its stead, and for the sugar set stones, after which he again knotted up the napkin and left it by her. His object, in doing this, was that she should come to him a second time; so, when she went forth of the shop, he gave her the napkin and she took it, thinking to have in it rice and sugar, and took her way; but when she returned home and, setting it before her husband, went for a cooking pot, he found in it earth and stones. So, as soon as she came back bringing the pot, he said to her, "Did I tell you I had anything to build, that you bring me earth and stones?"

When she saw this, she knew that the rice seller's slave had tricked her; so she said to her husband, "O man, in my trouble of mind for what has befallen me, I went to fetch the sieve and brought the cooking pot." "What has troubled you?" he asked; and she answered, "O husband, I dropped the dirham you gave me in the market street and was ashamed to search for it before the folk; yet I grudged to lose the silver, so I gathered up the earth from the place where it fell and brought it away, thinking to sift it at home. Why I went to fetch the sieve, but brought the cooking pot instead." Then she fetched the sieve and gave it to her husband, saying, "Do you sift it; for yours eyes are sharper than mine." Accordingly he sat, sifting the clay, till his face and beard were covered with dust; and he discovered not her trick, neither knew what had befallen her. "This then, O King," said the Wazir, "is an instance of the malice of women, and consider the saying of Allah Almighty, 'Surely the cunning of you (women) is great!' And again, 'Indeed, the malice of Satan is weak in comparison with the malice of women.'"

The King gave ear to his Wazir's speech and was persuaded by that and was satisfied by what he cited to him of the signs of Allah; and the lights of good counsel arose and shone in the firmament of his understanding and he turned from his purpose of slaying his son. But on the fourth day, the favourite came in to him weeping and wailing and, kissing the ground before him, said, "O King and lord of good counsel, I have made plainly manifest to you my grievance and you have dealt unjustly by me and have forborne to avenge me on him who has wronged me, because he is your son and the darling of your heart; but Allah (extolled and exalted be He!) will presently succour me against him, even as He succoured the King's son against his father's Wazir." "And how was that?" asked the King; and she answered, "I have heard tell, O King, a tale of