Knjigice
Fairy tale · Classic fairy tales
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
A tale from the Thousand and One Nights about a magic cave and clever Morgiana
Also in: Ali Baba in štirideset razbojnikov (Slovenian) · Ali Baba a štyridsať zbojníkov (Slovak)
In a town on the desert's edge lived two brothers. Cassim was rich but stingy and proud; Ali Baba was poor and kind-hearted. Every morning he led his three donkeys into the hills for firewood, and sold it at the market each evening. "We have little," he told his wife, "but we lack nothing." So he lived quietly and honestly, day by day.
1
One day, while chopping wood, Ali Baba heard the thunder of hooves. He quickly climbed a tree — and forty robbers came riding past! Their captain stepped up to a great grey rock and cried: "Open, Sesame!" The rock rumbled apart, the robbers carried heavy sacks inside, and then they rode away back down into the valley.
2
When they were gone from sight and sound, Ali Baba stepped up to the rock and softly repeated: "Open, Sesame!" The rock opened, and before him glittered a cave full of gold coins, pearls, silken carpets and silver jars. Ali Baba loaded just three sacks of gold onto his donkeys, said: "Close, Sesame!" and hurried home.
3
His wife wanted to measure the gold, so she borrowed a measuring cup from Cassim's wife. The curious sister-in-law dropped a little honey into it — and when she got the cup back, a gold coin sat stuck to the bottom! That very evening Cassim knocked at his brother's door: "Tell me where your gold comes from!" And good Ali Baba trusted him with the secret.
4
Cassim did not even wait for morning. He set off into the hills with ten donkeys, cried: "Open, Sesame!" and rushed into the cave. At the sight of all that treasure his head began to spin. He stuffed sack after sack, far more than he could ever carry — and in his greed forgot the whole world around him.
5
When he wanted to leave, he could not remember the magic words. "Open, Barley! Open, Oats!" he called, but the rock did not move a hair. Then the robbers returned, and there was no more help for his brother. Ali Baba searched for him in vain that evening — only his donkeys still waited before the closed rock.
6
The robbers soon noticed that someone knew their secret. "We will find him!" growled the captain. One robber sniffed out Ali Baba's house and marked its door with chalk. But at Ali Baba's there served a clever girl named Morgiana. She spotted the mark and drew the same chalk cross on every other door in the street. The robbers searched for the right house in vain.
7
Then the captain thought up a trick. He dressed as an oil merchant and drove mules up to Ali Baba's house with thirty-nine great clay jars. Only one truly held oil — in all the others crouched hidden robbers. "It is late," said the captain. "May I spend the night in your courtyard with my oil?" Kind-hearted Ali Baba warmly invited him in.
8
In the night Morgiana's lamp ran out of oil. She stepped among the jars — and from the first came a whisper: "Is it time yet?" Morgiana was not afraid. "Not yet," she answered calmly in a low voice. Then she heated oil in a great kettle and poured it into every jar. Not a sound came from the jars again.
9
At midnight the captain tapped softly on the jars to wake his men — but the courtyard was silent. He saw that he was all alone, leapt over the wall and fled into the dark. In the morning Ali Baba learned what had happened. "Morgiana, you clever head," he said, "you have saved our whole house!" But far off in the hills the captain was already making a new plan.
10
After a while a fine foreign merchant appeared in town. He made friends with Ali Baba's son, who one evening invited him to dinner. But when Morgiana brought in the dishes, she looked at him closely — and under the silk turban she knew the robber captain! "Ali Baba, look at your guest!" she cried. The unmasked captain knocked over his chair, leapt through the door and fled the town — this time for good.
11
"Morgiana, you have saved us twice," said Ali Baba. "From this day you are no servant, but free — and one of us." Soon there was a wedding in the house: Morgiana and Ali Baba's son joined hands, and the whole courtyard danced. They kept the secret of the rock to themselves and took from the cave only what they needed. And so they lived happily and generously to the end of their days.
12The End
