Having been accustomed to deal death around, the murder of the infant did not prey upon his mind; but the words of the mother he never forgot. 'I am miserable, because I am childless,' he repeated every day; and he ordered all the women of his harem to be well beaten. But he was compelled to admit, that there was now little chance of his wishes being fulfilled. However, as a last resort, he consulted a magician, a man of Persian origin, who had recently arrived with merchandise in that country. This magician, after many very intricate calculations, told him that he was destined to have a son by the daughter of an Abyssinian prince, now betrothed to the son of the sultan of Damascus; but that her friends would endeavour to take her secretly down the river in a boat before the year was out, lest he might behold and covet her. The magician also asked him wherefore he had thrown away the 'sword of good-luck;' and explained by saying, that the ancestors of King Mansoor had always been in possession of a sword which brought them prosperity, and that the dynasty was to come to an end if it were lost.
Upon this, the king gave, in the first place, orders to his servants and his guards to search for the sword he had lost; but the woman, who had concealed it, thinking it might afford some clue to the assassin of her child, instantly understood, on hearing these inquiries, that Mansoor was the man. So she vowed vengeance; and being a daughter of the Arabs of the desert, retired to a distant branch of her tribe with the sword, and effectually escaped all pursuit. Her name was Lulu; from that time forth she abjured all feminine pursuits, and became a man in action, riding a fierce horse, and wielding sword and spear; 'For I,' said she, 'when the period is fulfilled, will smite down this king who has slain my child.'
Meanwhile, Mansoor had also given orders to stretch an enormous chain across the river between the two parts of his city, so as to prevent all boats from passing until searched for the daughter of the Abyssinian prince; and this is the origin of the name of these mountains. For a long time, no such person could be discovered; but at length, when the year was nearly out, a maiden of surpassing loveliness was found concealed in a mean kanjia, and being brought before the king, and interrogated, confessed that she was the daughter of Sala-Solo, Prince of Gondar. Mansoor upon this explained the decrees of Heaven; and although she wept, and said that she was betrothed to the son of the sultan of Damascus, he paid no heed to her, but took her to wife, and in due course of time had a son by her, whom he named Ali; and he would thereafter smile grimly to, himself, and say: 'I now have an Ali, I now have a child.'
The magician, who returned about this time, being consulted, said that if the boy passed the critical period of fifteen years, he would live, like his father, to a good old age. So Mansoor caused a subterranean palace to be hewn out of the mountain, in the deeper chambers of which, fitted up with all magnificence, he caused Ali to be kept by a faithful nurse; whilst he himself dwelt in the front chambers that overlooked the river, and gave audience to all who came and floated in boats beneath his balconies; but no one was allowed to ascend, except the wezeer and a few proved friends: [There, said Ismaeen, pointing to one of the largest excavations on the opposite side, there is the palace of King Mansoor.]