The Boy Apprenticed to an Enchanter

g. But at the end of the three years my master said to me, “We will leave the Inaccessible Island, for I have a

ed on lonely islands, and at last we came to a mainland, and there the Enchanter left the boat to sink beneath the water. As travelers then we went on. We came to a town, and there my master bought for himself and me the dresses of merchants. Then we came to the river that flows toward Babylon. Men go down the river in round boats that are made of rods woven together. In every b

every street there are three hundred and sixty-five palaces, and to every palace there are three hundred and sixty-five steps leading up to its door of gold and ebony. The street

er told me, were one or two of all the beautiful or terrible animals of the world. Those gardens I will speak of a

g

he air. Outside of it there were steps that went round it and to the very top of it—a thousand steps. And on the top of the tower, resting again

on, Harut and Marut they were named. Giant beings they were. As they slept there the beard of each was spread across his mighty chest, and it was a beard so b

ade still more fearful[Pg 35] by the words that Zabulun said to me. “We

Babylon is shown with a spear raised in his hand. And if a King should bring an army against Babylon, the number of its men and the ways by which it comes would be shown in the mi

was once a Prince of Babylon. They dishonored me, the men of Babylon, and drove me out of

ul and terrible beasts that he can bring into them. And as for the Genii who guard Babylon—behold them! They are mighty beings, truly, Harut and Marut! Immeasurably old are they, and they pass

slept in the shadow of the Tower of Babylon, turned in their sleeping. The flocks of birds that had built nests in thei

now Zabulun the Enchanter, stood there with his staff in his hands and smiling to himself. And I, Eean, The Boy Ap