expelled from the palace and wanders the desert. A Magician finds him and takes him in as his apprentice. One day, the Magician explains he will go on a journey, gives him the keys to his house, and warns him not to open a certain door. While the Magician is away, Abdallah opens every door, and sees a leopard, a lion and a talking sword. He opens the last door and finds a horse. The horse tells him that the Magician lured and devoured its previous owner, and that the same fate may befall Abdallah if they do not escape. The horse tells him to make preparations: take a saddle, the sword and seven bottles from a chest, and release the lion and the leopard. Abdallah escapes on the horse and sees a cloud of smoke coming after them: it is the Magician and some friends. The horse tells its rider to throw behind them one of the bottles to create obstacles: a forest of thorns, a mountain of stones, a wall of fire, and lastly a large sea-wave. Abdallah and the horse reach a kingdom, and the horse advises him to dress in poor and ragged clothes. Abdallah goes to the city to a crowd that gathered to see the princesses' husband selection by lemon-throwing. The seventh princess throws her lemon and it lands near Abdallah. Her father, the sultan, marries the princess to the gardener and places them in a poor hut. Some time later, war breaks out thee times, and three times Abdallah rides into battle to defend his father-in-law's kingdom: he rides the leopard on the first battle, the leopard on the second and the horse on the third. In a tale from Zanzibar translated by George Bateman as The Magician and the Sultan’s Son, a sultan with three sons laments the fact that no one seems to be able to teach them anything. A magician named Mchaa′wee appears and asks to take one of the sultan's sons as a companion, and chooes the youngest, called Keejaa′naa. One day, the magician gives Keejaa′naa the keys to his house, and says he will away for a while. Keejaa′naa opens a door with a golden pool and dips his finger into it. The next time, the boy opens the remaining doors: he sees piles of animal bones and humans skulls, and finds a horse named Faraasee. Author Alice