One day, after a meal, Sindbad told his guests that, wishing to travel again, he bought merchandise and sailed with other merchants, selling their goods at different islands. One day, they arrived at a deserted island thick with fruit-laden trees, springs and streams. While the others explored the island and ate fruits, Sindbad fell asleep under a tree. When he awoke, his companions and the ship had vanished! In order to be able to see more of the area, he climbed up a tall tree and looked out towards the sea, but couldn’t see his ship anywhere on the horizon. Then, he looked towards the other side of the island and noticed a large, white object some distance away. Curious about it, he came down from the tree and went in that direction to see what it was that he had seen from the tree-top.
The Roc’s Egg
After walking a while, Sindbad came to a huge white ball, big as a hill! He walked around, looking for some footholds to climb up but there was none. Nor could he find any door or opening into it. Suddenly, it became dark and Sindbad thought it was going to rain. But looking up, he saw that the dark cloud was coming lower and he found it was a huge bird! He had heard stories from sailors about this great bird called roc. “This white ball must be its egg!” he realised. The roc settled down to roost on its egg, covering it with its wings. Sindbad watched it and thought it could help him escape. He untied his turban and tied himself to a leg of the roc very firmly. ‘In the morning, it will fly away for food and I will be able to escape from here, tied to its leg!’ thought Sindbad.
Sindbad waited patiently for dawn, when the roc flew off, carrying him till it came down in an island far away. Sindbad untied himself quickly as soon as the roc came down, just as it caught a huge snake and flew away! Sindbad found himself surrounded by steep mountains in a valley in which lay enormous diamonds, guarded by hundreds of huge snakes! They went into their caves as daylight grew. Sindbad hid himself in a cave, and came out in the morning to plan what to do. Suddenly, he saw large pieces of meat dropping into the valley. He had heard that when eagles had to feed their young ones, sailors and merchants threw meat into the valley to make the diamonds stick to them. Then the eagles would carry away the meat to their nests. The merchants arranged to own the nests and, shooing away the birds, they would pick up the diamonds.
Sindbad’s Escape
Sindbad collected big diamonds and stuck them into a large piece of meat that he tied on his back with his turban and lay face down, hoping that an eagle would pick up the meat! An eagle did just that and carried him to its nest. The merchant who owned that nest came to get diamonds and found Sindbad there! Sindbad offered him the diamonds but he took just one. He took Sindbad to his ship to sail homewards. They saw the island of Rohat with strange things like camphor trees and rhinoceros, an animal with a huge horn. The rhino fought against an elephant and both the animals got killed. The roc carried them to feed its young ones. Sindbad purchased merchandise with the diamonds and sold them. From Balsora he returned to Baghdad. It had been a delightful story and his guests went home wondering at Sindbad’s great courage.
