The Vizier of the Two-Horned Alexander

The Vizier of the Two-Horned
Alexander
by Frank R.
Stockton

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Alexander
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Title: The Vizier of the Two-Horned Alexander
Author: Frank R. Stockton
Release Date: December 2, 2003 [EBook #10368]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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THE VIZIER OF THE TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER
BY
FRANK R. STOCKTON
1899
PREFATORY NOTE
The story told in this book is based upon legendary history, and the
statements on which it is founded appear in the chronicles of
Abou-djafar Mohammed Tabari. This historian was the first
Mussulman to write a general history of the world. He was born in the
year 244 of the Hejira (838-839 A.D.), and passed a great part of his
life in Bagdad, where he studied and taught theology and jurisprudence.
His chronicles embrace the history of the world, according to his lights,
from the creation to the year 302 of the Hejira.
In these chronicles Tabari relates some of the startling experiences of
El Khoudr, or El Kroudhr, then Vizier of that great monarch, the
Two-Horned Alexander, and these experiences furnish the motive for
those subsequent adventures which are now related in this book.
Some writers have confounded the Two-Horned Alexander with
Alexander the Great, but this is an inexcusable error. References in
ancient histories to the Two-Horned Alexander describe him as a great
and powerful potentate, and place him in the time of Abraham. Mr. S.
Baring-Gould, in his "Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets," states
that, after a careful examination, he has come to the conclusion that
some of the most generally known legends which have come down to
us through the ages are based on incidents which occurred in the reign
of this monarch.
The hero of this story now deems it safe to speak out plainly without
fear of evil consequences to himself, and his confidence in our high
civilization is a compliment to the age.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
I lent large sums to the noble knights
"Don't you do it"
His wife was a slender lady
"Time of Abraham!" I exclaimed
Moses asked embarrassing questions
An encounter with Charles Lamb
I cut that picture from its frame
When we left Cordova
I had been a broker in Pompeii
Solomon and the Jinns
"Go tell the queen"
She gave me her hand, and I shook it heartily
Asking all sorts of questions
And roughly told me
She turned her head
"How like!"
I proceeded to dig a hole
"Why are you not in the army?"
Nebuchadnezzar and the gardener

Petrarch and Laura
The crouching African fixed her eyes upon him

THE VIZIER OF THE TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER

I
I was on a French steamer bound from Havre to New York, when I had
a peculiar experience in the way of a shipwreck. On a dark and foggy
night, when we were about three days out, our vessel collided with a
derelict--a great, heavy, helpless mass, as dull and colorless as the
darkness in which she was enveloped. We struck her almost head on,
and her stump of a bowsprit was driven into our port bow with such
tremendous violence that a great hole--nobody knew of what
dimensions--was made in our vessel.
The collision occurred about two hours before daylight, and the
frightened passengers who crowded the upper deck were soon informed
by the officers that it would be necessary to take to the boats, for the
vessel was rapidly settling by the head.
Now, of course, all was hurry and confusion. The captain endeavored
to assure his passengers that there were boats enough to carry every
soul on board, and that there was time enough for them to embark
quietly and in order. But as the French people did not understand him
when he spoke in English, and as the Americans did not readily
comprehend what he said in French, his exhortations were of little avail.
With such of their possessions as they could carry, the people crowded
into the boats as soon as they were ready, and sometimes before they
were ready; and while there was not exactly a panic on board, each man
seemed to be inspired with the idea that his safety, and that of his
family, if he had one, depended upon precipitate individual action.
I was a young man, traveling alone, and while I was as anxious as any

one to be saved from