Retold by Marie StuartThe story of Ali Baba is taken from a collection of stories called "The Thousand and One Nights". These stories are based on ancient Persian, Arabian and Indian tales handed down by word of mouth for hundreds of years. They first appeared in their present form, in Arabic, in 1450. The tales are linked together by the Story of Sheherazade. Sheherazade was the wife of the Sultan and had been condemned to death for her wickedness. She managed to put off her execution by telling one of the stories to her sister each night, in the presence of the Sultan. Being a very clever woman, as well as a talented storyteller, Sheherazade always left the most exciting part of the story until the following night. The Sultan could not bear to miss the end of each story, and kept on putting off the execution. For a thousand and one nights Sheherazade kept the Sultan spellbound with the stories. He eventually realized that he had been wrong and forgave Sheherazade.The stories are just as spellbinding today as they were in those far-off days, and are here presented in simple text so that younger readers can enjoy them.ONCE there were two boys who were brothers. The older one was called Cassim. The other was Ali Baba. When they grew up, Cassim married a woman who was rich.Ali Baba married a woman who had no money at all, so they had to live in a very small house and never had nice things to eat and drink.Ali Baba went out every day to cut down trees for firewood. He used to take the wood home on the backs of his three little donkeys. Then he went round the streets with it. Some of the women came out of their houses to buy the wood from him.This was how he made his living. It was not a very good living and he never had much money to take home to his wife and son.One day, when he was at work in the woods, he saw some men coming along on horse-back. He did not like the look of them so he said to his donkeys."I don't want these men to see me. They may take my wood. You go off so that they will not see you and I will climb up into this tree. I will call you when they have gone."Up into the tree he went and on came the men. Then the first man said: " Stop! The place is over there!"All the men jumped from their horses and Ali Baba saw that every horse had a big sack on its back. The men lifted these sacks off the horses' backs and put them on their own backs.Then the horses were led away and the men walked up to a big rock that was near Ali Baba's tree.Ali Baba counted the men as they stood nearby. There were forty of them.Standing in front of the big rock, one of the men called,"Open Sesame!"Ali Baba saw a door in the rock open! The men went in and all the others went in after him. No sooner had the last one got in than the door closed again."I wish I could get down now and run off home," said Ali Baba, "but they might come out again soon and see me."So he still sat in the tree. He wondered why he had never seen the door in the rock before! Who had opened it? Was it the entrance to a cave?

"Who put this there?" she wondered. "It could have been the children, but I don't think so. I don't like this. Why is it only on our house and not on the others?" So she made some more white crosses on the doors of the other houses. Then she went on to do her shopping.By this time the robber had gone back to the cave."I have found the house where the man lives, " he said to the others. "Come with me and I will take you to it."But when they got there he found so many houses with a white cross on the door that he could not tell which was the right one. There was nothing they could do but go back to the cave again.Then another man said, "Let me try.'So the next day the old man went with im as he did with the first man. When they found the house, a red cross was marked on the door by the robber."All the others have a white cross," he said. "This will be the only one with a red cross."Morgiana saw the red cross when she came back from the shops. So she put some red crosses on the doors of other houses, just as she had done with the white crosses before. When the robbers came again they could not tell which was the right house."This will not do!" said the robber chief. "I must go and find the house myself!"So he went and found the old man who took him to the house as he had done with the other two men. The head man did not put a cross on it. He had a good hard look at it and went away."I must think what to do next," he said to the robbers when he came back. Next day he said,"I have it! You must go and buy some big jars---the kind they use for oil. But I want oil in only one of them. The others must have nothing in them.""Why?" said one of the robbers."Because you are going to hide in the jars when you have put them on the horses to Ali Baba's house. I shall tell him I have come a long way, and I shall ask him to let me sleep at his house for the night.""What about us?" said the men."You will have to stay in the jars. They are so big there will be plenty of room in them for you. When the time comes I shall tell you what to do."Things went just as the robber chief had hoped. Ali Baba agreed that he could stay for the night.Ali Baba helped him to take the jars down from the horses' backs. Then he said, "Come in now and have a good dinner."After the robber had eaten and drunk all he could, he said, "I must go now and give the horses some water."While he was in the stable, he went to each jar and spoke to the man who was in it."When I make a call like a bird from my window," he said, "you must get out of your jars. I shall come down and tell you what to do." Then he went back into the house.When Morgiana went to make up the fire for the night, her lamp went out and she could not see what she was doing."I must buy some more oil in the morning," she said, "but tonight I shall take some from one of those jars."She went to the first jar and the man who was in it, thinking she was the robber chief, said, "Is it time?"This made her jump, but she quickly replied in a deep voice, "Not now. Soon... "

感觉这是最好读的一篇

翻译呢？