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THE ARABIAN NIGHTS - TALES OF 1001 NIGHTS Part -4

 Then, when it was the tenth night, her sister Dunyazad said: `Finish your story.' `With pleasure,' she replied, and she continued:

 


    I have heard, O fortunate king, that the girls produced three names for the porter, while he kissed, bit and embraced them until he was satisfied. They went on laughing until they said: `What is its name, then, brother?' `Don't you know?' `No.' `This is the mule that breaks barriers, browses on the mint of the dykes, eats the husked sesame and that passes the night in the khan of Abu Mansur.' The girls laughed until they fell over backwards and then they continued with their drinking party, carrying on until nightfall.

 

    At this point, they told the porter that it was time for him to get up, put on his gaiters and go ­ `Show us the width of your shoulders.' `By God,' said the porter, `if the breath of life were to leave me, it would be easier for me to bear than having to part from you. Let me link night with day, and in the morning we can all go our separate ways.' The girl who had bought the provisions pleaded with the others: `Let him sleep here so that we can laugh at him. Who knows whether in all our lives we shall meet someone else like him, both wanton and witty.' They then said: `You can only spend the night with us on condition that you accept our authority and that you don't ask about anything you see or the reason for it.' The porter agreed to this, and they then told him: `Get up and read what is written over the door.' He went to the door and there he found written above it in gold leaf: `Whoever talks about what does not concern him will hear what will not please him.' `I call you to witness,' he said, `that I shall not talk about what is no concern of mine.' witness,' he said, `that I shall not talk about what is no concern of mine.'

 

    The housekeeper got up and prepared a meal for them, which they ate, and then they lit candles and lamps, dipping ambergris and aloes into the candles. They sat drinking and talking of past loves, after having reset the table with fresh fruits and more wine. They continued for a time, eating, drinking, carousing together over their dessert, laughing and teasing each other, when suddenly there was a knock on the door.

 

     This did not disrupt the party, however, and one of the girls went by herself to the door and returned to report: `Our happiness is complete tonight.' `How is that?' the others asked. She told them: `At the door are three Persian dervishes, with shaven chins, heads and eyebrows. By a very remarkable coincidence, each of them has lost his left eye. They have only just arrived after a journey; they are showing the signs of travel and this is the first time that they have been to our city, Baghdad. They knocked on our door because they couldn't find a lodging for the night and they had said to themselves: "Perhaps the owner of this house would give us the key to a stable or to a hut in which we could pass the night." For they had been caught out by nightfall, and, being strangers, they had no acquaintance who might give them shelter ­ and, sisters, each of them is of a ludicrous appearance.'

 

    She continued to persuade and cajole until the others agreed to let the Persians come in on condition that they would not talk about what did not concern them lest they hear what would not please them. The girl went off joyfully and came back with the three one-eyed men, with shaven beards and moustaches. They spoke words of greeting, bowed and hung back. The girls got up to welcome them and, after congratulating them on their safe arrival, told them to be seated.

 

    What the visitors saw was a pleasant and clean room, furnished with greenery, where there were lighted candles, incense rising into the air, dessert, fruits and wine, together with three virgin girls. `This is good, by God,' they all agreed. Then they turned to the porter and found him cheerfully tired out and drunk. They thought, on seeing him, that he must be one of their own kinds and said: `This is a dervish like us, either a foreigner or an Arab.' Hearing this, the porter glowered at them and said: `Sit down and don't be inquisitive. Didn't you read what is written over the door? It is not for poor men who arrive like you to let loose your tongues at us.' The newcomers apologized submissively, and the girls laughed and made peace between them and the porter, after which food was produced for the new arrivals, which they ate.

 

    They then sat drinking together, with the doorkeeper pouring the wine and the wine cup circulating among them. The porter then asked the visitors whether they had some story or anecdote to tell. Heated by wine, they, in their turn, asked for musical instruments and were brought a tambourine, a lute and a Persian harp by the doorkeeper. They then got up and tuned the instruments, after which each one took one of them, struck a note and began to sing. The girls added a shrill accompaniment and the noise rose. Then, while this was going on, there was a knock at the door and the doorkeeper got up to see what was going on.

 

    The reason for this knocking was that the caliph Harun al-Rashid was in the habit of going around disguised as a merchant and he had come down from his palace that night on an excursion to listen to the latest news, accompanied by his vizier, Jafar, and Masrur, his executioner. On his way through the city, he and his companions had happened to pass that house, where they heard music and singing. He had said to Jafar: `I want to go in here so that we may listen to these voices and see their owners.' Jafar had replied: `Commander of the Faithful, these people are drunk and I am afraid that they may do us some harm.' The caliph had then said: `I must enter and I want you to think of some scheme to get us in.' `To hear is to obey,' Jafar had replied, before going up and knocking on the door. When it was opened by the doorkeeper, Jafar advanced and kissed the ground. `Lady,' he said, `we are traders from Tiberias who have been in Baghdad for ten days. We have sold our goods and are staying at the merchants' khan, but this evening we were invited out by a colleague. We went to his house and, after he had given us a meal, we sat drinking with him for a time, but when he let us go night had fallen and, as we are strangers here, we could not find our way back to our hostel. Of your charity, and may God reward you, would you let us come in and spend the night with you?'

 

    The girl looked at them and saw that they were dressed as merchants and appeared to be respectable people. So she went back to her sisters and passed on Jafar's message. The others sympathized with the visitors' plight and told her: `Let them in,' after which she went back and opened the door. The caliph, Jafar and Masrur came in and when the girls saw them, they stood up, seated their visitors and ministered to their needs, saying: `Welcome to our guests, but we lay a condition on you.' `What is that?' they asked. `That you do not speak of what does not concern you, lest you hear what will not please you.' `We agree,' they replied, and they sat down to drink together.

 

    Looking at the three dervishes, the caliph was surprised to find that each of them had lost his left eye. He was also thrown into confusion by the beauty and grace of the girls, which prompted his admiration. They began to drink together and to talk, but when the girls invited the caliph began to drink together and to talk, but when the girls invited the caliph to drink, he said: `I am proposing to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca.' The doorkeeper then got up and brought him an embroidered table cloth on which she set a china jar in which she poured willow-flower water, adding some snow and a sugar lump. The caliph thanked her and said to himself: `By God, I shall reward her tomorrow for the good that she has done me.'

 

    Then they all occupied themselves with drinking, and when the drink had gained the upper hand, the lady of the house got up, bowed to the company and then, taking the housekeeper by the hand, she said: `Sisters, come, we must settle our debt.' `Yes,' agreed the other two girls, and at that, the doorkeeper got up in front of them and first cleared the table, removed the debris, replaced the perfumes and cleared a space in the middle of the room. The dervishes were made to sit on a bench on one side of the room and the caliph, Jafar and Masrur on a bench on the other side. Then the lady of the house called to the porter: `Your friendship does not amount to much. You are not a stranger, but one of the household.' The porter got up, tightened his belt and asked: `What do you want?' `Stay where you are,' she said. Then the housekeeper stood up and set a chair in the middle of the room, opened a cupboard and said to the porter: `Come and help me.'

 

    In the cupboard he saw two black bitches, with chains around their necks. `Take them,' said the girl, and he took them and brought them to the centre of the room. Then the lady of the house got up, rolled back her sleeves and took up a whip. `Bring one of them,' she told the porter, and he did this, pulling the bitch by its chain, as it whimpered and shook its head at the girl. It howled as she struck it on the head, and she continued to beat it until her arms were tired. She then threw away the continued to beat it until her arms were tired. She then threw away the whip, pressed the bitch to her breast and wiped away its tears with her hand, kissing its head. Then she said to the porter: `Take this one away and bring the other.' This he did and she treated the second bitch in the same way as the first.

 

    The caliph was concerned and troubled by this. Unable to contain his curiosity about the story of the two bitches, he winked at Jafar, but the latter turned to him and gestured to him to remain silent. Then the lady of the house turned to the doorkeeper and said: `Get up and do your duty.' `Yes,' she replied and, getting up, she went to the couch, which was made of juniper wood with panels of gold and silver. Then the lady of the house said to the other two girls: `Bring out what you have.' The doorkeeper sat on a chair by her side, while the housekeeper went into a closet and came out with a satin bag with green fringes and two golden discs. She stood in front of the lady of the house, unfastened the bag and took from it a lute whose strings she tuned and whose pegs she tightened, until it was all in order. Then she recited:

 

    You are the object of my whole desire;

    Union with you, beloved, is unending bliss,

    While absence from you is like fire.

    You madden me, and throughout time

    In you is centred the infatuation of my love.

    It brings me no disgrace that I love you.

    The veils that cover me are torn away by love,

    And love continues shamefully to rend all veils.

    I clothe myself in sickness; my excuse is clear.

    For through my love, you lead my heart astray.

    For through my love, you lead my heart astray.

    Flowing tears serve to bring my secret out and make it plain.

    The tearful flood reveals it, and they try

    To cure the violence of this sickness, but it is you

    Who are for me both the disease and its cure.

    For those whose cure you are, the pains last long.

    I pine away through the light shed by your eyes,

    And it is my own love whose sword kills me,

    A sword that has destroyed many good men.

    Love has no end for me nor can I turn to consolation.

    Love is my medicine and my code of law;

    Secretly and openly it serves to adorn me.

    You bring good fortune to the eye that looks

    Its fill on you, or manages a glance.

    Yes, and its choice of love distracts my heart.

 

    When the lady of the house heard these lines, she cried: `Oh! Oh! Oh!', tore her clothes and fell to the ground in a faint. The caliph was astonished to see weal’s caused by the blows of a whip on her body, but then the doorkeeper got up, sprinkled water over her and clothed her in a splendid dress that she had fetched for her sister. When they saw that, all the men present were disturbed, as they had no idea what lay behind it. The caliph said to Jafar: `Don't you see this girl and the marks of a beating that she shows? I can't keep quiet without knowing the truth of the matter and without finding out about this girl and the two black bitches.' Jafar replied: `Master, they made it a condition that we should not talk about what did not concern us, lest we hear what we do not like.'

 

    At this point, the doorkeeper said: `Sister, keep your promise and come to me.' `Willingly,' said the housekeeper, and she took the lute, cradled it to her breasts, touched it with her fingers and recited:

 

    If I complain of the beloved's absence, what am I to say?

    Where can I go to reach what I desire?

    I might send messengers to explain my love,

    But this complaint no messenger can carry.

    I may endure, but after he has lost

    His love, the lover's life is short.

    Nothing remains but sorrow and then grief,

    With tears that flood the cheeks.

    You may be absent from my sight but you have still

    A settled habitation in my heart.

    I wonder, do you know our covenant?

    Like flowing water, it does not stay long.

    Have you forgotten that you loved a slave,

    Who finds his cure in tears and wasted flesh?

    Ah, if this love unites us once again,

    I have a long complaint to make to you.

 

    When the doorkeeper heard this second poem, she cried out and said: `That is good, by God.' Then she put her hand to her clothes and tore them, as the first girl had done, and fell to the ground in a faint. The housekeeper got up and, after sprinkling her with water, clothed her in a new dress. The doorkeeper then rose and took her seat before saying: `Give me more and pay off the debt you owe me.' So the housekeeper brought her lute and recited:

 

    How long will you so roughly turn from me?

    Have I not poured out tears enough?

    How long do you plan to abandon me?

    If this is thanks to those who envy me,

    Their envy has been cured.

    Were treacherous Time to treat a lover fairly,

    He would not pass the night wakeful and wasted by your love.

    Treat me with gentleness; your harshness injures me.

    My sovereign, is it not time for mercy to be shown?

    To whom shall I tell of my love, you who kill me?

    How disappointed are the hopes of the one who complains,

    When faithfulness is in such short supply!

    My passion for you and my tears increase,

    While the successive days you shun me are drawn out.

    Muslims, revenge the lovesick, sleepless man,

    The pasture of whose patience has scant grass.

    Does love's code permit you, you who are my desire,

    To keep me at a distance while another one

    Is honoured by your union? What delight or ease

    Can the lover find through nearness to his love,

    Who tries to see that he is weighted down by care?

 

    When the doorkeeper heard this poem, she put her hand on her dress and ripped it down to the bottom. She then fell fainting to the ground, showing marks of a beating. The dervishes said: `It would have been better to have slept on a dunghill rather than to have come into this house, where our stay has been clouded by something that cuts at the heart.' `Why is that?' asked the caliph, turning to them. `This affair has distressed us,' they replied. `Do you not belong to this household?' he asked. `No,' they replied. `We have never seen the place before.' The caliph was surprised and said, gesturing at the porter: `This man with you may know about them.' When they asked him, however, he said: `By Almighty God, love makes us all equal. I have grown up in Baghdad but this is the only time in my life that I ever entered this house and how I came to be here with these girls is a remarkable story.'

 

    The others said: `By God, we thought that you were one of them, but now we see that you are like us.' The caliph then pointed out: `We are seven men and they are three women. There is no fourth. So ask them about themselves, and if they don't reply willingly, we will force them to do so.' Everyone agreed except for Jafar, who said: `Let them be; we are their guests and they made a condition which we accepted, as you know. It would be best to let the matter rest, for there is only a little of the night left and we can then go on our ways.' He winked at the caliph and added: `There is only an hour left and tomorrow we can summon them to your court and ask for their story.' The caliph raised his head and shouted angrily: `I cannot bear to wait to hear about them; let the dervishes question them.' `I don't agree,' said Jafar, and the two of them discussed and argued about who should ask the questions until they both agreed that it should be the porter.

 

    The lady of the house asked what the noise was about and the porter got up and said to her: `My lady, these people would like you to tell them the story of the two bitches and how you come to beat them and then to weep and kiss them. They also want to know about your sister and why she has been beaten with rods like a man. These are there and why she has been beaten with rods like a man. These are their questions to you.' `Is it true what he says about you?' the lady of the house asked the guests, and all of them said yes, except for Jafar, who stayed silent. When the lady heard this, she told them: `By God, you have done us a great wrong. We started by making it a condition that if any of you talked about what did not concern him, he would hear what would not please him. Wasn't it enough for you that we took you into our house and shared our food with you? But the fault is not so much yours as that of the one who brought you in to us.'

 

    Then she rolled her sleeve back above the wrist and struck the floor three times, saying: `Hurry.' At this, the door of a closet opened and out came seven black slaves, with drawn swords in their hands. `Tie up these men who talk too much,' she said, `and bind them one to the other.' This the slaves did, after which they said: `Lady, give us the order to cut off their heads.' She replied: `Let them have some time so that I may ask them about their circumstances before their heads are cut off.' `God save me,' said the porter. `Don't kill me, lady, for someone else's fault. All the rest have done wrong and have committed a fault except me. By God, it would have been a pleasant night had we been saved from these dervishes who entered a prosperous city and then ruined it.' He recited:

 

    How good it is when a powerful man forgives,

    Particularly when those forgiven have no helper.

    By the sanctity of the love we share,

    Do not spoil what came first by what then follows it.

 

    When the porter had finished reciting these lines, the girl laughed... Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the eleventh night, she continued:

 

    I have heard, O auspicious king that the girl laughed in spite of her anger. She then went up to the men and said: `Tell me about yourselves, for you have no more than one hour to live, and were you not people of rank, leaders or governors among your peoples, you would not have been so daring.' `Damn you, Jafar,' the caliph said. `Tell her about us or else we shall be killed by mistake, and speak softly to her before we become victims of misfortune.' `That is part of what you deserve,' replied

Jafar, but the caliph shouted at him: `There is a time for joking, but now is when we must be serious.' The lady then went to the dervishes and asked them whether they were brothers. `No, by God,' they said, `we are only faqirs and foreigners.' She next asked one of them whether he had been born one-eyed. `No, by God,' he said, `but I have a strange and wonderful story about the loss of my eye, which, were it written with needles on the inner corners of the eyeballs, would serve as a warning to those who take heed.' The second and the third dervish, when asked, made the same reply, and they then said: `By God, lady, each of us comes from a different country and each is the son of a king and is a ruler over lands and subjects.'

 

    She turned to them and said: `Each of you is to tell his story and explain why he came here and he can then touch his forelock and go on his way.' The first to come forward was the porter, who said: `Lady, I am a porter and this girl, who bought you your provisions, told me to carry them from the wine seller to the fruiterer, from the fruiterer to the butcher, from the butcher to the grocer, from the grocer to the sweetmeat seller and the perfumer, and then here. You know what happened to me with you. This is my story, and that's all there is.' The girl laughed and said: `Touch your forelock and go.' `By God,' he said, `I am not going to leave until I have heard the stories of my companions.'

 

THE FIRST DERVISH THEN CAME FORWARD AND SAID:

 

    Lady, know that the reason why my chin is shaven and my eye has been plucked out is that my father was a king, who had a brother, also a king, who reigned in another city. His son and I were born on the same day. Years later, when we had grown up, I had got into the habit of visiting my uncle every so often, and I would stay with him for some months. My cousin treated me with the greatest generosity, and would kill sheep for me and pour out wine that he strained for me. Once, when we were sitting drinking and were both under the influence of the wine, he said to me: `Cousin, there is something that I need from you. Please don't refuse to do what I want.' `I shall obey you with pleasure,' I said. After binding me with the most solemn of oaths, he got up straight away and left for a short while. Back he came then with a lady, veiled, perfumed and wearing the most expensive of clothes, who stood behind him as he turned to me and said: `Take this woman and go ahead of me to such-and-such a cemetery' ­ a place that I recognized from his description. `Take her to the burial enclosure and wait for me there.'

 

    Because of the oath that I had sworn, I could not disobey him or refuse his request and so I went off with the woman and we both went into the enclosure. While we were sitting there, my cousin arrived with a bowl of water, a bag containing plaster, and a carpenter's axe. Taking this axe, he went to a tomb in the middle of the enclosure and started to open it up, moving its stones to one side. Then he used the axe to prod about in the soil of the tomb until he uncovered an iron cover the size of a small door. He raised this, revealing beneath it a vaulted staircase. Turning to the woman, he said: `Now you can do what you have chosen to do,' at which she went down the stairs. My cousin then looked at me and said: `In order to complete the favour that you are doing me, when I go down there myself, I ask you to put back the cover and to replace the soil on top of it as it was before. Use the mortar that is in this bag and the water in the bowl to make a paste and coat the circle of the stones in the enclosure so that it looks as it did before, without anyone being able to say: "The inner part is old but there is a new opening here." I have been working on this for a full year and no one but God knows what I have been doing. This is what I need from you.' He then took his leave of me, wishing me well, and went down the stairs. When he was out of sight, I got up and replaced the cover and followed his instructions, so that the place looked just as it had before.

 

    I then went back like a drunken man to the palace of my uncle, who was away hunting. In the morning, after a night's sleep, I thought of what had happened to my cousin the evening before and, when repentance was of no use, I repented of what I had done and of how I had obeyed him. Thinking that it might have been a dream, I started to ask after my cousin, but nobody could tell me where he was. I went out to the cemetery, looking for the enclosure, but I could not find it. I kept on going round enclosure after enclosure and grave after grave until nightfall, but I still failed in my search. I returned to the palace, but I could neither eat nor drink, for my thoughts were taken up with my cousin, as I did not know how he was, and I was intensely distressed. I passed a troubled night until morning came, when I went for a second time to the cemetery, thinking over what my cousin had done and regretting that I had listened to him. I went round all the enclosures but, to my regret, I still could not find the right one or recognize the grave.

 

    For seven days I went on with my fruitless quest, and my misgivings increased until I was almost driven mad. The only relief I could find was to leave and go back to my father, but as soon as I reached the gate of his city, I was attacked by a group of men who tied me up. I was astonished, seeing that I was the son of the city's ruler and they were my father's servants, and in my alarm I said to myself: `What can have happened to my father?' I asked my captors why they were doing this. At first they did not answer, but after a time one of them, who had been a servant of mine, said: `Your father has fallen victim to the treachery of Time. The army conspired against him and he was killed by the vizier, who has taken his place. It was on his orders that we were watching out for you.'

 

    I was stunned by what I heard about my father and fearful because I had a long-standing quarrel with the vizier, before whom my captors now brought me. I had been passionately fond of shooting with a pellet bow and the quarrel arose from this. One day when I was standing on the roof of my palace, a bird settled on the roof of the palace of the vizier. I intended to shoot it, but the pellet missed and, as had been decreed by fate, it struck out the eye of the vizier. This was like the proverb expressed in the old lines:

 

    We walked with a pace that was decreed for us,

    And this is how those under fate's control must walk.

    A man destined to die in a certain land

    A man destined to die in a certain land

    Will not find death in any other.

 

    When the vizier lost his eye, he could not say anything because my father was the king of the city, and this was why he was my enemy. When I now stood before him with my hands tied, he ordered my head to be cut off. `For what crime do you kill me?' I asked. `What crime is greater than this?' he replied, pointing to his missing eye. `I did that by accident,' I protested. `If you did it by accident,' he replied, `I am doing this deliberately.' Then he said: `Bring him forward.' The guards brought me up in front of him, and sticking his finger into my right eye, the vizier plucked it out, leaving me from that time on one-eyed, as you can see. Then he had me tied up and put in a box, telling the executioner: `Take charge of him; draw your sword and when you have brought him outside the city, kill him and let the birds and beasts eat him.'

 

    The executioner took me out of the city to the middle of the desert and then he removed me from the box, bound as I was, hand and foot. He was about to bandage my eyes before going on to kill me, but I wept so bitterly that I moved him to tears. Then, looking at him, I recited:

 

    I thought of you as a strong coat of mail

    To guard me from the arrows of my foes,

    But you are now the arrow head.

    I pinned my hopes on you in all calamities

    When my right hand could no longer aid my left.

    Leave aside what censurers say,

    And let my enemies shoot their darts at me.

    If you do not protect me from my foes,

    At least your silence neither hurts me nor helps them.

   

There are also other lines:

 

    I thought my brothers were a coat of mail;

    They were, but this was for the enemy.

    I thought of them as deadly shafts;

    They were, but their points pierced my heart.

 

    The executioner had been in my father's service and I had done him favours, so when he heard these lines, he said: `Master, what can I do? I am a slave under command.' But then he added: `Keep your life, but don't come back to this land or else you will be killed and you will destroy me, together with yourself. As one of the poets has said:

 

    If you should meet injustice, save your life

    And let the house lament its builder.

    You can replace the country that you leave,

    But there is no replacement for your life.

    I wonder at those who live humiliated

    When God's earth is so wide.

    Send out no messenger on any grave affair,

    For only you yourself will give you good advice.

    The necks of lions would not be so thick

    Were others present to look after them.'

 

    I kissed his hands, scarcely believing that I had escaped death, in comparison with which I found the loss of my eye insignificant. So I comparison with which I found the loss of my eye insignificant. So I travelled to my uncle's city and, after presenting myself to him, I told him what had happened to my father, as well as how I had come to lose my eye. He burst into tears and said: `You have added to my cares and my sorrows. For your cousin disappeared days ago and I don't know what has happened to him, nor can anyone bring me news.' He continued to weep until he fainted and I was bitterly sorry for him. He then wanted to apply some medicaments to my eye, but when he saw that it was like an empty walnut shell, he said: `Better to lose your eye, my boy, than to lose your life.'

 

    At that, I could no longer stay silent about the affair of my cousin, his son, and so I told him all that had happened. When he heard my news, he was delighted and told me to come and show him the enclosure. `By God, uncle,' I said, `I don't know where it is. I went back a number of times after that and searched, but I couldn't find the place.' Then, however, he and I went to the cemetery and, after looking right and left, to our great joy I recognized the place. The two of us went into the enclosure and, after removing the earth, we lifted the cover. We climbed down fifty steps and when we had reached the bottom, we were met by blinding smoke. `There is no might and no power except with God, the Exalted, the Omnipotent,' exclaimed my uncle ­ words that can never put to shame anyone who speaks them. We walked on and found ourselves in a hall filled with flour, grain, eatables and so on, and there in the middle of it we saw a curtain hanging down over a couch. My uncle looked and found his son and the woman who had gone down with him locked in an embrace, but they had become black charcoal, as though they had been thrown into a pit of fire.

 

    On seeing this, my uncle spat in his son's face and said: `You deserve this, you pig. This is your punishment in this world, but there remains the punishment of the next world, which will be harsher and stronger.' Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the twelfth night, SHE CONTINUED:

 

    I have heard, O auspicious king, that the dervish said to the lady of the house, to Jafar and the caliph and the rest of the company that were listening: `My uncle struck his son with his shoe, as he lay there, burned black as charcoal.' HE WENT ON:

 

    This astonished me and I was filled with grief for my cousin and at the fate that had overtaken him and the girl. `By God, uncle,' I said, `remove rancour from your heart. My heart and mind are filled with concern; I am saddened by what has happened to my cousin, and by the fact that he and this girl have been left like charcoal. Is their fate not enough for you that you strike your son with your shoe?' He said: `Nephew, from his earliest days this son of mine was passionately in love with his sister. I used to keep him away from her and I would tell myself: "They are only children," but when they grew up they committed a foul sin. I heard of this and, although I did not believe it, I seized him and reproached him bitterly, saying: "Beware of doing what no one has done before you or will do after you and which will remain as a source of disgrace and disparagement among the kings until the end of time, as the news is carried by the caravans. Take care not to act like this or else I shall be angry with you and kill you."

 

    `I kept him away from her and kept her from him, but the damned girl was deeply in love with him and Satan got the upper hand and made their actions seem good to them. When my son saw that I was keeping him from his sister, he constructed this underground chamber, set it in order and provisioned it, as you see. Then, taking me unawares when I had gone out hunting, he came here, but the Righteous God was jealous of them and consumed them both with fire, while their punishment in the next world will be harsher and stronger.'

 

    He then wept and I wept with him, and he looked at me and said: `You are my son in his place.' I thought for a time about this world and its happenings and of how my father had been killed by his vizier, who had then taken his place and who had plucked out my eye, and I thought of the strange fate of my cousin. I wept and my uncle wept with me. Then we climbed back up and replaced the cover and the earth and restored the tomb as it had been, after which we returned to the palace. Before we had sat down, however, we heard the noise of drums, kettledrums and trumpets, the clatter of lances, the shouting of men, the clink of bridles and the neighing of horses. The sky was darkened by sand and dust kicked up by horses' hooves and we were bewildered, not knowing what had happened. When we asked, we were told that the vizier who had taken my father's kingdom had fitted out his troops, collected men, hired Bedouin, and come with an army like the sands that could not be numbered and which no one could withstand. They had made a surprise attack on the city, which had proved unable to resist and which had surrendered to them.

 

    After this, my uncle was killed and I fled to the edge of the city, saying to myself: `If I fall into this man's hands, he will kill me.' Fresh sorrows were piled on me; I remembered what had happened to my father and to my uncle and I wondered what to do, for if I showed myself, the townspeople and my father's men would recognize me and I would be killed. The only way of escape that I could find was to shave off my beard and my moustache, which I did, and after that I changed my clothes and went out of the city. I then came here, hoping that someone might take me to the Commander of the Faithful, the caliph of the Lord of creation, so that I might talk to him and tell him the story of what had happened to me. I got here tonight and was at a loss to know where to go when I came to where this dervish was standing. I greeted him and told him that I was a stranger, at whom he said: `I too am a stranger.' While we were talking, our third companion here came up to us, greeted us, introducing himself as a stranger, to which we made the same reply. We then walked on as darkness fell and fate led us to you. This is the story of why my beard and moustache have been shaved and of how I lost my eye.

 

The lady said: `Touch your forelock and go.' `Not before I hear someone else's tale,' the man replied. The others wondered at his story and the caliph said to Jafar: `By God, I have never seen or heard the like of what has happened to this dervish.' The second dervish then came forward and kissed the ground. HE SAID:

 

    Lady, I was not born one-eyed and my story is a marvellous one which, were it written with needles on the inner corners of the eyes of men, would serve as a warning to those who take heed. I was a king, the son of a king. I studied the seven readings of the Quran; I read books and discussed them with men of learning; I studied astronomy, poetry and all other branches of knowledge until I surpassed all the people of my time, while my calligraphy was unrivalled. My fame spread through all lands and among all kings. So it was that the king of India heard of me and he sent a messenger to my father, together with gifts and presents suitable for royalty, to ask for me. My father equipped me with six ships and after a full month's voyage we came to land.

 

    We unloaded the horses that we had taken on board with us and we loaded ten camels with presents, but we had only travelled a short way when suddenly we saw a dust cloud which rose and spread until it filled the sky. After a while, it cleared away to show beneath it fifty mail-clad horsemen like scowling lions, and on closer inspection we could see that they were Bedouin highwaymen. When they saw our small numbers, and that we had ten camels laden with gifts for the king of India, they rushed at us with levelled lances. We gestured to them with our fingers and said: `We are envoys on our way to the great king of India, so do not harm us.' `We don't live in his country,' they told us, `and are no subjects of his.' Then they killed some of my servants, while the rest took flight. I was badly wounded and I too fled, but the Bedouin did not pursue me, being too busy sorting through the money and the gifts that we had brought with us.

 

    Having been cast down from my position of power, I went off with no notion of where I was going, and I carried on until I reached the top of a mountain, where I took refuge in a cave until daybreak. I continued travelling like this until I came to a strong and secure city, from which cold winter had retreated, while spring had come with its roses. Flowers were blooming; there were gushing streams and the birds were singing. It fitted the description of the poet:

 

    A place whose citizens are subject to no fear,

    And safety is the master there.

    For its people it is a decorated shield,

    Its wonders being plain to see.

 

    As I was tired out with walking and pale with care, I was glad to get there. With my changed circumstances, I had no idea where to go. Passing by a tailor in his shop, I greeted him and he returned my greeting and welcomed me with cheerful friendliness. When he asked me why I had left my own country, I told him what had happened to me from beginning to end. He was sorry for me and said: `Young man, don't tell anyone about yourself, as I am afraid lest the king of this city might do you some harm as he is one of your father's greatest enemies and has a blood feud with him.' He then produced food and drink and he and I ate together. I chatted with him that night and he gave me a place to myself at the side of his shop and fetched me what I needed in the way of bedding and blankets.

 

    I stayed with him for three days, and he then asked: `Do you know any craft by which to make your living?' I told him: `I am a lawyer, a scientist, a scribe, a mathematician and a calligrapher.' `There is no market for that kind of thing here,' he replied. `No one in this city has any knowledge of science or of writing and their only concern is making money.' `By God,' I said, `I know nothing apart from what I have told you.' He said: `Tighten your belt, take an axe and a rope and bring in firewood from the countryside. This will give you a livelihood until God brings you relief, but don't let people know who you are or else you will be killed.' He then brought me an axe and a rope and handed me over to some woodcutters, telling them to look after me. I went out with them and collected wood for a whole day, after which I carried back a load on my head and sold it for half a dinar. With part of this I bought food and the rest I saved.

 

    I went on like this for a year, and then when the year was up, I came out to the countryside one day, as usual, and as I was wandering there alone I found a tree-filled hollow where there was wood aplenty. Going down into the hollow, I came across a thick tree stump and dug round it, removing the soil. My axe then happened to strike against a copper ring and, on clearing away the earth, I discovered a wooden trapdoor, which I opened. Below it appeared a flight of steps, and when I reached the bottom of these, I saw a door, on entering which I saw a most beautiful palace set with pillars. In it I found a girl like a splendid pearl, one to banish from the heart all trace of care, sorrow and distress, while her words would dispel worries and would leave a man, however intelligent and sensible, robbed of his senses. She was of medium height, with rounded breasts and soft cheeks; she was radiant and beautifully formed, with a face shining in the black night of her hair, while the gleam of her mouth was reflected on her breast. She was as the poet said:

 

    Dark-haired and slim-waisted,

    Her buttocks were like sand dunes

    And her figure likes that of a ban tree.

 

There is another verse:

 

    There are four things never before united

    Except to pierce my heart and shed my blood:

    A radiant forehead, hair like night,

    A rosy cheek, and a slim form.

   

    When I looked at her, I praised the Creator for the beauty and loveliness that He had produced in her. She looked at me in turn and asked: `What are you, a human or one of the jinn?' `A human,' I told her, and she asked: `Who brought you to this place where I have been for twenty-five years without ever seeing a fellow human?' I found her speech so sweet that it filled my heart, and I said, `It was my lucky stars that brought me here, my lady, to drive away my cares and sorrows.' Then I told her from beginning to end what had happened to me and she found my plight hard to bear and wept. `I, for my part,' she said, `will now tell you my own story. You must know that I am the daughter of King Iftamus, lord of the Ebony Islands. He had given me in marriage to my cousin, but on my wedding night I was snatched away by an `ifrit named Jirjis, son of Rajmus, the son of the maternal aunt of Iblis. He flew off with me and brought me down into this place, where he fetched everything that was needed ­ clothes, ornaments, fabrics, furniture, food, drink and everything else. He comes once every ten days, sleeps here for the night and then goes on his way, as he took me without the permission of his own people. He has promised me that if I need anything night or day, and if I touch with my hand these two lines inscribed on the inside of this dome, before I take my hand away he shall appear before me. Today is the fourth day since he was here, and so there are six left until he comes again. Would you like to stay with me for five days and you can then leave one day before he returns?' `Yes,' I replied. `How splendid it is when dreams come true!'

 

    This made her glad and, rising to her feet, she took me by the hand and led me through an arched door to a fine, elegant bath. When I saw this, I took off my clothes and she took off hers. After bathing, she stepped out and sat on a bench with me by her side. Then she poured me out wine flavoured with musk and brought food. We ate and talked, until she said: `Sleep, rest, for you are tired.' Forgetting all my troubles, I thanked her and fell asleep. When I woke, I found her massaging my feet. `God bless you,' I said and we sat there talking for a time. `By God,' she said, `I was unhappy, living by myself under the ground, with no one to talk to me for twenty-five years. Praise is to God, Who has sent you to me.' Then she asked me whether I would like some wine, and when I said yes, she went to a cupboard and produced old wine in a sealed flask. She then set out some green branches, took the wine and recited:

 

    Had I known you were coming, I would have spread

    My heart's blood or the pupils of my eyes.

    My cheeks would have been a carpet when we met

    So that you could have walked over my eyelids.

 

    When she had finished these lines, I thanked her; love of her had taken possession of my heart and my cares and sorrows were gone. We sat drinking together until nightfall, and I then passed with her a night the like of which I had never known in my life. When morning came we were still joining delights to delights, and this went on until midday. I was so drunk that I had lost my senses and I got up, swaying right and left, and I said: `Get up, my beauty, and I will bring you out from under the earth and free you from this `ifrit.' She laughed and said: `Be content with what you have and stay silent. Out of every ten days he will have one and nine will be for you.' But drunkenness had got the better of me and I said: `I shall now smash the dome with the inscription; let him come, so that I may kill him, for I am accustomed to killing `ifrits.' On hearing this, she turned pale and exclaimed: `By God, don't do it!' Then she recited:

 

    If there is something that will destroy you,

    Protect yourself from it.

 

She added more lines:

 

    You look for separation, but rein in

    The horse that seeks to head the field.

    Patience, for Time's nature is treacherous,

    And at the end companions part.

 

She finished her poem but, paying no attention to her words of warning, I aimed a violent kick at the dome.

 

Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the thirteenth night, SHE CONTINUED:

 

    I have heard, O auspicious king, that THE SECOND DERVISH SAID TO THE

LADY OF THE HOUSE:

 

    As soon as I had delivered my violent kick, it grew dark; there was thunder and lightning; the earth shook and everything went black. My head cleared immediately and I asked the girl: `What has happened?' `The `ifrit has come,' she said. `Didn't I warn you? By God, you have brought harm on me, but save yourself and escape by the way that you came.' I was so terrified that I forgot my shoes and my axe. Then, when I had climbed up two steps, I turned to look back and I caught sight of a cleft appearing in the earth from which emerged a hideous `ifrit. `Why did you disturb me?' he asked the girl, `and what has happened to you?' `Nothing has happened to me,' she said, `but I was feeling depressed and I wanted to cheer myself by having a drink. So I drank a little, and then I was about to relieve myself, but my head was heavy and I fell against the dome.' `Whore, you are lying,' said the `ifrit, and he looked through the palace, right and left, and caught sight of the shoes and the axe. `These must belong to a man!' he exclaimed. `Who was it who came to you?' `I have only just seen these things,' she said. `You must have brought them with you.' `Nonsense; that doesn't deceive me, you harlot!' he cried.

 

    Then he stripped her naked and stretched her out, fastening her to four pegs. He started to beat her to force her to confess, and as I could not bear to listen to her weeping, I climbed up the staircase, trembling with fear, and when I got to the top I put the trapdoor back in its place and covered it with earth. I bitterly repented what I had done, and I remembered how beautiful the girl was and how this damned `ifrit was torturing her, how she had been there for twenty-five years and what had happened to her because of me. I also thought about my father and his kingdom, and how I had become a woodcutter, and how my cloudless days had darkened. I then recited:

 

    If one day Time afflicts you with disaster,

    Ease and hardship come each in turn.

 

    I walked away and returned to my friend the tailor, whom I found waiting for me in a fever of anxiety. `My heart was with you all last night,' he said, `and I was afraid lest you had fallen victim to a wild beast or something else, but praise be to God that you are safe.' I thanked him for his concern and entered my own quarters, where I started to think over what had happened to me, blaming myself for the impulsiveness that had led me to kick the dome. While I was thinking this over, the tailor came in to tell me that outside there was a Persian shaikh looking for me, who had with him my axe and my shoes. He had taken them to the woodcutters and had told them that, at the call of the muezzin, he had gone out to perform the dawn prayer and had found the shoes when he had got back. As he did not know whose they were, he asked about their owner. `The woodcutters recognized your axe,' said the tailor, `and so told him where you were. He is sitting in my shop and you should go to thank him and take back your axe and your shoes.'

 

    On hearing these words, I turned pale and became distraught. While I was in this state, the floor of my room split open and from it emerged the `Persian', who turned out to be none other than the `ifrit. In spite of the severest of tortures that he had inflicted on the girl, she had made no confession. He had then taken the axe and the shoes and had told her: `As certainly as I am Jirjis of the seed of Iblis, I will fetch the owner of this axe and these shoes.' He then went with his story to the woodcutters, after which he came on to me. Without pausing, he snatched me up and flew off with me into the air, and before I knew what was happening he came down and plunged under the earth. He took me to the palace where I had been before and my eyes brimmed with tears as I saw the girl, staked out naked with the blood pouring from her sides.

 

    The `ifrit took hold of her and said: `Whore, is this your lover?' She looked at me and said: `I don't recognize him and I have never seen him before.' `In spite of this punishment, are you not going to confess?' he asked. She insisted: `I have never seen this man in my life and God's law does not allow me to tell lies against him.' `If you don't know him,' said the `ifrit, `then take this sword and cut off his head.' She took the sword, came to me and stood by my head. I gestured to her with my eyebrows, while tears ran down my cheeks. She understood my gesture and replied with one of her own, as if to say: `You have done all this to us.' I made a sign to say: `Now is the time for forgiveness,' and inwardly I was reciting:

 

    My glance expresses the words that are on my tongue,

    And my love reveals what is concealed within.

    We met as the tears were falling;

    Though I was silent, my eyes spoke of you.

    She gestured and I understood the meaning in her eyes;

    I signed to her with my fingers and she understood.

    Our eyebrows settled the affair between us,

    And we kept silence, but love spoke.

 

When I had finished the poem, the girl threw down the sword and said: `How can I cut off the head of someone whom I do not know and who has done me no harm? My religion does not allow this.' Then she stepped back, and the `ifrit said: `It is not easy for you to kill your lover, and because he spent a night with you, you endure this punishment and do not admit what he did. Like feels pity for like.' Then he turned to me and said: `Young man, I suppose that you too don't recognize her?' I said: `Who is she? I have never seen her before.' `Then take this sword,' he said, `and cut off her head. By this, I shall be sure that you don't know her at all, and I shall then allow you to go free without doing you any harm.' `Yes,' I said, and taking the sword, I advanced eagerly and raised my hand, but the girl gestured to me with her eyebrows: `I did not fail you. Is this the way that you repay me?' I understood her meaning and signed to her with my eyes: `I shall ransom you with my life,' and it was as though our inner tongues were reciting:

 

    How many a lover has used his eyes to tell

    His loved one of the secret that he kept,

    With a glance that said: `I know what happened.'

    How beautiful is the glance! How elegant the expressive eye!

    The one writes with his eyelids;

    The other recites with the pupil of the eye.

 

My eyes filled with tears and I threw away the sword and said: `O powerful `ifrit, great hero, if a woman, defective as she is in understanding and in religious faith, thinks that it is not lawful to cut off my head, how can it be lawful for me to cut off hers when I have not seen her before? I shall never do that even if I have to drain the cup of death.' The `ifrit said: `The two of you know how to pay each other back for favours, but I shall show you the consequence of what you have done.' Then he took the sword and cut off one of the girl's hands, after which he cut off the other. With four blows he cut off her hands and her feet, as I watched, convinced that I was going to die, while she took farewell of me with her eyes. `You are whoring with your eyes,' said the `ifrit, and he struck off her head.

 

    Then he turned to me and said: `Mortal, our code allows us to kill an unfaithful wife. I snatched away this girl on her wedding night when she was twelve years old and she has known no one but me. I used to visit her for one night in every ten in the shape of a Persian. When I was sure that she had betrayed me, I killed her. As for you, I am not certain that you have played me false, but I cannot let you go unscathed, so make a wish.' Lady, I was delighted and asked: `What wish shall I make?' `You can tell me what shape you want me to transform you into,' he said, `that of a dog, an ass or an ape.' I was hoping that he would forgive me and so I said: `By God, if you forgive me, God will forgive you, because you have spared a Muslim who has done you no harm.' I went on to implore him with the greatest humility, and, standing before him, I cried: `I am wronged.' `Don't talk so much,' he said. `I am not far from killing you, but I will give you one chance.' `Forgiveness befits you better, `ifrit,' I said, `so forgive me as the envied forgive the envier.' `How was that?' he asked, AND I REPLIED:

 

    It is said, O `ifrit, that in a certain city there were two men living in two houses joined by a connecting wall. One of these two envied the other and because of this he used the evil eye against him and did all he could to injure him. So far did this envy increase that the envier lost appetite and no longer enjoyed the pleasure of sleep, while the man whom he envied grew more and more prosperous, and the more the envier tried to gain the upper hand, the more the other's prosperity increased and spread. On hearing of his neighbour's envy and of his attempts to injure him, he moved away from the district, leaving the country and saying: `By God, I shall abandon worldly things for his sake.' He settled in another city and bought a piece of land there in which was a well with an old water wheel. On this land he endowed a small mosque for which he bought everything that was needed, and there he devoted himself with all sincerity to the worship of Almighty God. Faqirs and the poor flocked there from every quarter, and his fame spread in that city until eventually his envious neighbour heard how he had prospered and how the leading citizens would go to visit him. So he came to the mosque where the object of his envy gave him a warm welcome and showed him the greatest honour.

 

    The envier then said: `I have something to tell you and this is why I have made the journey to see you. So get up and come with me.' The other did this and, taking the envier's hand, he walked to the farthest end of the mosque. `Tell the faqirs to go to their rooms,' said the envier, `for I can only speak to you in private where no one can hear us.' This the envied did, and the faqirs went to their rooms as they were told. The two then walked on a little until they came to the old well and there the envier pushed his victim into it without anyone knowing. He himself then left the mosque and went on his way, thinking that he had killed his former neighbour.

 

    The well, however, was inhabited by jinn, who caught the falling man and lowered him gently on to the bedrock. They then asked each other whether any of them knew who he was. Most said no, but one of them said: `This is the man who fled from his envier and who settled in this city where he founded this mosque. We have listened with delight to his invocations and to his reading of the Quran. The envier travelled to meet him and by a trick threw him down into our midst. But news of him has reached the king, who is intending to visit him tomorrow on the matter of his daughter.' `What is wrong with his daughter?' asked one of the jinn. `She is possessed by an evil spirit,' replied the other, `for the jinni Marwan ibn Damdam is in love with her. If this man knew how to treat her, he could cure her, for the treatment is the easiest possible.' `What is it?' asked the other. `The black cat that he has with him in the mosque has a white spot as big as a dirham at the end of its tail. If he takes seven of its white hairs and uses them to fumigate the girl, the evil spirit will leave her head and never return and she will be cured there and then.'

 

    The man was listening to all this, and so it was that the next morning, when dawn broke and the faqirs came, they found the shaikh rising out of the well, and as a result he became a figure of awe to them. Since he had no other medicines, he took seven hairs from the white spot at the end of the black cat's tail and carried them away with him. The sun had scarcely risen when the king arrived with his escort and his great officers of state. He told his men to wait and went in to visit the shaikh, who welcomed him warmly and said: `Shall I tell you why you have come to me?' `Please do,' replied the king. The man said: `You have come to visit me in order to ask me about your daughter.' `That is true, good shaikh,' the king agreed. `Send someone to fetch her,' said the man, `and I hope, if God Almighty wills it, that she will be cured immediately.' The king gladly sent for his daughter, who was brought tied up and manacled. The man sat her down and spread a curtain over her, after which he produced the seven cat hairs and used them to fumigate her. The evil spirit that was in her head cried out and left. She then recovered her senses, covered her face and said: `What is all this? Who has brought me here?'

 

    The joy that the king felt was not to be surpassed. He kissed his daughter's eyes and then the hands of the shaikh, after which he turned to his state officials and said: `What do you say? What does the man who cured my daughter deserve?' `He should marry her,' they said. `You are right,' said the king, and he married the man to his daughter, making him his son-in-law. Shortly afterwards, the vizier died and when the king asked who should replace him, the courtiers said: `Your son-in-law.' So he was appointed vizier and when, soon after that, the king himself died and people asked who should be made king, the answer was: `The vizier.' Accordingly he was enthroned and ruled as king.

 

    One day, as he was riding out, the envier happened to be passing by and saw the man he envied in his imperial state among his emirs, viziers and officers of state. The king's eye fell on him and, turning to one of his viziers, he said: `Bring me that man, but do not alarm him.' When his envious neighbour was brought to him, he said: `Give this man a thousand coins of gold from my treasury; load twenty camels for him with trade goods, and send a guard with him to escort him to his land.' Then he took his leave of the man who envied him, turned away from him and did not punish him for what he had done.

 

`See then, `ifrit, how the envied forgave the envious, who had started by envying him, then injured him, followed him, and eventually threw him into the well, intending to kill him. His victim did not pay him back for these injuries but forgave and pardoned him.' At this point, lady, I wept most bitterly before him and recited:

 

    Forgive those who do wrong, for the wise man

    Forgives wrongdoers for their evil deeds.

    If every fault is mine,

    Every forgiveness should be yours.

    Who hopes that his superior will pardon him

    Has to forgive inferiors their faults.

 

    The `ifrit said: `I shall not kill you, but neither shall I forgive you. Instead, I shall cast a spell on you.' Then he plucked me from the ground and flew up into the air with me until I could see the earth looking like a bowl set in the middle of water. He set me down on a mountain and, taking some earth, he muttered over it, cast a spell and scattered it over me, saying: `Leave this shape of yours and become an ape.' Instantly, I became a hundred-year-old ape, and when I saw myself in this ugly form, I wept over my plight, but I had to endure Time's tyranny, knowing that no one is Time's master. After climbing down from the mountain top, I found a wide plain across which I travelled for a month before ending at the shore of the salt sea. I stayed there for some time until suddenly I caught sight of a ship out at sea that was making for the shore with a fair breeze. I hid myself behind a rock and waited until it came by, when I jumped down into it. `Remove this ill-omened beast,' cried one of the merchants on board. `Let's kill it,' said the captain. `I'll do that with this sword,' said another. I clung to the hem of the captain's clothes and wept copious tears.

 

    The captain now felt pity for me and told the merchants: `This ape has taken refuge with me and I have granted it to him. He is now under my protection, so let no one trouble or disturb him.' He then began to treat me with kindness, and as I could understand whatever he said, I did everything that he wanted and acted as his servant on the ship, so that he became fond of me. The ship had a fair wind for fifty days, after which we anchored by a large city, with a vast population. As soon as we had arrived and the ship had anchored, mamluks sent by the local king came on board. They congratulated the merchants on their safe voyage and passed on further congratulations from the king. Then they said: `The king has sent you this scroll of paper, on which each one of you is to write one line. The king's vizier was a calligrapher and as he is now dead, the king has taken the most solemn of oaths that he will only appoint as his successor someone who can write as well as he did.'

 

    The merchants were then handed a scroll which was ten cubits long and one cubit in breadth. Every last one of them, who knew how to write, did so, and then I, in my ape's form, snatched the scroll from their hands. They were afraid that I was going to tear it and they tried to stop me, but I gestured to them to tell them I could write, and the captain signalled to them to leave me alone. `If he makes a mess of it,' he said, `we can drive him away, but if he can write well, I shall take him as a son, for I have never seen a more intelligent ape.' Then I took the pen, dipped it in the inkwell and wrote in the ruka`i script:

 

    Time has recorded the excellence of the generous

    But up till now your excellence has not been written down.

    May God not orphan all mankind of you,

    Who are the mother and father of every excellence.

 

Then I wrote in the raihani script:

 

    He has a pen that serves every land;

    Its benefits are shared by all mankind.

    The Nile cannot rival the loveliness

    That your five fingers extend to every part.

 

Then in the thuluth script I wrote:

 

    The writer perishes but what he writes

    Remains recorded for all time.

    Write only what you will be pleased to see

    When the Day of Resurrection comes.

 

I then wrote in naskh:

 

    When we were told you were about to leave,

    As Time's misfortunes had decreed,

    We brought to the mouths of inkwells with the tongues of pens

    What we complained of in the pain of parting.

 

Then I wrote in tumar script:

 

    No one holds the caliphate for ever:

    If you do not agree, where is the first caliph?

    So plant the shoots of virtuous deeds,

    And when you are deposed, no one will depose them.

    And when you are deposed, no one will depose them.

 

Then I wrote in muhaqqaq script:

 

    Open the inkwell of grandeur and of blessings;

    Make generosity and liberality your ink.

    When you are able, write down what is good;

    This will be taken as your lineage and that of your pen.

 

I then handed over the scroll and, after everyone had written a line, it was taken and presented to the king. When he looked at it, mine was the only script of which he approved and he said to his courtiers: `Go to the one who wrote this, mount him on a mule and let a band play as you bring him here. Then dress him in splendid clothes and bring him to me.' When they heard this, they smiled. The king was angry and exclaimed: `Damn you, I give you an order and you laugh at me!' `There is a reason for our laughter,' they said. `What is it?' he asked. `You order us to bring you the writer, but the fact is that this was written by an ape and not a man, and he is with the captain of the ship,' they told him. `Is this true?' he asked. `Yes, your majesty,' they said.

 

    The king was both amazed and delighted. He said: `I want to buy this ape from the captain,' and he sent a messenger to the ship, with a mule, a suit of clothes and the band. `Dress him in these clothes,' he said, `mount him on the mule and bring him here in a procession.' His men came to the ship, took me from the captain, dressed me and mounted me on the mule. The people were astonished and the city was turned upside down because of me, as the citizens flocked to look at me. When I was brought before the king, I thrice kissed the ground before him, and when he told me to sit, I squatted on my haunches. Those present were astonished at my good manners and the most astonished of all was the king. He then told the people to disperse, which they did, leaving me with him, his eunuch and a young mamluk.

 

    At the king's command, a table was set for me on which was everything that frisks or flies or mates in nests, such as sand grouse, quails, and all other species of birds. The king gestured to me that I should eat with him, so I got up, kissed the ground in front of him and joined him in the meal. Then, when the table cloth was removed, I washed my hands seven times, took the inkwell and the pen, and wrote these lines:

 

    Turn aside with the chickens in the spring camp of the saucers

   And weep for the loss of fritters and the partridges.

    Mourn the daughters of the sandgrouse,

    Whom I do not cease to lament,

    Together with fried chickens and the stew.

    Alas for the two sorts of fish served on a twisted loaf.

    How splendid and how tasty was the roasted meat,

    With fat that sank into the vinegar in the pots.

    Whenever hunger shakes me, I spend the night

    Applying myself to a pie, as bracelets glint.

    I am reminded of this merry meal when I eat

    On tables strewn with various brocades.

    Endure, my soul; Time is the lord of wonders.

    One day is straitened, but the next may bring relief.

I then got up and took my seat some way off. The king looked at what I had written and read it with astonishment. `How marvellous!' he exclaimed. `An ape with such eloquence and a master of calligraphy! By God, this is a wonder of wonders.' Then some special wine was brought in a glass, which he drank before passing it to me. I kissed the ground, drank and then wrote:

 

    They burned me with fire to make me speak,

    But found I could endure misfortune.

    For this reason, hands have lifted me,

    And I kiss the mouths of lovely girls.

 

I added the lines:

 

    Dawn has called out to the darkness, so pour me wine

    That leaves the intelligent as a fool.

    It is so delicate and pure that I cannot tell

    Whether it is in the glass or the glass is in it.

 

    When the king read the lines, he sighed and said: `Were a man as cultured as this, he would surpass all the people of his age.' He then brought out a chessboard and asked whether I would play with him. I nodded yes and came forward to set out the pieces. I played two games with him and beat him, to his bewilderment. Then I took the inkwell and the pen and wrote these lines on the chessboard:

 

    Two armies fight throughout the day,

    The battle growing fiercer every hour,

    But when night's darkness covers them,

    Both sleep together in one bed.

 

    On reading this, the king was moved to wonder, delight and astonishment and told a servant: `Go to your mistress, Sitt al-Husn, and tell her that I want her to come here to see this wonderful ape.' The eunuch went off and came back with the lady. When she saw me, she covered her face and said: `Father, how can you think it proper to send for me in order to show me to men?' `Sitt al-Husn,' he said, `there is no one here except for this little mamluk, the eunuch who brought you up, and I, your father. So from whom are you veiling your face?' She said: `This ape is a young man, the son of a king, who has been put under a spell by the `ifrit Jirjis, of the stock of Iblis, who killed his own wife, the daughter of King Iftamus, the lord of the Ebony Islands. You think that he is an ape, but in fact he is a wise and intelligent man.'

 

    The king was astonished by his daughter and he looked at me and said: `Is what she says about you true?' I nodded yes and broke into tears. `How did you know that he was under a spell?' the king asked his daughter. `When I was young,' she replied, `I had with me a cunning old woman who had knowledge of magic, a craft she passed on to me. I remembered what she taught me and have become so skilled in magic that I know a hundred and seventy spells, the least of which could leave the stones of your city behind Mount Qaf and turn it into a deep sea, with its people swimming as fish in the middle of it.' `By my life, daughter,' said the king, `please free this young man so that I can make him my vizier, for he has wit and intelligence.' `Willingly,' she replied, and taking a knife in her hand, she cut out a circle...

    Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the fourteenth night, 

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