The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, vol 8 - Sir Richard Francis Burton (best e reader for epub .TXT) 📗

day and night over plain and desert site and valley and stony heights through noontide glare and dawn’s soft light; and Allah decreed them safety, so that they reached Bassorah-city without hindrance and made their camels kneel at the door of his house. Hasan then dismissed the dromedaries and, going up to the door to open it, heard his mother weeping and in a faint strain, from a heart worn with parting-pain and on fire with consuming bane, reciting these couplets,

 

“How shall he taste of sleep who lacks repose * Who wakes a-night when all in slumber wone?

He owned wealth and family and fame * Yet fared from house and home an exile lone:

Live coal beneath his[FN#80] ribs he bears for bane, And mighty longing, mightier ne’er was known: Passion hath seized him, Passion mastered him; Yet is he constant while he maketh moan:

His case for Love proclaimeth aye that he, * (As prove his tears) is wretched, woebegone.”

 

When Hasan heard his mother weeping and wailing he wept also and knocked at the door a loud knock. Quoth she, “Who is at the door?”; and quoth he, “Open!” Whereupon she opened the door and knowing him at first sight fell down in a fainting fit; but he ceased not to tend her till she came to herself, when he embraced her and she embraced him and kissed him, whilst his wife looked on mother and son. Then he carried his goods and gear into the house, whilst his mother, for that her heart was comforted and Allah had reunited her with her son versified with these couplets,

 

“Fortune had ruth upon my plight * Pitied my long long bane and blight;

Gave me what I would liefest sight; * And set me free from all afright.

So pardon I the sin that sin * n�d she in days evanisht quite; E’en to the sin she sinned when she * Bleached my hair-parting silvern white.”

 

—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

 

When it was the Seven Hundred and Ninety-third Night, She pursued, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that Hasan with his mother then sat talking and she asked him, “How faredst thou, O my son, with the Persian?” whereto he answered, “O my mother, he was no Persian, but a Magian, who worshipped the fire, not the All-powerful Sire.” Then he told her how he dealt with him, in that he had journeyed with him to the Mountain of Clouds and sewed him up in the camel’s skin, and how the vultures had taken him up and set him down on the summit and what he had seen there of dead folk, whom the Magian had deluded and left to die on the crest after they had done his desire. And he told her how he had cast himself from the mountaintop into the sea and Allah the Most High had preserved him and brought him to the palace of the seven Princesses and how the youngest of them had taken him to brother and he had sojourned with them till the Almighty brought the Magian to the place where he was and he slew him.

Moreover, he told her of his passion for the King’s daughter and how he had made prize of her and of his seeing her[FN#81] in sleep and all else that had befallen him up to the time when Allah vouchsafed them reunion. She wondered at his story and praised the Lord who had restored him to her in health and safety. Then she arose and examined the baggage and loads and questioned him of them. So he told her what was in them, whereat she joyed with exceeding joy. Then she went up to the King’s daughter, to talk with her and bear her company; but, when her eyes fell on her, her wits were confounded at her brilliancy and she rejoiced and marvelled at her beauty and loveliness and symmetry and perfect grace: and she sat down beside her, cheering her and comforting her heart while she never ceased to repeat “Alhamdolillah, O my son, for thy return to me safe and sound!”

Next morning early she went down into the market and bought mighty fine furniture and ten suits of the richest raiment in the city, and clad the young wife and adorned her with everything seemiy. Then said she to Hasan, “O my son, we cannot tarry in this town with all this wealth; for thou knowest that we are poor folk and the people will suspect us of practising alchemy. So come, let us depart to Baghdad, the House[FN#82] of Peace, where we may dwell in the Caliph’s Sanctuary, and thou shalt sit in a shop to buy and sell, in the fear of Allah (to whom belong Might and Majesty!) and He shall open to thee the door of blessings with this wealth.” Hasan approved her counsel and going forth straightway, sold the house and summoned the dromedaries, which he loaded with all his goods and gear, together with his mother and wife. Then he went down to the Tigris, where he hired him a craft to carry them to Baghdad and embarked therein all his possessions and his mother and wife. They sailed up the river with a fair wind for ten days till they drew in sight of Baghdad, at which they all rejoiced, and the ship landed them in the city, where without stay or delay Hasan hired a storehouse in one of the caravanserais and transported his goods thither. He lodged that night in the Khan, and on the morrow he changed his clothes and going down into the city, enquired for a broker. The folk directed him to one, and when the broker saw him, he asked him what he lacked. Quoth he, “I want a house, a handsome one and a spacious.” So the broker showed him the houses at his disposal and he chose one that belonged to one of the Wazirs and buying it of him for an hundred thousand golden dinars, gave him the price.

Then he returned to his caravanserai and removed all his goods and monies to the house; after which he went down to the market and bought all the mansion needed of vessels and carpets and other household stuff, besides servants and eunuchs, including a little black boy for the house. He abode with his wife in all solace and delight of life three years, during which time he was vouchsafed by her two sons, one of whom he named N�sir and the other Mans�r: but, at the end of this time he bethought him of his sisters, the Princesses, and called to mind all their goodness to him and how they had helped him to his desire. So he longed after them and going out to the marketstreets of the city, bought trinkets and costly stuffs and fruit-confections, such as they had never seen or known. His mother asked him the reason of his buying these rarities and he answered, “I purpose to visit my sisters, who showed me every kind of kindness and all the wealth that I at present enjoy is due to their goodness and munificence: wherefore I will journey to them and return soon, Inshallah!”

Quoth she, “O my son, be not long absent from me;” and quoth he, “Know, O my mother, how thou shalt do with my wife. Here is her feather-dress in a chest, buried under ground in such a place; do thou watch over it, lest haply she hap on it and take it, for she would fly away, she and her children, and I should never hear of them again and should die of grieving for them; wherefore take heed, O my mother, while I warn thee that thou name this not to her. Thou must know that she is the daughter of a King of the Jinn, than whom there is not a greater among the Sovrans of the Jann nor a richer in troops and treasure, and she is mistress of her people and dearest to her father of all he hath. Moreover, she is passing high-spirited, so do thou serve her thyself and suffer her not to go forth the door neither look out of window nor over the wall, for I fear the air for her when it bloweth,[FN#83] and if aught befel her of the calamities of this world, I should slay myself for her sake.” She replied, “O my son, I take refuge with Allah[FN#84] from gainsaying thee! Am I mad that thou shouldst lay this charge on me and I disobey thee therein? Depart, O my son, with heart at ease, and please Allah, soon thou shalt return in safety and see her and she shall tell thee how I have dealt with her: but tarry not, O my son, beyond the time of travel.”—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

 

When it was the Seven Hundred and Ninety-fourth Night, She resumed, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that when Hasan had determined to visit the Princesses, he gave his mother the orders we have mentioned.[FN#85] Now, as Fate would have it, his wife heard what he said to his mother and neither of them knew it. Then Hasan went without the city and beat the kettledrum, whereupon up came the dromedaries and he loaded twenty of them with rarities of Al-Irak; after which he returned to his mother and repeated his charge to her and took leave of her and his wife and children, one of whom was a yearling babe and the other two years old. Then he mounted and fared on, without stopping night or day, over hills and valleys and plains and wastes for a term of ten days till, on the eleventh, he reached the palace and went in to his sisters, with the gifts he had brought them. The Princesses rejoiced at his sight and gave him joy of his safety, whilst his sister decorated the palace within and without. Then they took the presents and, lodging him in a chamber as before, asked him of his mother and his wife, and he told them that she had borne him two sons. And the youngest Princess, seeing him well and in good case, joyed with exceeding joy and repeated this couplet,

 

“I ever ask for news of you from whatso breezes pass * And never any but yourselves can pass across my mind.”

 

Then he abode with them in all honour and hospitality, for three months, spending his time in feasting and merrymaking, joy and delight, hunting and sporting. So fared it with him; but as regards his wife, she abode with his mother two days after her husband’s departure, and on the third day, she said to her, “Glory be to God! Have I lived with him three years and shall I never go to the bath?” Then she wept and Hasan’s mother had pity on her condition and said to her, “O my daughter, here we are strangers and thy husband is abroad. Were he at home, he would serve thee himself, but, as for me, I know no one. However, O my daughter, I will heat thee water and wash thy head in the Hammam-bath which is in the house.” Answered the King’s daughter, “O my lady, hadst thou spoken thus to one of the slavegirls, she had demanded to be sold in the Sultan’s open market and had not abode with thee.[FN#86] Men are excusable, because they are jealous and their reason telleth them that, if a woman go forth the house, haply she will do frowardness. But women, O my lady, are not all equal and alike and thou knowest that, if woman have a