The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, vol 4 - Sir Richard Francis Burton (robert munsch read aloud txt) 📗

Of the bright bracelets that those fair hands wore; Again remembrance glads my sense With visions of its excellence!

Again I see the cloth unrolled Rich worked in many a varied fold!

Be patient, oh! my soul, they say Fortune rules all that’s new and strange, And though she pinches us to day, Tomorrow brings full rations, and a change!’[FN#337]

Then said Jubayr, ‘Put forth thy hand to our food and ease our heart by eating of our victual.’ Answered I, ‘By Allah, I will not eat a mouthful, till thou grant me my desire.’ He asked, ‘What is thy desire?’; so I brought out the letter and gave it to him; but, when he had read it and mastered its contents, he tore it in pieces and throwing it on the floor, said to me, ‘O Ibn Mansur, I will grant thee whatever thou askest save thy desire which concerneth the writer of this letter, for I have no answer to her.’ At this I rose in anger; but he caught hold of my skirts, saying, ‘O Ibn Mansur, I will tell thee what she said to thee, albeit I was not present with you.’ I asked, ‘And what did she say to me?’; and he answered, ‘Did not the writer of this letter say to thee, If thou bring me back an answer, thou shalt have of me five hundred ducats; and if not, an hundred for thy pains?’ ‘Yes,’ replied I; and he rejoined, ‘Abide with me this day and eat and drink and enjoy thyself and make merry, and thou shalt have thy five hundred ducats.’ So I sat with him and ate and drank and made merry and enjoyed myself and entertained him with talk deep in to the night;[FN#338] after which I said to him, ‘O my master, is there no music in thy house.’ He answered, ‘Verily for many a day we have drunk without music.’ Then he called out, saying, ‘Ho, Shajarat al-Durr?’ Whereupon a slave-girl answered him from her chamber and came in to us, with a lute of Hindu make, wrapped in a silken bag. And she sat down and, laying the lute in her lap, preluded in one and twenty modes; then, returning to the first, she sang to a lively measure these couplets,

‘We have ne’er tasted of Love’s sweets and bitter draught, No difference kens ‘twixt presence-bliss and absence-stress; And so, who hath declined from Love’s true road, No diference kens ‘twixt smooth and ruggedness: I ceased not to oppose the votaries of love, Till I had tried its sweets and bitters not the less: How many a night my pretty friend conversed with me And sipped I from his lips honey of love liesse: Now have I drunk its cup of bitterness, until * To bondman and to freedman I have proved me base.

How short-aged was the night together we enjoyed, * When seemed it daybreak came on nightfall’s heel to press!

But Fate had vowed to disunite us lovers twain, * And she too well hath kept her vow, that votaress.

Fate so decreed it! None her sentence can withstand: * Where is the wight who dares oppose his Lord’s command?’

Hardly had she finished her verses, when her lord cried out with a great cry and fell down in a fit; whereupon exclaimed the damsel, ‘May Allah not punish thee, O old man! This long time have we drunk without music, for fear the like of this falling sickness befal our lord. But now go thou to yonder chamber and there sleep.’ So I went to the chamber which she showed me and slept till the morning, when behold, a page brought me a purse of five hundred dinars and said to me, ‘This is what my master promised thee; but return thou not to the damsel who sent thee, god let it be as though neither thou nor we had ever heard of this matter.’ ‘Hearkening and obedience,’ answered I and taking the purse, went my way. Still I said to myself, ‘The lady must have expected me since yesterday; and by Allah there is no help but I return to her and tell her what passed between me and him: otherwise she will revile me and revile all who come from my country.’ So I went to her and found her standing behind the door; and when she saw me she said, ‘O Ibn Mansur, thou hast done nothing for me?’ I asked, ‘Who told thee of this?’; and she answered, ‘O Ibn Mansur, yet another thing hath been revealed to me;[FN#339] and it is that, when thou handedst him the letter, he tore it in pieces. and throwing it on the floor, said to thee: ‘O

Ibn Mansur, I will grant thee whatever thou askest save thy desire which concerneth the writer of this letter; for I have no answer to her missive.’ Then didst thou rise from beside him in anger; but he laid hold of thy skirts, saying: ‘O son of Mansur, abide with me to day, for thou art my guest, and eat and drink and make merry; and thou shalt have thy five hundred ducats.’ So thou didst sit with him, eating and drinking and making merry, and entertainedst him with talk deep into the night and a slave-girl sang such an air and such verses, whereupon he fell down in a fit.’ So, O Commander of the Faithful, I asked her ‘West thou then with us?’; and she answered, ‘O Ibn Mansur, hast thou not heard the saying of the poet,

‘The hearts of lovers have eyes I ken, * Which see the unseen by vulgar men.’

However, O Ibn Mansur, the night and day shift not upon anything but they bring to it change.’—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

When it was the Three Hundred and Thirty-first Night, She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the lady exclaimed, ‘O Ibn Mansur, the night and the day shift not upon anything but they bring to it change!’ Then she raised her glance to heaven and said, ‘O my God and my Leader and my Lord, like as Thou hast afflicted me with love of Jubayr bin Umayr, even so do Thou afflict him with love of me, and transfer the passion from my heart to his heart!’[FN#340] Then she gave me an hundred sequins for my trouble in going and coming and I took it and returned to the palace, where I found the Sultan come home from the chase; so I got my pension of him and fared back to Baghdad.

And when next year came, I repaired to Bassorah, as usual, to seek my pension, and the Sultan paid it to me; but, as I was about to return to Baghdad, I bethought me of the Lady Budur and said to myself, ‘By Allah, I must needs go to her and see what hath befallen between her and her lover!’ So I went to her house and finding the street before her door swept and sprinkled and eunuchs and servants and pages standing before the entrance, said to myself, ‘Most like grief hath broken the lady’s heart and she is dead, and some Emir or other hath taken up his abode in her house.’ So I left it and went on to the house of Jubayr, son of Umayr the Shaybani, where I found the benches of the porch broken down and ne’er a page at the door, as of wont and said to myself, ‘Haply he too is dead.’ Then I stood still before the door of his house and with my eyes running over with tears, bemoaned it in these couplets,

‘O Lords of me, who fared but whom my heart e’er followeth, *

Return and so my festal-days with you shall be renewed!

I stand before the home of you, bewailing your abode; Quiver mine eyelids and my eyes with tears are ever dewed: I ask the house and its remains that seem to weep and wail,

‘Where is the man who whilom wont to lavish goods and good?”

It saith, ‘Go, wend thy way; those friends like travellers have fared * From Springtide-camp, and buried lie of earth and worms the food!’

Allah ne’er desolate us so we lose their virtues’ light * In length and breadth, but ever be the light in spirit viewed!’

As I, O Prince of True Believers, was thus keening over the folk of the house,[FN#341] behold, out came a black slave therefrom and said to me, ‘Hold thy peace, O Shaykh! May thy mother be reft of thee! Why do I see thee bemoaning the house in this wise?’

Quoth I, ‘I frequented it of yore, when it belonged to a good friend of mine.’ Asked the slave, ‘What was his name?’; and I answered, ‘Jubayr bin Umayr the Shaybani.’ Rejoined he, And what hath befallen him? Praised be Allah, he is yet here with us in the enjoyment of property and rank and prosperity, except that Allah hath stricken him with love of a damsel called the Lady Budur;, and he is so whelmed by his love of her and his longing for her, that he is like a great rock cumbering the ground. If he hunger, he saith not, ‘Give me meat;’ nor, if he thirst, doth he say, ‘Give me drink.’ Quoth I, ‘Ask leave for me to go in to him.’ Said the slave, ‘O my lord, wilt thou go in to one who understandeth or to one who understandeth not?’; and I said ‘There is no help for it but I see him whatever be the case.’

Accordingly he went in to ask and presently returned with permission for me to enter, whereupon I went in to Jubayr and found him like a rock that cumbereth the ground, understanding neither sign nor speech; and when I spoke to him he answered me not. Then said one of his servants, ‘O my lord, if thou remember aught of verse, repeat it and raise thy voice; and he will be aroused by this and speak with thee.’ So I versified in these two couplets,

‘Hast quit the love of Moons[FN#342] or dost persist? * Dost wake o’ nights or close in sleep thine eyes?

If aye thy tears in torrents flow, then learn * Eternal-thou shalt dwell in Paradise.’[FN#343]

When he heard these verses he opened his eyes and said; ‘Welcome, O son of Mansur! Verily, the jest is become earnest.’ Quoth I, ‘O

my lord, is there aught thou wouldst have me do for thee?’

Answered he, ‘Yes, I would fain write her a letter and send it to her by thee. If thou bring me back her answer, thou shalt have of me a thousand dinars; and if not, two hundred for thy pains.’ So I said, ‘Do what seemeth good to thee;’—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased saying her permitted say.

When it was the Three Hundred and Thirty-second Night, She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that Ibn Mansur continued: “So I said, ‘Do what seemeth good to thee;’ whereupon he called to one of his slave-girls, ‘Bring me ink case and paper;’ and wrote these couplets,

‘I pray in Allah’s name, O Princess mine, be light * On me, for Love hath robbed me of my reason’s sight’

‘Slaved me this longing and enthralled me love of you; * And clad in sickness garb, a poor and abject wight.

I wont ere this to think small things of Love and hold, * O

Princess mine, ‘twas silly thing and over-slight.

But when it showed me swelling