with any thing but an explanation of the affair, I said to her, I see thee to be one of those who take pleasure in singing, and I have a cousin who is more comely than myself in countenance, and of higher rank, and more accomplished manners, and he is most nearly acquainted of all the creatures of God (whose name be exalted !) with Ishak. Upon this she said, Art thou a spunger and dost thou urge an impertinent request? I answered her, Thou art the arbitress of the matter. And she replied, If thy cousin be as thou hast described him, we shall have no dislike to be acquainted with him.-Then the time came, and I arose and went homewards.

But before I arrived at my house, the messengers of El-Ma'mun rushed upon me, and violently bore me away to him. I found him sitting upon a throne, and incensed against me; and he said, O Ishak, hast thou swerved from allegiance ? I answered, No, by Allah, O Prince of the Faithful.-What then is thy story? said he relate the affair to me with truth. So I replied, Well; but in privacy. He therefore made a sign to those who were before him; whereupon they retired; and I told him the story, and said to him, I promised her that thou wouldst pay her a visit. And he said, Thou hast done well. We then occupied ourselves with our usual pleasures that day; but the heart of El-Ma'mun was intent upon the damsel; and scarcely had the appointed time arrived when we departed. I charged him, saying, Refrain from calling me by my name before her ; and be as though thou wert my attendant 43 in her presence. And we agreed on this subject.

We proceeded until we came to the place where the basket had been hung, and we found two baskets: so we seated ourselves in them, and they were drawn up with us to the same place. The damsel then advanced and saluted us; and when El-Ma'mun beheld her, he was astonished at her beauty and loveliness. She began to relate stories to him, and to recite verses, and afterwards caused the wine to be brought, and we drank; she making him the object of her particular favour, and rejoicing in his society, and he shewing the same favour to her, and alike delighted with her. And she took the lute, and sang these verses 44:

The beloved visited me towards the close of night. I stood, to shew him honour, until he sat down.

I said, O my intimate, and all my desire, hast thou come this night and not feared the watch?

He answered, The love-smitten feared; but his desire had forcibly deprived him of his reason.

She then said to me, And is thy cousin of the pointed towards El-Ma'mun. I answered, Yes. ye nearly resemble each other. I replied, Yes.

merchants? And she And she said, Verily

And when El-Ma'mun had drunk three pints, being_moved with joy and merriment, he called out and said, O Ishak ! I replied, At thy service, O Prince of the Faithful.-Sing, said he, this air. And when the damsel discovered that he was the Khalifeh, she retired into another apartment. So after I had finished my song, El-Ma'mun said to me, See who is the master of this house. Whereupon an old woman

quickly answered and said, It belongeth to El-Hasan the son of Sahl. And he said, Bring him hither unto me. The old woman, therefore, was absent for a short time, and, lo, El-Hasan came in. El-Ma'mun said to him, Hast thou a daughter? He answered, Yes: her name is Khadijeh.*-Is she married? said the Khalifeh. El-Hasan answered, No, by Allah. Then, said El-Ma'mun, I demand her of thee as my wife. El-Hasan replied, She is thy handmaiden, and at thy disposal, O Prince of the Faithful. And the Khalifeh said, I marry her on the condition of paying in ready money, as her dowry, thirty thousand pieces of gold, which shall be brought to thee this next morning: so, after thou shalt have received the money, do thou convey her to us in the following night. He replied, I hear and obey. We then went forth; and he said, O Ishak, tell not this story to any one. I therefore kept it a secret until El-Ma'mun died.

Never have such pleasures altogether fallen to the lot of any one, as those which I enjoyed during these four days, keeping company with El-Ma'mun by day, and with Khadijeh by night. By Allah, I have seen no one among men like El-Maʼmun, and I have not beheld among women the like of Khadijeh, nor any who approached her in intelligence and sense and elocution.-And God is all-knowing.†

* Her true name, or that by which she was generally known, was Buran.

+ Some Arab authors have, not without reason, pronounced this anecdote an invention of Ishak. It is well known that El-Ma'mun married the daughter of his Wezir El-Hasan the son of Sahl; but that he became acquainted with her in the manner above described is highly improbable. The marriage took place at Fem es-Silh, on the bank of the Tigris, near Wasit, and was celebrated with a magnificence scarcely credible.

CHAPTER XII*

THE STORY OF ABU-L-HASAN THE WAG, OR THE SLEEPER AWAKENED 45

THERE was a merchant in Baghdad, in the reign of the Khalifeh Harun Er-Rashid, and he had a son named Abu-lHasan the Wag. 46 And this merchant died, leaving to his son vast wealth: whereupon Abu-l-Hasan divided his property into two equal portions, one of which he laid aside, and of the other he expended. He took as his familiar friends a number of the sons of the merchants, and others, and gave himself up to the delights of good drinking and good eating, until all the wealth that he had appropriated to this purpose was consumed. And upon this he repaired to his associates and relations and boon-companions, and exposed to them his case, shewing them how little property remained in his possession; but none of them paid any regard to him, or uttered a word in reply. So he returned to his mother, with a broken heart, and told her of the treatment that he had experienced from his associates, that they would neither do him justice nor even reply to him. But she said, O Abu-l-Hasan, thus are the sons of this age: as long as thou hast any thing, they draw thee near to them; and when thou hast nothing, they cast thee off. She was grieved for him, and he sighed and wept.

He then sprang up, and went to the place in which was deposited the other half of his wealth, and upon this he lived agreeably. He took an oath that he would not thenceforth associate with any one of those whom he knew, but only with the stranger, and that he would not associate with any person but for one night, and on the following morning would not recognise him. Accordingly, every night, he went forth

*The Nights are not numbered in this story, as it does not occur in the Cairo Text, but is inserted from that of Breslau (Nts. 271-290).

and seated himself on the bridge, and when a stranger passed by him, he invited him to an entertainment, and took him to his house, where he caroused with him that night, until the morning: he then dismissed him; and after that, he would not salute him if he saw him.

Thus he continued to do for a whole year; after which, as he was sitting one day upon the bridge as usual, to see who might come towards him, Er-Rashid and certain of his domestics passed by in disguise; for the Khalifeh had experienced a contraction of the bosom, and come forth to amuse himself among the people. So Abu-l-Hasan laid hold upon him, and said to him, O my master, hast thou any desire for a repast and beverage? And Er-Rashid complied with his request, saying to him, Conduct us. And Abu-lHasan knew not who was his guest. The Khalifeh proceeded with him until they arrived at Abu-l-Hasan's house : and when Er-Rashid entered, he found in it a saloon, such that if thou beheldest it, and lookedst towards its walls, thou wouldst behold wonders; and if thou observedst its conduits of water, thou wouldst see a fountain encased with gold. And after he had seated himself there, Abu-l-Hasan called for a slave-girl, like a twig of the Oriental willow, who took a lute, and extemporized and sang these verses :—

O thou who ever dwellest in my heart, while thy person is distant from my sight!

Thou art my soul; though I see it not, it is nearer to me than any thing beside.

And when Er-Rashid heard these verses, he said to her, Thou hast performed well. God bless thee !-Her eloquence pleased him, and he wondered at Abu-l-Hasan and his entertainment.

He then said to Abu-l-Hasan, O young man, who art thou? Acquaint me with thy history, that I may requite thee for thy kindness.—But Abu-l-Hasan smiled, and replied, O my master, far be it from me that what hath happened should recur, and that I should be in thy company again after this time !—And why so? said the Khalifeh, and why wilt thou not acquaint me with thy case ?-So Abu-l-Hasan told him his story, and when the Khalifeh heard it, he laughed violently, and said, By Allah, O my brother, thou

47

art excusable in this matter. Then a dish of roast goose was placed before him, and a cake of fine bread; and Abu-lHasan sat, and cut off the meat, and put morsels into the mouth of the Khalifeh, and they continued eating until they were satisfied; when the basin and ewer were brought, with the potash ;* and they washed their hands. After this, Abu1-Hasan lighted for his guest three candles and three lamps, spread the wine-cloth, and brought clear, strained, old, perfumed wine, the odour of which was like fragrant musk, and, having filled the first cup, said, O my boon-companion, bashfulness is dismissed from us, with thy permission. Thy slave is by thee, may I never be afflicted by the loss of thee! -And he drank the cup, and filled the second, which he handed to the Khalifeh, waiting upon him as a servant. And the Khalifeh was pleased with his actions, and the politeness of his words, and said within himself, By Allah, I will certainly requite him for this! Abu-l-Hasan then, after he had kissed the cup, handed it to the Khalifeh, who accepted it from his hand, kissed it and drank it, and handed it back to him. Abu-l-Hasan still continued serving him. He filled and drank, and filled again and handed the cup to the Khalifeh, after he had kissed it three times, reciting these

verses :

Thy presence with us is an honour, and we confess it to be so ; And if thou absent thyself from us, we have none to fill thy place. Drink, he added, and may it be attended with health and vigour. And they drank and caroused until midnight.

After this, the Khalifeh said to his host, O Abu-l-Hasan, is there any service that thou wouldst have performed, or any desire that thou wouldst have accomplished? And Abu-lHasan answered, In our neighbourhood is a mosque, to which belong an Imam and four sheykhs, and whenever they hear music or any sport, they incite the Wali against me, and impose fines upon me, and trouble my life, so that I suffer torment from them. If I had them in my power, therefore, I would give each of them a thousand lashes, that I might be relieved from their excessive annoyance.

*The most common substitute for soap, besides potash, is dukak, lupin meal.