The Book Of The Thousand Nights And A Night, Vol 1 Page-109

The Book Of The Thousand Nights And A Night, Vol 1

A plain and literal translation of the arabian nights entertainments

command that we strike off their heads?”; but she answered, “Leave them awhile that I question them of their condition, before their necks feel the sword.” “By Allah, O my lady!” cried the Porter, “slay me not for other’s sin; all these men offended and deserve the penalty of crime save myself. Now by Allah, our night had been charming had we escaped the mortification of those monocular Kalandars whose entrance into a populous city would convert it into a howling wilderness.” Then he repeated these verses : “How fair is ruth the strong man deigns not smother! And fairest fair when shown to weakest brother: By Love’s own holy tie between us twain, Let one not suffer for the sin of other.” When the Porter ended his verse the lady laughed And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say. When It was the Eleventh Night, She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the lady, after laughing at the Porter despite her wrath, came up to the party and spake thus, “Tell me who ye be, for ye have but an hour of life; and were ye not men of rank and, perhaps, notables of your tribes, you had not been so froward and I had hastened your doom.” Then said the Caliph, “Woe to thee, O Ja’afar, tell her who we are lest we be slain by mistake; and speak her fair be fore some horror befal us.” “‘Tis part of thy deserts,“replied he; whereupon the Caliph cried out at him saying, “There is a time for witty words and there is a time for serious work.” Then the lady accosted the three Kalandars and asked them, “Are ye brothers?”; when they answered, “No, by Allah, we be naught but Fakirs and foreigners.” Then quoth she to one among them, “West thou born blind of one eye?”; and quoth he, “No, by Allah, ‘twas a marvellous matter and a wondrous mischance which caused my eye to be torn out, and mine is a tale which, if it were written upon the eye corners with needle gravers, were a warner to whoso would be warned.”[FN#188] She questioned the second and third Kalandar; but all replied like the first, “By Allah, O our mistress, each one of us cometh from a different country, and we are all three the sons of Kings, sovereign Princes ruling over suzerains and capital cities.” Thereupon she turned