Page:Tales from the Gulistan (1928).pdf/213

Story CXLIII

having in the days of my youth passed through a street, intending to see a moon-faced [beauty]. It was in Temûz, whose heat dried up the saliva in the mouth, and whose Simûm boiled the marrow in my bones. My weak human nature being unable to endure the scorching sun, I took refuge in the shadow of a wall, wishing someone might relieve me from the summer heat, and quench my fire with some water; and lo! all of a sudden, from the darkness of the porch of a house, a light shone forth, namely a beauty, the grace of which the tongue of eloquence is unable to describe. She came out like the rising dawn after an obscure night, or the water of immortality gushing from a dark cavern, carrying in her hand a bowl of snow-water, into which sugar had been poured, and essence of roses mixed. I knew not whether she had perfumed it with rose-water, or whether a few drops from her rosy face had fallen into it. In short, I took the beverage from her beautiful hands, drank it, and began to live again.

Blessed is the man of happy destiny whose eye alights every morning on such a countenance. One drunk of wine awakens at midnight; one drunk of the cup-bearer on the morn of resurrection.