Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 1.djvu/91

73 for my right hire is scarce two dirhems; but of a truth my heart and soul are taken up with you and how it is that ye are alone and have no man with you and no one to divert you, although ye know that women’s sport is little worth without men, nor is an entertainment complete without four at the table, and ye have no fourth. What says the poet?

And ye are three and need a fourth, who should be a man, witty, sensible and discreet, one who can keep counsel.’ When they heard what he said, it amused them and they laughed at him and replied, ‘What have we to do with that, we who are girls and fear to entrust our secrets to those who will not keep them? For we have read, in such and such a history, what says Ibn eth Thumam:

Or, as well says Abou Nuwas on the same subject:

‘By your lives,’ rejoined the porter, ‘I am a man of sense and discretion, well read in books and chronicles. I make known what is fair and conceal what is foul, and as says the poet: