Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 2.djvu/266

233 vase full of wine, with a goblet of crystal, sprayed with gold. Near these was a great covered dish of silver, which I uncovered and found therein fruits of all kinds, figs and pomegranates and grapes and oranges and citrons and shaddocks, together with all manner sweet-scented flowers, such as roses and jasmine and myrtle and eglantine and narcissus and all kinds of sweet-smelling herbs; but I saw there not a living soul, no, not even a slave, male or female, to guard these things. I was transported with delight at what I saw, and my grief and anxiety ceased from me. So I sat down to await the coming of the beloved of my heart: but the first hour of the night passed by, and the second and the third, and still she came not. Then I grew sore an hungred, for that it was long since I had tasted food by reason of the violence of my passion: but when I found the garden even as my cousin had told me and saw the truth of her interpretation of my mistress’s signs, my mind was set at rest and I made sure of attaining my desire, so that nature resumed its sway and I felt the pangs of hunger. Moreover the odour of the viands on the table excited in me a longing to eat: so I went up to the table, and lifting the cover, found in the middle a porcelain dish, containing four fricasseed fowls, seasoned with spices, round which were four smaller dishes, one containing sweetmeats, another conserve of pomegranate-seeds, a third almond patties and a fourth honey fritters, and the contents of these dishes were part sweet and part acid. So I ate of the fritters and a piece of meat, then went on to the almond patties and ate what I would of them; after which I attacked the sweetmeats, of which I ate a spoonful or two or three or four, ending with part of a fowl and a mouthful of bread. With this my stomach became full and my limbs heavy and I grew drowsy; so I laid my head on a cushion, after having washed my hands, and sleep overcame me; and I knew