Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 4.djvu/329

299 ABOU SUWEID AND THE HANDSOME OLD WOMAN.

(Quoth Abou Suweid), I entered a garden one day, I and a company of my friends, to buy somewhat of fruit; and we saw, in a corner of the place, an old woman, who was bright of face, but her hair was white, and she was combing it with a comb of ivory. We stopped before her, but she paid no heed to us neither veiled her face. So I said to her, “O old woman, wert thou to dye thy hair black, thou wouldst be handsomer than a girl. What hinders thee from this?” She raised her head and looking at me with great eyes, recited the following verses:

“By Allah,” cried I, “bravo to thee for an old woman! How sincere art thou in thy yearning remembrance of sin and how false in thy presence of repentance from forbidden things!” THE AMIR ALI BEN TAHIR AND THE GIRL MOUNIS.

There was once shown to the Amir Ali ben Mohammed ben Abdallah ben Tahir a slave-girl, who was excellently handsome and well-bred and an accomplished poetess; and he asked her of her name. ‘May God advance the Amir,’ replied she, ‘my name is Mounis.’ Now he knew this before; so he bowed his head awhile, then raising his eyes to her, recited the following verse: