Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 5.djvu/260

228 and at its head a tablet of white marble, whereon were graven the following verses:

The Amir and his companions wept; then, drawing near unto the pavilion, they saw that it had eight doors of sandal-wood, studded with nails of gold and stars of silver and inlaid with all manner precious stones. On the first door were written these verses:

That which I left, I left it not of generous purpose; nay, But fate and fortune fore-ordained still o’er mankind bear sway. What while content and prosperous I was, my hoarding-place, Even was a raging lion fierce, I did defend alway. Ne’er was I still and of my good so niggard, not a grain Of mustard-seed, though I were cast on fire, I gave away, Till, of the fore-ordained decree of God, the Lord of Might, The Maker and the Fashioner, I stricken was one day. Death, sudden, irrevocable, in haste upon me came: I could not ward it with my store, nor eke the vast array Of troops I gathered neath my hand availed me any jot; Nor friend nor neighbour aided me the feet of fate to stay. All my life’s days, or if it were in solace or in stress, Still in my journey to the grave I toiled and wearied aye. I fared the road that all must fare, till, when the money-bags Are full, though dinar, without cease, to dinar thou shouldst lay,