Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 5.djvu/31

13 and they both betook themselves to rendering thanks to God (to whom belong might and majesty) for that which He had vouchsafed them of the reunion of their loves; but the brother and the thief and the villager’s wife began to implore her forgiveness. So she forgave them, and they all worshipped God in that place, and were assiduous in her service, till Death sundered them. THE SHIPWRECKED WOMAN AND HER CHILD.

(Quoth one of the Seyyids ), [sic] I was going round about the Kaabeh one dark night, when I heard a plaintive voice, speaking from a contrite heart and saying, ‘O Bountiful One, Thy past favours! Indeed, my heart is constant to the covenant.’ When I heard this, my heart fluttered, so that I was nigh upon death, but I followed the voice and found that it came from a woman, to whom I said, ‘Peace be on thee, O handmaid of God!’ ‘And on thee be peace,’ answered she, ‘and the mercy of God and His blessings!’ Quoth I, ‘I conjure thee, by the Most Great God, tell me what is the covenant to which thy heart is constant.’ ‘But that thou adjurest me by the Almighty,’ replied she, ‘I would not tell thee my secret. See what is before me.’ So I looked and saw a child lying asleep before her and breathing heavily in his slumber. ‘Know,’ said she, ‘that I set forth, being big with this child, to make the pilgrimage to this [Holy] House and took passage in a ship; but the waves rose against us and the winds were contrary and the ship broke up under us. I saved myself on a plank, and in this situation, I gave birth to the child.

‘AsAs [sic] I sat on the plank, with the boy on my lap and the waves beating upon me, there swam up to me one of the sailors, who climbed on to the plank and said to me, ‘By