Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 5.djvu/84

64 Solomon the gift of this ring and peculiarly favoured him therewith, for that he said to Him, ‘O my Lord, bestow upon me a dominion, that shall beseem none after me; for Thou art the Giver of gifts.’ So the ring is not for you. Had ye taken the herb, whereof whoso eateth shall not die until the first blast [of the last trumpet], it had better availed you than this ye have gotten; for ye shall nowise come at your desire of it.”

When they heard this, they repented them exceedingly and went their ways, whilst I went in quest of my subjects and found them fallen in piteous plight, the weaker of them having died in my absence and the stronger grown weak. When they saw me, they rejoiced and flocking about me, enquired what had befallen me. So I told them what had passed, after which I gathered them together and repaired with them to the mountain Caf, where I use to winter, spending the summer in the place where thou now seest me, O Hasib. This, then, is my story and what befell me [with Beloukiya and Uffan].’

Hasib marvelled at her words and said to her, ‘I beseech thee, of thy favour, bid one of thy subjects bring me out to the surface of the earth, that I may go to my people.’ ‘O Hasib,’ replied she, ‘thou shalt not depart from us till winter come, and needs must thou go with us to the mountain Caf and divert thyself with the sight of hills and sands and trees and birds magnifying the One God, the Victorious, besides Marids and Afrits and Jinn, whose number none knoweth save God the Most High.’ When Hasib heard this, he was sore chagrined and concerned; then he said to her, ‘Tell me of Uffan and Beloukiya; when they departed from thee and went their way, did they win to the burial-place of our lord Solomon or not; and if they won thither, did they avail to take the ring or not?’ ‘Know,’ answered she, ‘that, when they left me, they