Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 6.djvu/345

315 and ears and crucify him on the gate of the bazaar wherein is his shop!’

When the old woman heard this, she turned pale and trembled in every nerve and her tongue clave to her mouth; but she took courage and said, ‘Softly, O my lady! What is there in his letter to trouble thee thus? Is it aught but a memorial, wherein he taketh his complaint to thee of poverty or oppression, from which he hopes to be relieved by thy favour?’ ‘By Allah, O my nurse,’ replied the princess, ‘it is nought of this; but verses and shameful words! Needs must the dog be in one of three cases: either he is mad and hath no wit or he seeks his own slaughter, or else he is assisted to his wish of me by some one of exceeding puissance and a mighty Sultan. Or hath he heard that I am one of the light o’ loves of the city, who lie a night or two with whosoever seeketh them, that he writeth me shameful verses to debauch my reason withal?’ ‘By Allah, O my lady,’ rejoined the old woman, ‘thou sayst sooth! But reck not thou of yonder ignorant dog, for thou art seated in thy high-builded and unapproachable palace, to which the very birds cannot soar neither the wind pass over it, and he is distracted. Wherefore do thou write him a letter and chide him roundly and spare him no kind of reproof, but threaten him exceedingly and menace him with death and say to him, “Whence hast thou knowledge of me, that thou darest to write to me, O dog of a merchant, that trudgest far and wide all thy days in deserts and wastes for the sake of gaining a dirhem or a dinar? By Allah, except thou awake from thy sleep and put off thine intoxication, I will crucify thee on the gate of the bazaar wherein is thy shop!”’ Quoth the princess, ‘I fear lest he [be encouraged to] presume, if I write to him.’ ‘And what is he,’ rejoined the nurse, ‘that he should presume to us? Indeed, we write to him but to the intent that