Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 7.djvu/191

169 it blows, and if aught befell her, I should slay myself for her sake.’ ‘O my son,’ replied she, ‘God forbid that I should gainsay thee! Am I mad that thou shouldst lay this injunction on me and I disobey thee therein? Depart, O my son, with a heart at ease, and God willing, thou shalt return in safety and see her and she shall tell thee how I have dealt with her: but tarry not beyond the time to come and go.’

Now, as fate would have it, his wife heard what he said to his mother and they knew it not. Then Hassan went without the city and beat the drum, whereupon up came the dromedaries and he loaded twenty of them with rarities of Irak; after which he returned to his mother and repeated his injunctions to her and took leave of her and his wife and children, one of whom was a yearling babe and the other two years old. Then he mounted and fared on ten days, without stopping night or day, over hills and valleys and plains and wastes, till, on the eleventh day, he reached the palace and went in to his sisters, with the presents he had brought them. The princesses rejoiced at his sight and gave him joy of his safety, whilst the youngest decorated the palace within and without. Then they took the presents and lodging him in a chamber as of old, enquired at him of his wife and mother and he told them that his wife had borne him two sons. And the youngest princess, seeing him well and in good case, rejoiced with an exceeding joy and repeated the following verse:

Then he abode with them, an honoured guest, three months, passing his time in hunting and merrymaking and joy and delight.

To return to his wife. She abode with his mother two