Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 7.djvu/198

176 He hid my vest and deemed that love had mastered me And that I of the One to seek it would forbear. He wronged me, for my vest he to his mother gave And in a closet charged her keep it with all care: But I heard what they said and stored it in my mind And much therein rejoiced and hoped for fortune fair. My going to the bath, indeed, was but a trick, That I to wonderment might move the people there. The Khalif’s bride no less did marvel at my charms, When she on every side had viewed my shape and air. ‘O wife of Er Reshid,’ then said I, ‘thou must know, I have a feather-dress, right splendid, rich and rare. Were it on me, thou shouldst see wonders such as blot Affliction from the spright and charm away despair.’ ‘ [sic]Where is it?’ deigned to ask the Khalif’s wife, and I Made answer, ‘In his house who caught me in his snare.’ So Mesrour went in haste and brought the dress to her, And lo, its lustre lit the palace everywhere. I took it from his hand and opening, viewed it all, To see ’twas whole and fit to wing withal the air. Then, with my babes, therein I entered and my wings Spreading, up to the roof I flew and perching there, Said, ‘Husband’s mother mine, tell him, if he would meet With me again, he must to leave his home prepare.’

When she had made an end of her verses, the lady Zubeideh said to her, ‘Wilt thou not come down to us, that we may take our fill of thy beauty, O fairest of the fair? Glory be to Him who hath given thee eloquence and beauty!’ But she said, ‘God forbid that what is past should return!’ Then to the mother of the wretched Hassan, ‘By Allah, O my lady,’ said she, ‘it irketh me to part from thee; but, when thy son cometh and the days of separation are long upon him and he craveth reunion with me and meeting and the winds of love and longing agitate him, let him come to me in the Islands of Wac.’ Then she took flight with her children and sought her own country, whilst the old woman wept and buffeted her face