Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 8.djvu/54

42 straitened upon me, and of the excess of my passion, I go, saying:

Nesim marvelled at his eloquence and the goodliness of his speech and the elegance of his verses and was moved to compassion for him. Then she sealed the letter with virgin musk and incensed it with aloes-wood and ambergris, after which she committed it to a merchant, bidding him deliver it not save to Zein el Mewasif or her maid Huboub.

When the letter reached her sister, she knew it for Mesrour’s inditing and recognized himself in the grace of its expression. So she kissed it and laid it on her eyes, whilst the tears streamed from her lids and she gave not over weeping, till she fainted. When she came to herself, she called for pen and paper and wrote him the following answer: ‘This letter is to my lord and