Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night - Volume 2.djvu/62

 42 A If Laylak wa Laylah. him and said, " O my lord, I am but a slave commanded in this matter : an thou have any desire, tell it me that I may fulfil it, for now there remaineth of thy life only so much as may be till the Sultan shall put his face out of the lattice." Thereupon Nur al- Din looked to the right and to the left, and before him and behind him and began improvising : The sword, the sworder and the blood-skin waiting me I sight, o And cry, Alack, mine evil fate ! ah, my calamity ! How is't I see no loving friend with eye of sense or soul? o What ! no one here ? I cry to all : will none reply to me ? The time is past that formed my life, my death term draweth nigh, o Will no man win the grace of God showing me clemency ; And look with pity on my state, and clear my dark despair, o E'en with a draught of water dealt to cool death's agony ? The people fell to weeping over him ; and the headsman rose and brought him a draught of water; but the Wazir sprang up from his place and smote the gugglet with his hand and broke it : then he cried out at the executioner and bade him strike off Nur ai- Din's head. So he bound the eyes of the doomed man and folk clamoured at the Wazir and loud wailings were heard and much questioning of man and man. At this moment behold, rose a dense dust-cloud filling sky and wold ; and when the Sultan, who was sitting in the palace, descried this, he said to his suite, " Go and see what yon cloud bringeth : " Replied Al Mu'in, " Not till we have smitten this fellow's neck ; " but the Sultan said, " Wait ye till we see what this meaneth." Now the dust-cloud was the dust of Ja'afar the Barmecide, Wazir to the Caliph, and his host ; and the cause of his coming was as follows. The Caliph passed thirty days without calling to mind the matter of Nur al-Din Ali, 1 and none reminded him of it, till one night, as he passed by the chamber of Anis al-Jalis, he heard her weeping and singing with a soft sweet voice these lines of the poet : In thought I see thy form when farthest far or nearest near ; o And on my tongue there dwells a name which man shall ne'er unhear. Then her weeping redoubled ; when lo ! the Caliph opened the door and, entering the chamber, found Anis al-Jalis in tears. When she saw him she fell to the ground and kissing his feet three times repeated these lines : This improbable detail shows the Caliph's greatness.