Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night - Volume 5.djvu/303

 Inshallah!' So he tarried with them till the end of the day, when there came a boy five years old who took the mats they had made and carrying them to the market, sold them for a carat; [FN#484] and with this bought bread and beans and returned with them to the King. The hermit broke his fast and lay down to sleep with them; but in the middle of the night they both arose and fell to praying and weeping. When daybreak was near, the King said, "O my God, this Thy servant beseecheth Thee to return him his cloud; and to do this Thou art able; so, O my God, let him see his prayer granted and restore him his cloud." The Queen amen'd to his orisons and behold, the cloud grew up in the sky; whereupon the King gave the hermit joy and the man took leave of them and went away, the cloud companying him as of old. And whatsoever he required of Allah after this, in the names of the pious King and Queen, He granted it without fail and the man made thereon these couplets,

"My Lord hath servants fain of piety; * Hearts in the Wisdom-garden ranging free: Their bodies' lusts at peace, and motionless * For breasts that bide in purest secresy. Thou seest all silent, awesome of their Lord, * For hidden things unseen and seen they see."

And they tell a tale of THE MOSLEM CHAMPION AND THE CHRISTIAN DAMSEL.

The Commander of the Faithful, Omar bin al-Khattáb (whom Allah accept!), once levied for holy war an army of Moslems, to encounter the foe before Damascus, and they laid close siege to one of the Christians' strongholds. Now there were amongst the Moslems two men, brothers, whom Allah had gifted with fire and bold daring against the enemy; so that the commander of the