Page:The Celebrated Romance of the Stealing of the Mare.djvu/33

 If that thou bidedst a year, yet shall thy beast find pasture."

And I took my lute in my hand and sought his tent, the Agheyli,

Speaking low to myself, "O thou Hejazi Salame,

This is thy day of deceit, the noontide of thy cunning.

See to thy stratagems." And I laid my wallet before me,

Pondering ways and designs how I might come to my purpose.

Said the Narrator:

And when Abu Zeyd was on his way through the desert making to himself a plan how he should come into his foeman's camp unperceived, behold him of a sudden in the midst of them. And he saw the men of Agheyl to the right of him, and to the left, and in his front. And with them in their midst he saw a fair young lady, very beautiful to behold, with whom the fairest maidens of the Arabs were in converse. And the maiden turned her eyes to the desert and to the hills, and she perceived him coming. And she sent a young girl of those near her towards him. And the girl met him among the sand dunes and asked him " Who and whence art thou, and what is thy business V And he told her that he was a traveller, of the pedlars who sell necklaces to the young maidens, and also that he was an hungred. And she brought him food and he ate, praising the Giver of all. And returning the girl told her mistress of his desire to serve her, and she bade him thread pearls upon