Page:The Perfumed Garden - Burton - 1886.djvu/114

98 that I open my thighs and he down on my back." Then cried the husband, "O Emir, she tells untruth; in order to possess her I have to fight with her." The Emir pronounced the following judgment: "I give you, he said, a year's time to prove her allegation to be false." He decides thus out of regard for the man. El Adjadje then went away reciting these verses:

Returned to his house he began to kiss and caress his wife; but his efforts went no farther, he remained incapable of giving proofs of his virility. Dahama said to him, "Keep your caresses and embraces; they do not satisfy love. What I desire is a solid and stiff member, the sperm of which will flow into my matrix." And she recited to him the following verses:

"

El Adjadje, in despair, conducted her forthwith back to her family, and, to hide his shame, repudiated her that very night.

A poet said on that occasion: