Page:The Perfumed Garden - Burton - 1886.djvu/115

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Know then that the majority of women do not find full satisfaction in kisses and embraces without coition. For them it resides only in the member, and they only like the man who rummages them, even if he is ugly.

A story also goes on this subject that Moussa ben Mesab betook himself one day to a woman in the town who had a female slave, an excellent singer, whom he wanted to buy from her. The woman was resplendently beautiful, and independent of her charming appearance, she had a large fortune. He saw at the same time in the house a young man of bad shape and ungainly appearance, who went to and fro giving orders.

Moussa having asked who that man was, she told him, "This is my husband, and for him I would give my life!" "This is a hard slavery," he said, "to which you are reduced, and I am sorry for you. We belong to God, and shall return to him! but what a misfortune it is that such incomparable beauty and such delightful forms as I see in you should be for such a man!"

She made answer, "O son of my mother, if he could do to you from behind what he does for me in front, you would sell your lately acquired fortune as well as your patrimony. He would appear to you beautiful, and his plain looks would be changed into beauty."

"May God preserve him to you!" said Moussa.

It is also said that the poet Farazdak met one day a woman on whom he cast a glance burning with love, and