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strangerhood, of my expectation that I should see him and solace myself with him;[1] and now thou tellest me that he is dead! Marry, blood discovered unto me that[2] thou wast the son of my brother, and indeed I knew thee from amongst all the lads; although thy father, when I left him, was not yet married. And[3] now, O my son Alaeddin,” continued he, “I have lost my consolation[4] and my joy in thy father, my brother, whom I had hoped, after my strangerhood, to see ere I died; but separation hath afflicted me in him[5] and there is no fleeing from that which is[6] nor is there any resource against the ordinance of God the Most High.”
Then he took Alaeddin and said to him, “O my son, I have no comfort[7] but in thee[8] and thou art [to me]
- ↑ Or “comfort myself in him” (ateazza bihi). Burton “condole with him [over the past].”
- ↑ Lit. “hid not unto me that” (ma ekhfa aleyya an).
- ↑ Night DXVI.
- ↑ Teaziyeti. Burton, “I have now railed in the mourning ceremonies.”
- ↑ El bein ked efjaani fihi, i.e. “I have been stricken with separation from him.” Burton, “Far distance wrought me this trouble.”
- ↑ Lit. “the being (el kaïn, i.e. that which is, the accomplished fact) there is not from it a refuge or place of fleeing” (mehreb). Burton, “nor hath the creature aught of asylum from the Creator.”
- ↑ Or “consolation” (azaa).
- ↑ Burton, “I have none to condole with now save thyself.”
