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to swoon away for excess of joy. Then he pulled out the key, but could not bring his hand to open the door. However, after awhile, he took heart and applying himself, opened the door and entered, saying, ‘Methinks this is none other than a dream or an illusion of sleep.’ When Tuhfeh saw him, she rose and coming to meet him, strained him to her bosom; and he cried out with a cry, wherein his soul was like to depart, and fell down in a swoon. She strained him to her bosom and sprinkled on him rose-water, mingled with musk, and washed his face, till he came to himself, as he were a drunken man, for the excess of his joy in Tuhfeh’s return to him, after he had despaired of her.
Then she took the lute and smote thereon, after the fashion she had learnt from the Sheikh Iblis, so that Er Reshid’s wit was dazed for excess of delight and his understanding was confounded for joy; after which she improvised and sang the following verses:
My heart will never credit that I am far from thee; In it thou art, nor ever the soul can absent be.
Or if to me “I’m absent” thou sayest, “’Tis a lie,” My heart replies, bewildered ’twixt doubt and certainty.
When she had made an end of her verses, Er Reshid said to her, ‘O Tuhfeh, thine absence was extraordinary, but thy presence[1] is yet more extraordinary.’ ‘By Allah, O my lord,’ answered she, ‘thou sayst sooth.’ And she took his hand and said to him, ‘See what I have
- ↑ i.e. thy return.
