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When we had done eating, the table was removed, and I washed my hands seven times. Then I took pen and ink and wrote the following verses:
Weep for the cranes that erst within the porringers did lie, And for the stews and partridges evanished heave a sigh!
Mourn for the younglings of the grouse; lament unceasingly, As, for the omelettes and the fowls browned in the pan, do I.
How my heart yearneth for the fish, that in its different kinds, Upon a paste of wheaten flour lay hidden in the pie!
Praised be God for the roast meat! As in the dish it lay, With pot-herbs, soaked in vinegar, in porringers hard by!
My hunger was appeased: I lay, intent upon the gleam Of arms that in the frumenty were buried bracelet high.
I woke my sleeping appetite to eat, as ’twere in jest, Of all the tarts that, piled on trays, shone fair unto the eye.
O soul, have patience! For indeed, Fate full of marvel is: If fortune straiten thee one day, the next relief is nigh.
Then I rose and seated myself at a distance, whilst the King read what I had written and marvelled and said, “Strange that an ape should be gifted with such fluency and skill in penmanship! By Allah, this is a wonder of wonders!” Then they set choice wine before the King in flagons of glass; and he drank, then passed the cup to me; and I kissed the earth and drank and wrote the following verses:
They burnt me[1] with fire, to make me speak, And found me patient and debonair.
For this I am borne on men’s hands on high And kiss the rosy lips of the fair!
And these also:
Morn struggles through the dusk; so pour me out, I pray, Of wine, such wine as makes the saddest-hearted gay!
So pure and bright it is, that whether wine in glass Or glass in wine be held, i’ faith, ’tis hard to say.
- ↑ Referring, of course, to the wine, which it appears to have been customary to drink warm or boiled (vinum coctum) as among several ancient nations and in Japan and China at the present day.
