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Night cxciv.God may discover to me a means of deliverance for thee.’ ‘Know then,’ said she, ‘that one night I awoke from sleep, in the last watch of the night, and sitting up, saw by my side the handsomest of youths, as he were a willow-wand or an Indian cane, the tongue fails to describe him. Methought this was my father’s doing to try me, for that he had consulted me, when the kings sought me of him in marriage, and I had refused. It was this idea that withheld me from arousing him, for I thought that if I did aught or embraced him, he would most like tell my father. When I awoke in the morning, I found his ring on my finger in place of my own, which he had taken; and, O my brother, my heart was taken with him at first sight; and for the violence of my passion and longing, I have never since known the taste of sleep and have no occupation save weeping and repeating verses night and day. This, then, O my brother, is the story of the cause of my (pretended) madness.’ Then she poured forth tears and repeated the following verses:
Love has banished afar my delight; they are fled With a fawn that hath hearts for a pasturing-stead.
To him lovers’ blood is a trifle, for whom My soul is a-wasting for passion and dread.
I’m jealous for him of my sight and my thought; My heart is a spy on my eyes and my head.
His eyelashes dart at us death-dealing shafts; The hearts that they light on are ruined and dead.
Whilst yet there is left me a share in the world, Shall I see him, I wonder, or ever I’m sped?
I fain would conceal what I suffer for him; ’Tis shown to the spy by the tears that I shed.
When near, his enjoyment is distant from me: But his image is near, when afar he doth tread.
‘See then, O my brother,’ added she, ‘how thou mayest aid me in this my affliction.’ Merzewan bowed his head awhile, marvelling and knowing not what to do, then
