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and sat there all day, expecting news of Shemsennehar; but none came. He passed the night in his own house and when it was day, he went to Ali ben Bekkar’s lodging and found him laid on his bed, with his friends about him and physicians feeling his pulse and prescribing this or that. When he saw Aboulhusn, he smiled, and the latter saluting him, enquired how he did and sat with him till the folk withdrew, when he said to him, ‘What plight is this?’ Quoth Ali, ‘It was noised abroad that I was ill and I have no strength to rise and walk, so as to give the lie to the report of my sickness, but continue lying here as thou seest. So my friends heard of me and came to visit me. But, O my brother, hast thou seen the damsel or heard any news of her?’ ‘I have not seen her,’ answered Aboulhusn, ‘since we parted from her on the Tigris’ bank; but, O my brother, beware of scandal and leave this weeping.’ ‘O my brother,’ rejoined Ali, ‘indeed, I have no control over myself;’ and he sighed and recited the following verses:
She giveth unto her hand that whereof mine doth fail, A dye on the wrist, wherewith she doth my patience assail.
She standeth in fear for her hand of the arrows she shoots from her eyes; So, for protection, she’s fain to clothe it in armour of mail.[1]
The doctor in ignorance felt my pulse, and I said to him, “Leave thou my hand alone; my heart it is that doth ail.”
Quoth she to the dream of the night, that visited me and fled, “By Allah, describe him to me and bate me no jot of the tale!”
It answered, “I put him away, though he perish of thirst, and said, ‘Stand off from the watering-place!’ So he could not to drink avail.”
She poured forth the pearls of her tears from her eyes’ narcissus and gave The rose of her cheeks to drink and bit upon jujubes[2] with hail.[3]
