Thousand & One Nights: One Hundred & Second Night

One hundred and second night.
Shahrazad said:
The Story of the Hunchback
There lived in China a tailor who had a pretty compatible and loyal wife. One day they went out for a stroll to enjoy sights at a place of entertainment. They spent the whole day in diversions and funs, and when they returned home at the end of the day, they met on the way a jolly hunchback. He was smartly dressed in folded inner robe and an open outer robe with gathered sleeves and embroidered collarband, in the Egyptian style, and sporting a scarf and a tall green hat with notes of yellow silk stuffed in ambergris. The hunchback was short, like him, of poet Antar said: [1]

Lovely the hunchback who hides his Hump, like a pearl in an oyster shell
A man who looks like a castor oil
Branch on which dangles rotten citric lump. He was busy playing on tambourine, singing and improvising all kinds of funny gestures. When they drew near and looked at him, they saw that he was drunk, reeking of wine. He placed his tambourine under his arm and began to beat time by clapping his hands as he sang the following verses:

Go early to the darling in yon jug[2]
Bring her to me
And fete her as you fete a young girl,
With joy and glee
Make her as pure as virgin bride,
Unveiled to please,
I may honour my friend with a cup
Of wine from Greece, 
If you care for the best in life,
Life repays,
Fill my empty cup,
Without delay.
Don't you, my tantalizer, on the plain
The gardens see?

It was Dawn. Shahrazad the queen stopped the story to tantalize the berserked king, who was fallen to the myth of chastity.


1. Antar: Antarah ibn Shaddad al-Absi, also known as Antar was a pre-Islamic Arabian poet.
2. Yon jug: antique Burmese silver wine jug made by Maung Shwe Yon.


Reeking = stinking 
Fete = honour and entertain someone lavishly.
Tantalizer is something that excites, and then keeps it just out of reach.

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