Thousand & One Nights: 205th Night: Anis al Jalis, The Slave Girl -5

The following night Shahrazad said:

I heard, O happy King, the vizier said to his wife, "Tell me the truth."
She replied, "First of all, you have to swear me that you will not loss your self. Be patient and we will deal with it."

Vizier said, "Very well."
She said, "Your son went into Anis al Jalis and took her virginity."  The vizier sagged down to the ground, beat down his face until his nose began to bleed, and plucked out the wisps of his beard.  His wife said to him, "My lord, you are killing yourself.  I will give you ten thousand dinars, the price of the girl from my own money."  The vizier raised his head and said to her, "Damn it.  I don't need her price.  I am afraid of losing of my life and possessions."  

She asked, "My lord, how do?"

He replied, "Don't you know our enemy al Mu'in ibn-Sawi is lying in wait for us, and when he hears of this affair he will go to the king and say to him, "O my lord, your vizier, who according to you loves you and cares for your welfare, has taken ten thousand dinars from you and bought a girl, whose like was never seen, but when he saw her, he liked her and said to his son, 'Take this girl for yourself, for you deserve her, more than the king.' 

"Then he will say that my son had took her virginity, and she is with my son. 

"Then the king will order to kill me and confiscate all my possessions."

His wife said, "You are unnecessarily worrying out of fear. Nobody knows anything. You bury it and get another girl." 
 
His wife's words calmed him and he drank a cup of wine.

Nur al-Din, fearing the consequences of his act, spent the whole day in gardens and places of entertainment, and kept aloof from his companions, and came back late night. The maids opened the door to him and he went to his chamber and slept till early morning. He left the palace before daylight.  This routine he maintained for a whole month. He never faced his father. 

After one month his mother approached his husband and said, "My lord, you have lost the girl, and now you are going to lose your own son.  If things continue like this, he will run away."

The vizier asked, "What shall we do?"

She said, "My lord, stay awake, and wait for him tonight.  When he comes home late at night, seize him, and scare him, and I will rescue him from you.  Then you will make your peace with him, and give him the girl, for she loves him and he loves her.  And I will pay your price.

The vizier waited until his son came home, and when he heard him knock the door, he rose and hid in a dark corner, while the maids opened the door.  When the young man entered, he suddenly felt someone seize him and throw him on the ground, and when he raised his head to see who had done this to him, he saw his father.

But morning overtook and Shahrazad lapsed into silence.
-

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

( 16 )CHARLES DICKENS: DAVID COPPERFIELD: CHAPTER 16: I AM A NEW BOY IN MORE SENSES THAN ONE

Next morning, after breakfast, I entered on school life again.  I went, accompanied by Mr Wickfield to the scene of my future studies- a grave building in a courtyard, with a learned air about it that suited very well to the stray rooks and jackdaws who came down from the Cathedral tower to walk with a clerkly bearing on the grass plot - and was introduced to my new master, Doctor Strong. Doctor Strong looked almost as rusty, to my thinking, as the tall iron rails and gates outside the house; and almost as stiff and heavy as the great stone urn that flanked them, and were set up, on the top of red brick wall, at regular distances all round the court, like sublimated skittles for Time to play at.  Doctor Strong was in his library, with his clothes not particularly well brushed, and his hair not particularly combed, his knee-small unbraced, his long black gaiters unbuttoned, and his shoes  yawning like two caverns on the hearth-rug.  Turning upon me a lustreless eye, t...
Read more

Sailing Around Erythraean Sea: Thirteen

In the previous section Gaurdafui and Tohen on the Red Sea coast were described. Gaurdafui is on the apex of The Horn.Tohen is around 10 kilometres south of Gaurdafui. Gaurdafui's strategic position in relation to Gulf of Aden helped it to align it with known trade routes connecting East Africa to Arabia and India. Continue reading Thirteen. Beyond Taba (modern day Tohen), after four hundred stadia, there is the village of Pano . And then, after sailing four hundred stadia, along a promontory, towards which place the current also draws you, there is another market-town called Opone , into which the same things are imported, as those already mentioned, and in it the greatest quantity of cinnamon is produced, (the arebo, and moto), and slaves of better sort, which are brought to Egypt in increasing numbers and a great quantity of tortoise shell, better than that found elsewhere. My Search:- The village of Pano may be somewhere between Tohen and Hafun. It is widely accepted by scholar...
Read more

Sailing Around Erythraean Sea: Eight

Updated 02/11/2024 In the last Section, at Zula (ancient Avalites) the unknown sailor had been giving an account of imports and exports into and out of ports around Zula. Lret us see his further course: After Avalites there is another market-town, better than this, called Malao  distant a sail of about eight hundred stadia. The anchorage is an open roadstead, sheltered by a spit running out from the east. Here the natives are more peaceable. There are imported into this place the things already mentioned, and many tunics, cloaks from Arsinoe, dressed and dyed; drinking cups, sheets of soft copper in small quantity, iron and gold and silver coins, not much. There are exported from these places myrrh, a little frankincense (that is known as far-side), the harder cinnamon, duaca, Indian copal, and macir, which are imported into Arabia; and slaves, but rarely. Notes:- 1. Malao: A coastal town in Eritrea; in Semien-ki-Bahri region known for its beaches and historic port. Now it is calle...
Read more