She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the merchant went up to Nuzhat al-Zaman and was put to shame by her beauty and loveliness, so he sat by her side and asked her, "O my mistress, what is thy name?" She answered, "Doss thou ask what is my name this day or what it was before this day?" Thereupon the merchant enquired, "Hast thou then two names: to-day's and yesterday's?" "Yes," replied she, "my name in the past was Nuzhat al-Zaman, the Delight of the Age; but my name at this present is Ghussat[FN#252] al-Zaman, the Despight of the Age." When the merchant heard this his eyes brimmed over with tears and quoth he to her, "Hast thou not a sick brother?" "Ay by Allah, O my lord, I have," quoth she, "but fortune hath parted me and him and he lieth sick in Jerusalem." The merchant's head was confounded at the sweetness of her speech and he said to himself, "Verily, the Badawi spake the truth of her." Then she called to mind her brother and his sickness and his strangerhood and her separation from him in his hour of weakness and her not knowing what had befallen him; and she thought of all that had happened to her with the Badawi and of her severance from her mother and father and native land; and the tears coursed down her cheeks and fast as they started they dropped; and she began reciting, "Allah, where'er thou be, His aid impart * To thee, who distant dwellest in my heart! Allah be near thee how so far thou fare; * Ward off all shifts of Time, all dangers thwart! Mine eyes are desolate for thy vanisht sight, * And start my tears-ah me, how fast they start! Would Heaven I kenned what quarter or what land * Homes thee, and in what house and tribe thou art An fount of life thou drain in greenth of rose, * While drink I tear drops for my sole desert? An thou 'joy slumber in those hours, when I * Peel 'twixt my side and couch coals' burning smart? All things were easy save to part from thee, * For my sad heart this grief is hard to dree."