The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 03 (of 10)
General
The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 03 (of 10)
Fairy tales; Tales -- Arab countries
She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that when Kamar
al-Zaman acquainted the Lady Budur with what he had seen in his dream,
she and he went in to her sire and, telling him what had passed,
besought his leave to travel. He gave the Prince the permission he
sought; but the Princess said, "O my father, I cannot bear to be parted
from him." Quoth Ghayur, her sire, "Then go thou with him," and gave
her leave to be absent a whole twelvemonth and afterwards to visit him
in every year once; so she kissed his hand and Kamar al-Zaman did the
like. Thereupon King Ghayur proceeded to equip his daughter and her
bridegroom for the journey, and furnished them with outfit and
appointments for the march; and brought out of his stables horses
marked with his own brand, blood-dromedaries[FN#306] which can journey
ten days without water, and prepared a litter for his daughter, besides
loading mules and camels with victual; moreover, he gave them slaves
and eunuchs to serve them and all manner of travellinggear; and on the
day of departure, when King Ghayur took leave of Kamar al-Zaman, he
bestowed on him ten splendid suits of cloth of gold embroidered with
stones of price, together with ten riding horses and ten she-camels,
and a treasury of money;[FN#307] and he charged him to love and cherish
his daughter the Lady Budur. Then the King accompanied them to the
farthest limits of his Islands where, going in to his daughter Budur in
the litter, he kissed her and strained her to his bosom, weeping and
repeating,
"O thou who wooest Severance, easy fare! *
For love-embrace belongs to lover-friend:
Fare softly! Fortune's nature falsehood is, *
And parting shall love's every meeting end."
Then leaving his daughter, he went to her husband and bade him farewell
and kissed him; after which he parted from them and, giving the order
for the march he returned to his capital with his troops. The Prince
and Princess and their suite fared on without stopping through the
first day and the second and the third and the fourth, nor did they
cease faring for a whole month till they came to a spacious champaign,
abounding in pasturage, where they pitched their tents; and they ate
and drank and rested, and the Princess Budur lay down to sleep.
Presently, Kamar al-Zaman went in to her and found her lying asleep
clad in a shift of apricot-coloured silk that showed all and
everything; and on her head was a coif of gold-cloth embroidered with
pearls and jewels. The breeze raised her shift which laid bare her
navel and showed her breasts and displayed a stomach whiter than snow,
each one of whose dimples would contain an ounce of benzoin-
ointment.[FN#308] At this sight, his love and longing redoubled, and he
began reating,
"An were it asked me when by hell-fire burnt, *
When flames of heart my vitals hold and hem,
'Which wouldst thou chose, say wouldst thou rather them, *
Or drink sweet cooling draught?' I'd answer, 'Them!' "
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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