The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 07 (of 10)
General
The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 07 (of 10)
Fairy tales; Tales -- Arab countries
She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that when the
handmaid went down and said to the porter, “Suffer yonder Religious
enter to my lady so haply she may get a blessing of her, and we too
may be blessed, one and all,” the gate-keeper went up to Dalilah and
kissed her hand, but she forbade him, saying, “Away from me, lest
my ablution be made null and void.[FN#188] Thou, also, art of the
attracted God-wards and kindly looked upon by Allah’s Saints and under
His especial guardianship. May He deliver thee from this servitude,
O Abu Ali!” Now the Emir owed three months’ wage to the porter who
was straitened thereby, but knew not how to recover his due from his
lord; so he said to the old woman, “O my mother, give me to drink from
thy pitcher, so I may win a blessing through thee.” She took the ewer
from her shoulder and whirled it about in air, so that the plug flew
out of its mouth and the three dinars fell to the ground. The porter
saw them and picked them up, saying in his mind, “Glory to God! This
old woman is one of the Saints that have hoards at their command! It
hath been revealed to her of me that I am in want of money for daily
expenses; so she hath conjured me these three dinars out of the air.”
Then said he to her, “Take, O my aunt, these three dinars which fell
from thy pitcher;” and she replied, “Away with them from me! I am of
the folk who occupy not themselves with the things of the world, no
never! Take them and use them for thine own benefit, in lieu of those
the Emir oweth thee.” Quoth he, “Thanks to Allah for succour! This is
of the chapter of revelation!” Thereupon the maid accosted her and
kissing her hand, carried her up to her mistress. She found the lady
as she were a treasure, whose guardian talisman had been loosed; and
Khatun bade her welcome and kissed her hand. Quoth she, “O my daughter,
I come not to thee save for thy weal and by Allah’s will.” Then Khatun
set food before her; but she said, “O my daughter, I eat naught except
of the food of Paradise and I keep continual fast breaking it but five
days in the year. But, O my child, I see thee chagrined and desire
that thou tell me the cause of thy concern.” “O my mother,” replied
Khatun, “I made my husband swear, on my wedding-night, that he would
wive none but me, and he saw others with children and longed for them
and said to me, ‘Thou art a barren thing!’ I answered, ‘Thou art a
mule which begetteth not’; so he left me in anger, saying, ‘When I
come back from my journey, I will take another wife,’ for he hath
villages and lands and large allowances, and if he begat children by
another, they will possess the money and take the estates from me.”
Said Dalilah, “O my daughter, knowest thou not of my master, the Shaykh
Abú al-Hamlát,[FN#189] whom if any debtor visit, Allah quitteth him his
debt, and if a barren woman, she conceiveth?” Khatun replied, “O my
mother, since the day of my wedding I have not gone forth the house,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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