So he returned to the vestibule and sitting down between the doors, fell to musing upon what he had seen, when lo, he heard a moaning that came from a sorrowful heart, and a voice chanted the following verses:I hid what I endured from thee: it came to light, And sleep was
changed to wake thenceforward to my sight.
O Fate, thou sparest not nor dost desist from me; Lo, for my
heart is racked with dolour and affright!
Have pity, lady mine, upon the great laid low, Upon the rich made
poor by love and its despite!
Once, jealous of the breeze that blew on thee, I was, Alas! on
whom Fate falls, his eyes are veiled with night.
What boots the archer's skill, if, when the foe draws near, His
bow-string snap and leave him helpless in the fight?
So when afflictions press upon the noble mind, Where shall a man
from Fate and Destiny take flight?
When the King heard this, he rose and followed the sound and found that it came from behind a curtain let down before the doorway of a sitting-chamber. So he raised the curtain and saw a young man seated upon a couch raised a cubit from the ground. He was a handsome well-shaped youth, with flower-white forehead and rosy cheeks and a black mole, like a grain of ambergris, on the table of his cheek, as says the poet:
The slender one! From his brow and the night of his jetty hair,
The world in alternate gloom and splendour of day doth fare.
Blame not the mole on his cheek. Is an anemone's cup Perfect,
except in its midst an eyelet of black it wear?
Continued next week. Tomorrow's installment from The Illiad by Homer.
From the Arab world: these stories date back to the Middle Ages.
Picture: Queen Scheherazade tells her stories to King Shahryār.
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