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And as much as the people loved Fezl, so much did they hate Muin.
Come, let us go to the house of Yehya ben Khalid. So they went to Yehya's house, and Mensour told him his case, whereat he was sore concerned and bowed his head awhile; then raising it, he called his treasurer and said to him, 'How much money have we in our treasury? 'Five thousand dirhems, answered the treasurer, and Yehya bade him bring them and sent a message to his son Fezl, saying, 'I am offered for sale estates of great price, that may never be laid waste; so send me somewhat of money. Fezl sent him a thousand thousand dirhems, and he despatched a like message to his son Jaafer, who also sent him a thousand thousand dirhems; nor did he leave sending to his kinsmen of the Barmecides, till he had collected from them a great sum of mosey for Mensour.
His name was King Mohammed ben Suleiman ez Zeini, and he had two Viziers, one called Muin ben Sawa and the other Fezl ben Khacan.
When the Sultan saw his condition and heard his story, the vein of anger started out between his eyes, and he turned to his guards, who stood before him, forty swordsmen, and said to them, 'Go down at once to the house of Noureddin ben Fezl, and sack it and raze it; then take him and the damsel and drag them hither with their hands bound behind them. 'We hear and obey, answered they: and arming themselves, set out for Noureddin's house.
Now our lord the Sultan aforetime gave his father ten thousand dinars to buy him a handsome slave-girl, and he bought therewith this damsel, who pleased him, so that he grudged her to our lord the Sultan and gave her to his own son. When Fezl died, his son sold all that he possessed of houses and gardens and household stuff and squandered the price, till he became penniless.
Now there was with the Sultan a man called Ilmeddin Senjer, who had aforetime been servant to Noureddin's father Fezl ben Khacan, but had left his service for that of the Sultan, who had advanced him to be one of his chamberlains.
The matter, indeed, came to Muin's ears, but he dared not speak of it, by reason of the favour in which the Vizier Fezl stood with the Sultan. At the end of the year, the Vizier Fezl went one day to the bath and coming out, whilst still in a sweat, the air smote him and he caught cold and took to his bed.
So I left him and went straight to El Fezl and Jaafer, sons of Yehya ben Khalid, to whom I related my case.
It befell one day, that the King, being seated on his throne, with his officers of state about him, called his Vizier Fezl and said to him, 'I wish to have a slave-girl of unsurpassed beauty, perfect in grace and symmetry and endowed with all praiseworthy qualities. Said the courtiers, 'Such a girl is not to be had for less than ten thousand dinars! whereupon the King cried out to his treasurer and bade him carry ten thousand dinars to Fezl's house.
Indeed thou art renowned for the practice of virtue and the praying of the preachers for thee in the pulpits. Quoth Fezl, 'O my son, I hope for acceptance from God the Most High. Then he pronounced the two professions of the faith and was numbered among the blessed.
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