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'Because, replied Jaafer 'if thou crucify us all together, we shall keep each other company. The Khalif laughed at his speech; then the damsel took the lute and tuning it, played a measure which made all hearts yearn to her, then sang the following verses: O ye that to help unhappy lovers are fain! We burn with the fire of love and longing in vain.
In little more than a single generation, the Khalif was informed by his officers that the tribute must cease, for all the children born in that region were Mohammedans, and all spoke Arabic. MOHAMMEDANISM. Mohammedanism, as left by its founder, was an anthropomorphic religion. Its God was only a gigantic man, its heaven a mansion of carnal pleasures.
When he had ended, Ali ben Hisham sprang up and kissing his feet, said, "O my lord, God hath heard thy prayer and answered thy supplication, and consenteth to thy taking her with all her gear, so the Commander of the Faithful have no mind to her." "Had we a mind to her," answered the Khalif, "we would prefer Abou Isa before ourselves and help him to his desire."
As well might one have held back the Atlantic from rushing through that canal upon the isthmus, as to have stayed the inflowing of the Saracens through the breach made by "the Traitor," Count Julian! In less than two years Spain was a conquered province, rendering allegiance to the Khalif at Damascus, and the Moor, as the followers of the Prophet in Morocco were called, reigned in Toledo.
The Khalif grieved sore for her death and bade break all the vessels and lutes and other instruments of mirth and music in the place; then carrying her body to his closet, he abode with her the rest of the night. When the day broke, he laid her out and commanded to wash her and shroud her and bury her. And he mourned very sore for her and questioned not of her case nor what ailed her.
He asked him for a draught of water, and the man gave him to drink, saying, 'Peradventure, the Commander of the Faithful will honour me by alighting in this my garden. So the Khalif dismounted and entered the garden with his suite; whereupon the man brought out to them a hundred carpets and a hundred leather mats and a hundred cushions and set before them a hundred dishes of fruits, a hundred saucers of sweetmeats and a hundred bowls full of sherbets of sugar; whereat the Khalif marvelled and said to his host, 'O man, this thy case is a strange one.
Then she turned to Ghanim and said to him, 'O my love, fly for thy life! 'What shall I do? said he; 'and whither shall I go, seeing that my substance and fortune are in this house? 'Delay not, answered she, 'lest thou lose both life and goods. 'O my beloved and light of my eyes, rejoined he, 'how shall I do to get away, when they have surrounded the house? 'Fear not, said she: and taking off his clothes, made him put on old and ragged ones, after which she took the empty pot and put in it a piece of bread and a saucer of meat, and placing the whole in a basket, set it on his head and said, 'Go out in this guise and fear not for me, for I know how to deal with the Khalif. So he went out amongst them, carrying the basket and its contents, and God covered him with His protection and he escaped the snares and perils that beset him, thanks to the purity of his intent.
Now the keeper of the garden was an old man by name Gaffer Ibrahim, and he had found, from time to time, on going out on his occasions, idlers taking their case with courtezans in the alley leading to the door of the garden, at which he was sore enraged; so he complained to the Khalif, who said, 'Whomsoever thou findest at the door of the garden, do with him as thou wilt. As chance would have it, he had occasion to go abroad that very day and found these two sleeping at the gate, covered with one veil; whereupon, 'By Allah, said he, 'this is fine!
Said they, 'Be quick about it. So he went out, running, and coming up to Jaafer, cried out, 'Hallo, Jaafer! 'Here am I, O Commander of the Faithful! replied he. 'They want the fish fried, said the Khalif.
However, that night a fisherman named Kerim, happening to pass by and seeing the garden gate open, said to himself, 'This is a time of negligence: I will take advantage of it to fish. So he went in, but had hardly cast his net, when the Khalif came up alone and standing behind him, knew him and called out to him, saying, 'Ho, Kerim! The fisherman, hearing himself called by his name, turned round, and seeing the Khalif, trembled in every limb and exclaimed, 'O Commander of the Faithful, I did it not in mockery of the edict; but poverty and distress drove me to what thou seest. Quoth the Khalif, 'Make a cast in my name. At this the fisherman was glad and going to the bank, cast his net, then waiting till it had spread out to the utmost and settled down, pulled it up and found in it various kinds of fish.
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