Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 14, 2025
So they tarried with him that day and slept the night; and next morning Abu Mohammed's servants saddled him a she mule with selle and trappings of gold, set with all manner of pearls and stones of price; whereupon quoth Masrur to himself, "I wonder, when Abu Mohammed shall present himself in such equipage, if the Caliph will ask him how he came by all this wealth."
Then she made the Kalandars sit upon a sofa at the side of the estrade, and seated the Caliph and Ja'afar and Masrur on the other side of the saloon; after which she called the Porter, and said, "How scanty is thy courtesy! now thou art no stranger; nay, thou art one of the household."
Answered Masrur, "Nay, by Allah, O Commander of the Faithful," And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say. When it was the Four Hundredth Night, She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that Harun al- Rashid said to Masrur the Sworder, "Dost thou laugh to make mock of me or hath madness seized thee?"
What an array of figures beautiful, revolting, sly, fatuous, witty, brave, pusillanimous, mean, generous meets the eye as we recall one by one these famous stories; beautiful and amorous, but mercurial ladies with henna scented feet and black eyes often with a suspicion of kohl and more than a suspicion of Abu Murreh in them peeping cautiously through the close jalousies of some lattice; love sick princes overcoming all obstacles; executioners with blood-dripping scimitars; princesses of blinding beauty and pensive tenderness, who playfully knock out the "jaw-teeth" of their eunuchs while "the thousand-voiced bird in the coppice sings clear;" hideous genii, whether of the amiable or the vindictive sort, making their appearance in unexpected moments; pious beasts nay, the very hills praising Allah and glorifying his vice-gerent; gullible saints, gifted scoundrels; learned men with camel loads of dictionaries and classics, thieves with camel loads of plunder; warriors, zanies, necromancers, masculine women, feminine men, ghouls, lutists, negroes, court poets, wags the central figure being the gorgeous, but truculent, Haroun Al Rashid, who is generally accompanied by Ja'afer and Masrur, and sometimes by the abandoned but irresistible Abu Nowas.
And after leaving the bath Masrur and his men went in to Abu Mohammed Lazybones and found him seated in his upper chamber; and over his head hung curtains of gold-brocade, wrought with pearls and jewels, and the pavilion was spread with cushions, embroidered in red gold.
"I will be with thee at sunset," answered I, and going out found the donkey boy, who had brought me the day before, awaiting at the door. So I mounted ass and rode to the Khan of Masrur where I alighted and gave the man a half dinar, saying, "Return at sunset;" and he said "I will."
He answered, "O Prince of True Believers, wilt thou walk in the palace-garden and divert thyself with the sight of its blooms and gaze upon the stars and constellations and note the beauty of their ordinance and the moon among them rising in sheen over the water?" Quoth the Caliph, "O Masrur, my heart inclineth not to aught of this."
Word Of The Day
Others Looking