ROMANCE OF SIR ISUMBRAS.
There was once a knight, who, from his earliest infancy, appeared to be the peculiar favourite of Fortune. His birth was noble; his person equally remarkable for strength and beauty; his possessions so extensive as to furnish the amusements of hawking and hunting in the highest perfection. Though he had found no opportunity of signalising his courage in war, he had borne away the prize at numberless tournaments; his courtesy was the theme of general praise; his hall was the seat of unceasing plenty; it was crowded with minstrels, whom he entertained with princely liberality, and the possession of a beautiful wife and three lovely children completed the sum of earthly happiness.
Sir Isumbras had many virtues, but he had one vice. In the pride of his heart he forgot the Giver of all good things, and considered the blessings so abundantly showered upon him as the proper and just reward of his distinguished merit. Instances of this overweening presumption might perhaps be found in all ages among the possessors of wealth and power; but few sinners have the good fortune to be recalled, like Sir Isumbras, by a severe but salutary punishment, to the pious sentiments of Christian humility.
It was usual with knights to amuse themselves with hawking or hunting whenever they were not occupied by some more serious business; and, as business seldom intervened, they thus amused themselves every day in the year. One morning, being mounted on his favourite steed, surrounded by his dogs, and with a hawk on his wrist, Sir Isumbras cast his eyes on the sky, and discovered an angel, who, hovering over him, reproached him with his pride, and announced the punishment of instant and complete degradation. The terrified knight immediately fell on his knees; acknowledged the justice of his sentence; returned thanks to Heaven for deigning to visit him with adversity while the possession of youth and health enabled him to endure it; and, filled with contrition, prepared to return from the forest. But scarcely had the angel disappeared when his good steed suddenly fell dead under him; the hawk dropped from his wrist; his hounds wasted and expired; and, being thus left alone, he hastened on foot towards his palace, filled with melancholy forebodings, but impatient to learn the whole extent of his misfortune.
He was presently met by a part of his household, who, with many tears, informed him that his horses and oxen had been suddenly struck dead with lightning, and that his capons were all stung to death with adders. He received the tidings with humble resignation, commanded his servants to abstain from murmurs against Providence, and passed on. He was next met by a page, who related that his castle was burned to the ground, that many of his servants had lost their lives, and that his wife and children had with great difficulty escaped from the flames. Sir Isumbras, rejoiced that Heaven had yet spared those who were most dear to him, bestowed upon the astonished page his purse of gold as a reward for the intelligence.
A doleful sight then gan he see;
His wife and children three
Out of the fire were fled:
There they sat, under a thorn,
Bare and naked as they were born,
Brought out of their bed.
A woful man then was he,
When he saw them all naked be,
The lady said, all so blive,
“For nothing, sir, be ye adrad.”
He did off his surcoat of pallade,[[573]]
And with it clad his wife.
His scarlet mantle then shore[[574]] he;
Therein he closed his children three
That naked before him stood.
He then proposed to his wife that, as an expiation of their sins, they should at once undertake a pilgrimage to Jerusalem; so, cutting with his knife a sign of the cross on his bare shoulder, he set off with the four companions of his misery, resolving to beg his bread till they should arrive at the Holy Sepulchre. After passing through “seven lands,” supported by the scanty alms of the charitable, they arrived at length at a forest, where they wandered during three days without meeting a single habitation. Their food was reduced to the few berries which they were able to collect; and the children, unaccustomed to such hard fare, began to sink under the accumulated difficulties of their journey. In this situation they were stopped by a wide and rapid though shallow river. Sir Isumbras, taking his eldest son in his arms, carried him over to the opposite bank, and placing him under a bush of broom, directed him to dry his tears, and amuse himself by playing with the blossoms till his return with his brothers. But scarcely had he left the place when a lion, starting from a neighbouring thicket, seized the child and bore him away into the recesses of the forest. The second son became, in like manner, the prey of an enormous leopard; and the disconsolate mother, when carried over with her infant to the fatal spot, was with difficulty persuaded to survive the loss of her two elder children. Sir Isumbras, though he could not repress the tears extorted by this cruel calamity, exerted himself to console his wife, and, humbly confessing his sins, contented himself with praying that his present misery might be accepted by Heaven as a partial expiation.
Through forest they went days three,
Till they came to the Greekish sea;
They grette,[[575]] and were full wo!
As they stood upon the land,
They saw a fleet sailand,[[576]]
Three hundred ships and mo.[[577]]
With top-castels set on-loft,
Richly then were they wrought,
With joy and mickle[[578]] pride:
A heathen king was therein,
That Christendom came to win;
His power was full wide.
It was now seven days since the pilgrims had tasted bread or meat; the soudan’s[[579]] galley, therefore, was no sooner moored to the beach than they hastened on board to beg for food. The soudan, under the apprehension that they were spies, ordered them to be driven back on shore; but his attendants observed to him that these could not be common beggars; that the robust limbs and tall stature of the husband proved him to be a knight in disguise; and that the delicate complexion of the wife, who was “bright as blossom on tree,” formed a striking contrast to the ragged apparel with which she was very imperfectly covered. They were now brought into the royal presence; and the soudan, addressing Sir Isumbras, immediately offered him as much treasure as he should require, on condition that he should renounce Christianity and consent to fight under the Saracen banners. The answer was a respectful but peremptory refusal, concluded by an earnest petition for a little food; but the soudan, having by this time turned his eyes from Sir Isumbras to the beautiful companion of his pilgrimage, paid no attention to his request.
The soudan beheld that lady there,
Him thought an angel that she were,
Comen a-down from heaven;
“Man! I will give thee gold and fee,
An thou that woman will sellen me,
More than thou can neven.[[580]]
I will give thee an hundred pound
Of pennies that been whole and round,
And rich robes seven:
She shall be queen of my land,
And all men bow unto her hand,
And none withstand her steven.”[[581]]
Sir Isumbras said, “Nay!
My wife I will nought sell away,
Though ye me for her sloo![[582]]
I weddid her in Goddislay,
To hold her to mine ending day,
Both for weal and wo.”
It evidently would require no small share of casuistry to construe this declaration into an acceptance of the bargain; but the Saracens, having heard the offer of their sovereign, deliberately counted out the stipulated sum on the mantle of Sir Isumbras; took possession of the lady; carried the knight with his infant son on shore; beat him till he was scarcely able to move; and then returned for further orders. During this operation, the soudan, with his own hand, placed the regal crown on the head of his intended bride; but recollecting that the original project of the voyage to Europe was to conquer it, which might possibly occasion a loss of some time, he delayed his intended nuptial, and ordered a fast-sailing vessel to convey her to his dominions, providing her at the same time with a charter addressed to his subjects, in which he enjoined them to obey her, from the moment of her landing, as their legitimate sovereign.
The lady, emboldened by these tokens of deference on the part of her new lord, now fell on her knees and entreated his permission to pass a few moments in private with her former husband, and the request was instantly granted by the complaisant Saracen. Sir Isumbras, still smarting from his bruises, was conducted with great respect and ceremony to his wife, who, embracing him with tears, earnestly conjured him to seek her out as soon as possible in her new dominions, to slay his infidel rival, and to take possession of a throne which was probably reserved to him by Heaven as an indemnification for his past losses. She then supplied him with provisions for a fortnight; kissed him and her infant son; swooned three times; and then set sail for Africa.
Sir Isumbras, who had been set on shore quite confounded by this quick succession of strange adventures, followed the vessel with his eyes till it vanished from his sight, and then taking his son by the hand led him up to some rocky woodlands in the neighbourhood. Here they sat down under a tree, and after a short repast, which was moistened with their tears, resumed their journey. But they were again bewildered in the forest, and, after gaining the summit of the mountain without being able to descry a single habitation, lay down on the bare ground and resigned themselves to sleep. The next morning Sir Isumbras found that his misfortunes were not yet terminated. He had carried his stock of provisions, together with his gold, the fatal present of the soudan, enveloped in a scarlet mantle; and scarcely had the sun darted its first rays on the earth when an eagle, attracted by the red cloth, swooped down upon the treasure and bore it off in his talons. Sir Isumbras, waking at the moment, perceived the theft, and for some time hastily pursued the flight of the bird, who, he expected, would speedily drop the heavy and useless burthen; but he was disappointed; for the eagle, constantly towering as he approached the sea, at length directed his flight towards the opposite shore of Africa. Sir Isumbras slowly returned to his child, whom he had no longer the means of feeding; but the wretched father only arrived in time to behold the boy snatched from him by a unicorn. The knight was now quite disheartened. But his last calamity was so evidently miraculous that even the grief of the father was nearly absorbed by the contrition of the sinner. He fell on his knees and uttered a most fervent prayer to Jesus and the Virgin, and then proceeded on his journey.
His attention was soon attracted by the sound of a smith’s bellows: he quickly repaired to the forge and requested the charitable donation of a little food; but was told by the labourers that he seemed as well able to work as they did, and they had nothing to throw away in charity.
Then answered the knight again,
“For meat would I swink[[583]] fain.”
Fast he bare and drow;[[584]]
They given him meat and drink anon.
And taughten him to bear stone:
Then had he shame enow.
This servitude lasted a twelvemonth, and seven years expired before he had fully attained all the mysteries of his new profession. He employed his few leisure hours in fabricating a complete suit of armour: every year had brought him an account of the progress of the Saracens; and he could not help entertaining a hope that his arm, though so ignobly employed, was destined at some future day to revenge the wrongs of the Christians, as well as the injury which he had personally received from the unbelievers.
At length he heard that the Christian army had again taken the field; that the day was fixed for a great and final effort; and that a plain at an inconsiderable distance from his shop was appointed for the scene of action. Sir Isumbras rose before day, buckled on his armour, and mounting a horse which had hitherto been employed in carrying coals, proceeded to the field and took a careful view of the disposition of both armies. When the trumpets gave the signal to charge, he dismounted, fell on his knees, and after a short but fervent prayer to Heaven, again sprang into his saddle and rode into the thickest ranks of the enemy. His uncouth war-horse and awkward armour had scarcely less effect than his wonderful address and courage in attracting the attention of both parties; and when after three desperate charges, his sorry steed was slain under him, one of the Christian chiefs made a powerful effort for his rescue, bore him to a neighbouring eminence, and presented to him a more suitable coat of armour, and a horse more worthy of the heroic rider.
When he was armed on that stead,
It is seen where his horse yede,[[585]]
And shall be evermore.
As sparkle glides off the glede,[[586]]
In that stour he made many bleed,
And wrought hem wonder sore.
He rode up into the mountain,
The soudan soon hath he slain,
And many that with him were.
All that day lasted the fight;
Sir Isumbras, that noble knight,
Wan the battle there.
Knights and squires have him sought,
And before the king him brought;
Full sore wounded was he.
They asked what was his name;
He said, “Sire, a smith’s man;
What will ye do with me?”
The Christian king said, than,
“I trow never smith’s man
In war was half so wight.”
“I bid[[587]] you, give me meat and drink
And what that I will after think,
Till I have kevered[[588]] my might.”
The king a great oath sware,
As soon as he whole were,
That he would dub him knight.
In a nunnery they him leaved,
To heal the wound in his heved,[[589]]
That he took in that fight.
The nuns of him were full fain,
For he had the soudan slain,
And many heathen hounds;
For his sorrow they gan sore rue;
Every day they salved him new,
And stoppèd well his wounds.
We may fairly presume, without derogating from the merit of the holy sisters or from the virtue of their salves and bandages, that the knight’s recovery was no less accelerated by the pleasure of having chastised the insolent possessor of his wife and the author of his contumelious beating. In a few days his health was restored; and having provided himself with a “scrip and pike” and the other accoutrements of a palmer, he took his leave of the nuns, directed his steps once more to the “Greekish Sea,” and, embarking on board of a vessel which he found ready to sail, speedily arrived at the port of Acre.
During seven years, which were employed in visiting every part of the Holy Land, the penitent Sir Isumbras led a life of continued labour and mortification: fed during the day by the precarious contributions of the charitable, and sleeping at night in the open air, without any addition to the scanty covering which his pilgrim’s weeds, after seven years’ service, were able to afford. At length his patience and contrition were rewarded. After a day spent in fruitless applications for a little food,
Beside the burgh of Jerusalem
He set him down by a well-stream,
Sore wepand[[590]] for his sin.
And as he sat, about midnight,
There came an angel fair and bright,
And brought him bread and wine;
He said, “Palmer, well thou be!
The King of Heaven greeteth well thee;
Forgiven is sin thine.”
Sir Isumbras accepted with pious gratitude the donation of food, by which his strength was instantly restored, and again set out on his travels; but he was still a widower, still deprived of his children, and as poor as ever; nor had his heavenly monitor afforded him any hint for his future guidance. He wandered therefore through the country, without any settled purpose, till he arrived at a “rich burgh,” built round a “fair castle,” the possessor of which, he was told, was a charitable queen, who daily distributed a florin of gold to every poor man who approached her gates, and even condescended to provide food and lodging within her palace for such as were distinguished by superior misery. Sir Isumbras presented himself with the rest; and his emaciated form and squalid garments procured him instant admittance.
The rich queen in hall was set;
Knights her served, at hand and feet,
In rich robes of pall:
In the floor a cloth was laid;
“The poor palmer,” the steward said,
“Shall sit above you all.”
Meat and drink forth they brought;
He sat still, and ate right nought,
But looked about the hall.
So mickle he saw of game and glee
(Swiche mirthis he was wont to see),
The tears he let down fall.
Conduct so unusual attracted the attention of the whole company, and even of the queen, who, ordering “a chair with a cushion” to be placed near the palmer, took her seat in it, entered into conversation with him on the subject of his long and painful pilgrimage, and was much edified by the moral lessons which he interspersed in his narrative. But no importunity could induce him to taste food: he was sick at heart, and required the aid of solitary meditation to overcome the painful recollections which continually assailed him. The queen was more and more astonished, but at length left him to his reflections, after declaring that, “for her lord’s soul, or for his love, if he were still alive,” she was determined to retain the holy palmer in her palace, and to assign him a convenient apartment, together with a servant to attend him.
An interval of fifteen years, passed in the laborious occupations of blacksmith and pilgrim, may be supposed to have produced a very considerable alteration in the appearance of Sir Isumbras; and even his voice, subdued by disease and penance, may have failed to discover the gallant knight under the disguise which he had so long assumed. But that his wife (for such she was) should have been equally altered by the sole operation of time; that the air and gestures and action of a person once so dear and so familiar to him should have awakened no trace of recollection in the mind of a husband, though in the midst of scenes which painfully recalled the memory of his former splendour, is more extraordinary. Be this as it may, the knight and the queen, though lodged under the same roof and passing much of their time together, continued to bewail the miseries of their protracted widowhood.
Sir Isumbras, however, speedily recovered, in the plentiful court of the rich queen, his health and strength, and with these the desire of returning to his former exercises. A tournament was proclaimed; and the lists, which were formed immediately under the windows of the castle, were quickly occupied by a number of Saracen knights, all of whom Sir Isumbras successively overthrew. So dreadful was the stroke of his spear, that many were killed at the first encounter; some escaped with a few broken bones; others were thrown headlong into the castle ditch; but the greater number consulted their safety by a timely flight; while the queen contemplated with pleasure and astonishment the unparalleled exploits of her favourite palmer.
Then fell it, upon a day,
The Knight went him for to play,
As it was ere his kind;
A fowl’s nest he found on high;
A red cloth therein he seygh[[591]]
Wavand[[592]] in the wind.
To the nest he gan win;[[593]]
His own mantle he found therein;
The gold there gan he find.
The painful recollection awakened by this discovery weighed heavily on the soul of Sir Isumbras. He bore the fatal treasure to his chamber, concealed it under his bed, and spent the remainder of the day in tears and lamentations. The images of his lost wife and children now began to haunt him continually; and his altered demeanour attracted the attention and excited the curiosity of the whole court, and even of the queen, who could only learn from the palmer’s attendant that his melancholy seemed to originate in the discovery of something in a bird’s nest. With this strange report she was compelled to be satisfied, till Sir Isumbras, with the hope of dissipating his grief, began to resume his usual exercises in the field; but no sooner had he quitted his chamber than the “squires” by her command broke open the door, discovered the treasure, and hastened with it to the royal apartment. The sight of the gold and the scarlet mantle immediately explained to the queen the whole mystery of the palmer’s behaviour. She burst into tears; kissed with fervent devotion the memorial of her lost husband; fell into a swoon; and on her recovery told the story to her attendants, and enjoined them to go in quest of the palmer, and to bring him at once before her. A short explanation removed her few remaining doubts; she threw herself into the arms of her husband, and the reunion of this long separated couple was immediately followed by the coronation of Sir Isumbras and by a protracted series of festivities.
The Saracen subjects of the Christian sovereign continued, with unshaken loyalty, to partake of the plentiful entertainments provided for all ranks of people on this solemn occasion; but no sooner had the pious Sir Isumbras signified to them the necessity of their immediate conversion, than his whole “parliament” adopted the resolution of deposing and committing to the flames their newly-acquired sovereign, as soon as they should have obtained the concurrence of the neighbouring princes. Two of these readily joined their forces for the accomplishment of this salutary purpose, and invading the territories of Sir Isumbras with an army of thirty thousand men, sent him, according to usual custom, a solemn defiance. Sir Isumbras boldly answered the defiance, issued the necessary orders, called for his arms, sprang upon his horse, and prepared to march out against the enemy; when he discovered that his subjects had, to a man, abandoned him, and that he must encounter singly the whole host of the invaders.
Sir Isumbras was bold and keen,
And took his leave at the queen,
And sighed wonder sore:
He said, “Madam, have good day!
Sickerly, as you I say,
For now and evermore!”
“Help me, sir, that I were dight
In arms, as it were a knight;
I will with you fare:
Gif God would us grace send,
That we may together end,
Then done were all my care.”
Soon was the lady dight
In arms, as it were a knight;
He gave her spear and shield:
Again[[594]] thirty thousand Saracens and mo.[[595]]
There came no more but they two,
When they met in field.
Never, probably, did a contest take place between such disproportioned forces. Sir Isumbras was rather encumbered than assisted by the presence of his beautiful but feeble helpmate; and the faithful couple were upon the point of being crushed by the charge of the enemy, when three unknown knights suddenly made their appearance, and as suddenly turned the fortune of the day. The first of these was mounted on a lion, the second on a leopard, and the third on a unicorn. The Saracen cavalry, at the first sight of these unexpected antagonists, dispersed in all directions. But flight and resistance were equally hopeless: three and twenty thousand unbelievers were soon laid lifeless on the plain by the talons of the lion and leopard and by the resistless horn of the unicorn, or by the swords of their young and intrepid riders; and the small remnant of the Saracen army who escaped from the general carnage quickly spread, through every corner of the Mohammedan world, the news of this signal and truly miraculous victory.
Sir Isumbras, who does not seem to have possessed the talent for unravelling mysteries, had never suspected that his three wonderful auxiliaries were his own children, whom Providence had sent to his assistance at the moment of his greatest distress; but he was not the less thankful when informed of the happy termination of all his calamities. The royal family were received in the city with every demonstration of joy by his penitent subjects, whose loyalty had been completely revived by the recent miracle. Magnificent entertainments were provided; after which Sir Isumbras, having easily overrun the territories of his two pagan neighbours, who had been slain in the last battle, proceeded to conquer a third kingdom for his youngest son; and the four monarchs, uniting their efforts for the propagation of the true faith, enjoyed the happiness of witnessing the baptism of all the inhabitants of their respective dominions.
They lived and died in good intent;
Unto heaven their souls went,
When that they dead were.
Jesu Christ, heaven’s king,
Give us, aye, his blessing,
And shield us from care!
On comparing these several versions it will be seen that, while they differ one from another in some of the details, yet the fundamental outline is identical, with the single exception of the Tibetan story, which, in common with Tibetan tales generally, has departed very considerably from the original. A king, or knight, is suddenly deprived of all his possessions, and with his wife and two children becomes a wanderer on the face of the earth; his wife is forcibly taken from him; he afterwards loses his two sons; he is once more raised to affluence; his sons, having been adopted and educated by a charitable person, enter his service; their mother recognises them through overhearing their conversation; finally husband and wife and children are happily re-united. Such is the general outline of the story, though modifications have been made in the details of the different versions—probably through its being transmitted orally in some instances. Thus in the Arabian story, the king is ruined apparently in consequence of no fault of his own; in the Panjábí version, he relinquishes his wealth to a fakír as a pious action; in the Kashmírí and in the romance of Sir Isumbras, the hero loses his wealth as a punishment for his overweening pride; in the legend of St. Eustache, as in the story of Job, the calamities which overtake the Christian convert are designed by Heaven as a trial of his patience and fortitude; while even in the corrupted Tibetan story the ruin of the monarch is reflected in the destruction of the parents of the heroine by a hurricane. In both the Kashmírí and the Panjábí versions, the father is swallowed by a fish (or an alligator) in re-crossing the river to fetch his second child; in the Tibetan story the wife loses her husband, who is killed by a snake, and having taken one of her children over the river, she is returning for the other when, looking back, she discovers her babe in the jaws of a wolf: both her children perish: in the European versions they are carried off by wild beasts and rescued by strangers—the romance of Sir Isumbras is singular in representing the number of children to be three. Only in the Arabian story do we find the father carrying his wife and children in safety across the stream, and the latter afterwards lost in the forest. The Kashmírí and “Gesta” versions correspond exactly in representing the shipman as seizing the lady because her husband could not pay the passage-money: in the Arabian she is entrapped in the ship, owned by a Magian, on the pretext that there is on board a woman in labour; in Sir Isumbras she is forcibly “bought” by the Soudan. She is locked up in a chest by the Magian; sent to rule his country by the Soudan; respectfully treated by the merchant in the Kashmírí story, and, apparently, also by Kandan in the Panjábí legend; in the story of St. Eustache her persecutor dies and she is living in humble circumstances when discovered by her husband.—I think there is internal evidence, apart from the existence of the Tibetan version, to lead to the conclusion that the story is of Buddhist extraction, and if such be the fact, it furnishes a further example of the indebtedness of Christian hagiology to Buddhist tales and legends.
AL-MALIK AL-ZAHIR AND THE SIXTEEN CAPTAINS OF POLICE.—Vol. II. p. 3.
We must, I think, regard this group of tales as being genuine narratives of the exploits of Egyptian sharpers. From the days of Herodotus to the present time, Egypt has bred the most expert thieves in the world. The policemen don’t generally exhibit much ability for coping with the sharpers whose tricks they so well recount; but indeed our home-grown “bobbies” are not particularly quick-witted.
THE THIEF’S TALE.—Vol. II. p. 42.
A parallel to the woman’s trick of shaving off the beards and blackening the faces of the robbers is found in the well-known legend, as told by Herodotus (Euterpe, 121), of the robbery of the treasure-house of Rhampsinitus king of Egypt, where the clever thief, having made the soldiers dead drunk, shaves off the right side of their beards and then decamps with his brother’s headless body.
THE NINTH CONSTABLE’S STORY.—Vol. II. p. 46.
The narrow escape of the singing-girl hidden under a pile of halfah grass may be compared with an adventure of a fugitive Mexican prince whose history, as related by Prescott, is as full of romantic daring and hair’s-breadth ’scapes as that of Scanderbeg or the “Young Chevalier.” This prince had just time to turn the crest of a hill as his enemies were climbing it on the other side, when he fell in with a girl who was reaping chian, a Mexican plant, the seed of which is much used in the drinks of the country. He persuaded her to cover him with the stalks she had been cutting. When his pursuers came up and inquired if she had seen the fugitive, the girl coolly answered that she had, and pointed out a path as the one he had taken.
THE FIFTEENTH CONSTABLE’S STORY.—Vol. II. p. 59.
The concluding part of this story differs very materially from that of the Greek legend of Ibycus (fl. B.C. 540), which is thus related in a small MS. collection of Arabian and Persian anecdotes in my possession, done into English from the French:
It is written in the history of the first kings that in the reign of a Grecian king there lived a philosopher named Ibycus, who surpassed in sagacity all other sages of Greece. Ibycus was once sent by the king to a neighbouring court. On the way he was attacked by robbers, who, suspecting him to have much money, formed the design of killing him. “Your object in taking my life,” said Ibycus, “is to obtain my money; I give it up to you, but allow me to live.” The robbers paid no attention to his words, and persisted in their purpose. The wretched Ibycus, in his despair, looked about him to see if any one was coming to his assistance, but no person was in sight. At that very moment a flock of cranes flew overhead. “O cranes!” cried Ibycus, “know that I have been seized in this desert by these wicked men, and I die from their blows. Avenge me, and demand from them my blood.” At these words the robbers burst into laughter: “To take away life from those who have lost their reason,” they observed, “is to add nothing to their hurt.” So saying, they killed Ibycus and divided his money. On receipt of the news that Ibycus had been murdered, the inhabitants of the town were exasperated and felt great sorrow. They caused strict inquiries to be made for the murderers, but they could not be found. After some time the Greeks were celebrating a feast. The inhabitants of the adjoining districts came in crowds to the temples. The murderers of Ibycus also came, and everywhere showed themselves. Meanwhile a flock of cranes appeared in the air and hovered above the people, uttering cries so loud and prolonged that the prayers and ceremonies were interrupted. One of the robbers looked with a smile at his comrades, saying, by way of joke, “These cranes come without doubt to avenge the blood of Ibycus.” Some one of the town, who was near them, heard these words, repeated them to his neighbour, and they together reported them to the king. The robbers were taken, strictly cross-examined, confessed their crime, and suffered for it a just punishment. In this way the cranes inflicted vengeance on the murderers of Ibycus. But we ought to see in this incident a matter which is concealed in it: This philosopher, although apparently addressing his words to the cranes, was really imploring help from their Creator; he hoped, in asking their aid, that He would not suffer his blood to flow unavenged. So God accomplished his hopes; and willed that cranes should be the cause that his death was avenged in order that the sages of the world should learn from it the power and wisdom of the Creator.
This ancient legend was probably introduced into Arabian literature in the 9th century, when translations of so many of the best Greek works where made; and, no doubt, it was adapted in the following Indian (Muslim) story:[[596]]
There was a certain pir, or saint, of great wisdom, learning, and sanctity, who sat by the wayside expounding the Kurán to all who would listen to him. He dwelt in the out-buildings of a ruined mosque close by, his only companion being a maina, or hill-starling, which he had taught to proclaim the excellence of the formula of his religion, saying, “The Prophet is just!” It chanced that two travellers passing that way beheld the holy man at his devotions, and though far from being religious persons yet tarried a while to hear the words of truth. Evening now drawing on, the saint invited his apparently pious auditors to his dwelling, and set before them such coarse food as he had to offer. Having eaten and refreshed themselves, they were astonished at the wisdom displayed by the bird, who continued to repeat holy texts from the Kurán. The meal ended, they all lay down to sleep, and while the good man reposed, his treacherous guests, who envied him the possession of a bird that in their hands might be the means of enriching them, determined to steal the treasure and murder its master. So they stabbed the sleeping devotee to the heart and then seized hold of the bird’s cage. But, unperceived by them, the door of it had been left open and the bird was not to be found. After searching for the bird in vain, they considered it necessary to dispose of the body, since, if discovered, suspicion would assuredly fall upon them; and carrying it away to what they deemed a safe distance they buried it. Vexed to be obliged to leave the place without obtaining the reward of their evil deeds, they again looked carefully for the bird, but without success; it was nowhere to be seen, and so they were compelled to go forward without the object of their search. The maina had witnessed the atrocious deed, and unseen had followed the murderers to the place where they had buried the body; it then perched upon the tree beneath which the saint had been wont to enlighten the minds of his followers, and when they assembled flew into their midst, exclaiming, “The Prophet is just!” making short flights and then returning. These unusual motions, together with the absence of their preceptor, induced the people to follow it, and directing its flight to the grave of its master, it uttered a mournful cry over the newly-covered grave. The villagers, astonished, began to remove the earth, and soon discovered the bloody corse. Surprised and horror-stricken, they looked about for some traces of the murderers, and perceiving that the bird had resumed the movements which had first induced them to follow it, they suffered it to lead them forward. Before evening fell, the avengers came up with two men, who no sooner heard the maina exclaim, “The Prophet is just!” and saw the crowd that accompanied it, than they fell upon their knees, confessing that the Prophet had indeed brought their evil deeds to light; so, their crime being thus made manifest, summary justice was inflicted upon them.
TALE OF THE DAMSEL TUHFAT AL-KULUB.—Vol. II. p. 70.
An entertaining story, but very inconsistent in the character of Iblis, who is constantly termed, in good Muslim fashion, “the accursed,” yet seems to be somewhat of a follower of the Prophet, and on the whole a good-natured sort of fellow. His mode of expressing his approval of the damsel’s musical “talent” is, to say the least, original.
WOMEN’S WILES.—Vol. II. p. 137.
A variant—perhaps an older form—of this story occurs in the tale of Prince Fadlallah, which is interwoven with the History of Prince Calaf and the Princess of China, in the Persian tales of “The Thousand and One Days”:
The prince, on his way to Baghdád, is attacked by robbers, his followers are all slain, and himself made prisoner, but he is set at liberty by the compassionate wife of the robber-chief during his absence on a plundering expedition. When he reaches Baghdád he has no resource but to beg his bread, and having stationed himself in front of a large mansion, an old female slave presently comes out and gives him a loaf. At this moment a gust of wind blew aside the curtain of a window and discovered to his admiring eyes a most beautiful damsel, of whom he became immediately enamoured. He inquired of a passer-by the name of the owner of the mansion, and was informed that it belonged to a man called Mouaffac, who had been lately governor of the city, but having quarrelled with the kází, who was of a revengeful disposition, the latter had found means to disgrace him with the khalíf and to have him deprived of his office. After lingering near the house in vain till nightfall, in hopes of once more obtaining a glimpse of this beauty, he retired for the night to a burying-ground, where he was soon joined by two thieves, who pressed upon him a share of the good cheer with which they had provided themselves; but while the thieves were feasting and talking over a robbery which they had just accomplished, the police suddenly pounced upon them, and took all three and cast them into prison.
In the morning they were examined by the kází, and the thieves, seeing it was useless to deny it, confessed their crime. The prince then told the kází how he chanced to fall into company of the thieves, who confirmed all he said, and he was set at liberty. Then the kází began to question him as to how he had employed his time since he came to Baghdád, to which he answered very frankly but concealed his rank. On his mentioning the brief glance he had of the beautiful lady at the window of the ex-governor’s house, the kází’s eyes sparkled with apparent satisfaction, and he assured the prince that he should have the lady for his bride; for, believing the prince to be a mere beggarly adventurer, he resolved to foist him on Mouaffac as the son of a great monarch. So, having sent the prince to the bath and provided him with rich garments, the kází despatched a messenger to request Mouaffac to come to him on important business. When the ex-governor arrived, the kází told him blandly that there was now an excellent opportunity for doing away the ill will that had so long existed between them. “It is this,” continued he: “the prince of Basra, having fallen in love with your daughter from report of her great beauty, has just come to Baghdád, unknown to his father, and intends to demand her of you in marriage. He is lodged in my house, and is most anxious that this affair should be arranged by my interposition, which is the more agreeable to me, since it will, I trust, be the means of reconciling our differences.” Mouaffac expressed his surprise that the prince of Basra should think of marrying his daughter, and especially that the proposal should come through the kází, of all men. But the kází begged him to forget their former animosity and consent to the immediate celebration of the nuptials. While they were thus talking, the prince entered, in a magnificent dress, and was not a little astonished to be presented to Mouaffac by the treacherous kází as the prince of Basra, who had come as a suitor for his daughter in marriage. The ex-governor saluted him with every token of profound respect, and expressed his sense of the honour of such an alliance: his daughter was unworthy to wait upon the meanest of the prince’s slaves. In brief, the marriage is at once celebrated, and the prince duly retires to the bridal chamber with the beauteous daughter of Mouaffac. But in the morning, at an early hour, a servant of the kází knocks at his door, and, on the prince opening it, says that he brings him his rags of clothes and is required to take back the dress which the kází had lent him yesterday to personate the prince of Basra. The prince, having donned his tattered garments, said to his wife, “The kází thinks he has married you to a wretched beggar, but I am no whit inferior in rank to the prince of Basra—I am also a prince, being the only son of the king of Mosel,” and then proceeded to recount all his adventures. When he had concluded his recital, the lady despatched a servant to procure a suitable dress for the prince, which when he had put on, she said, “I see it all: the kází, no doubt, believes that by this time we are all overwhelmed with shame and grief. But what must be his feelings when he learns that he has been a benefactor to his enemies! Before you disclose to him your real rank, however, we must contrive to punish him for his malicious intentions. There is a dyer in this town who has a frightfully ugly daughter—but leave this affair in my hands.”
The lady then dressed herself in plain but becoming apparel, and went out of the house alone. She proceeded to the court of the kází, who no sooner cast his eyes upon her than he was struck with her elegant form. He sent an officer to inquire of her who she was and what she had come about. She made answer that she was the daughter of an artisan in the city, and that she desired to have some private conversation with the kází. When the officer reported the lady’s reply, the kází directed her to be conducted into a private chamber, where he presently joined her, and gallantly placed his services at her disposal. The lady now removed her veil, and asked him whether he saw anything ugly or repulsive in her features. The kází on seeing her beautiful face was suddenly plunged in the sea of love, and declared that her forehead was of polished silver, her eyes were sparkling diamonds, her mouth a ruby casket containing a bracelet of pearls. Then she displayed her arms, so white and plump, the sight of which threw the kází into ecstasies and almost caused him to faint. Quoth the lady, “I must tell you, my lord, that with all the beauty I possess, my father, a dyer in the city, keeps me secluded, and declares to all who come to ask me in marriage that I am an ugly, deformed monster, a mere skeleton, lame, and full of diseases.” On this the kází burst into a tirade against the brutal father who could thus traduce so much beauty, and vowed that he would make her his wife that same day. The lady, after expressing her fears that he would not find it easy to gain her father’s consent, took her leave and returned home.
The kází lost no time in sending for the dyer, and, after complimenting him upon his reputation for piety, said to him, “I am informed that behind the curtain of chastity you have a daughter ripe for marriage. Is not this true?” Replied the dyer, “My lord, you have been rightly informed. I have a daughter who is indeed fully ripe for marriage, for she is more than thirty years of age; but the poor creature is not fit to be a wife to any man. She is very ugly, lame, leprous, and foolish. In short, she is such a monster that I am obliged to keep her out of all people’s sight.” “Ha!” exclaimed the kází, “you can’t impose on me with such a tale. I was prepared for it. But let me tell you that I myself am ready and willing to marry that same ugly and leprous daughter of yours, with all her defects.” When the dyer heard this, he looked the kází full in the face and said, “My lord, you are welcome to divert yourself by making a jest of my daughter.” “No,” replied the kází, “I am quite in earnest. I demand your daughter in marriage.” The dyer broke into laughter, saying, “By Allah, some one has meant to play you a trick, my lord. I forewarn you that she is ugly, lame, and leprous.” “True,” responded the kází, with a knowing smile; “I know her by these tokens. I shall take her notwithstanding.” The dyer, seeing him determined to marry his daughter, and being now convinced that he had been imposed upon by some ill-wisher, thought to himself, “I must demand of him a round sum of money which may cause him to cease troubling me any further about my poor daughter.” So he said to the kází, “My lord, I am ready to obey your command; but I will not part with my daughter unless you pay me beforehand a dowry of a thousand sequins.” Replied the kází, “Although, methinks, your demand is somewhat exorbitant, yet I will pay you the money at once,” which having done, he ordered the contract to be drawn up. But when it came to be signed the dyer declared that he would not sign save in the presence of a hundred men of the law. “Thou art very distrustful,” said the kází, “but I will comply in everything, for I am resolved to make sure of thy daughter.” So he sent for all the men of law in the city, and when they were assembled at the house of the kází, the dyer said that he was now willing to sign the contract; “But I declare,” he added, “in the presence of these honourable witnesses, that I do so on the condition that if my daughter should not prove to your liking when you have seen her, and you should determine to divorce her, you shall oblige yourself to give her a thousand sequins of gold in addition to the same amount which I have already received from you.” “Agreed,” said the kází, “I oblige myself to it, and call this whole assembly to be witnesses. Art thou now satisfied?” “I am,” replied the dyer, who then went his way, saying that he would at once send him his bride.
As soon as the dyer was gone, the assembly broke up, and the kází was left alone in his house. He had been two years married to the daughter of a merchant of Baghdad, with whom he had hitherto lived on very amicable terms. When she heard that he was arranging for a second marriage, she came to him in a great rage. “How now,” said she, “two hands in one glove! two swords in one scabbard! two wives in one house! Go, fickle man! Since the caresses of a young and faithful wife cannot secure your constancy, I am ready to yield my place to my rival and retire to my own family. Repudiate me—return my dowry—and you shall never see me more.” “I am glad you have thus anticipated me,” answered the kází, “for I was somewhat perplexed how to acquaint you of my new marriage.” So saying, he opened a coffer and took out a purse of five hundred sequins of gold, and putting it into her hands, “There, woman,” said he, “thy dowry is in that purse: begone, and take with you what belongs to you. I divorce thee once; I divorce thee twice; three times I divorce thee. And that thy parents may be satisfied thou art divorced from me, I shall give thee a certificate signed by myself and my nayb.” This he did accordingly, and his wife went to her father’s house, with her bill of divorce and her dowry.
The kází then gave orders to furnish an apartment sumptuously for the reception of his bride. The floor was spread with velvet carpets, the walls were hung with rich tapestry, and couches of gold and silver brocade were placed around the room. The bridal chamber was decked with caskets filled with the most exquisite perfumes. When everything was in readiness, the kází impatiently expected the arrival of his bride, and at last was about to despatch a messenger to the dyer’s when a porter entered, carrying a wooden chest covered with a piece of green taffeta. “What hast thou brought me there, friend?” asked the kází. “My lord,” replied the porter, setting the chest on the floor, “I bring your bride.” The kází opened the chest, and discovered a woman of three feet and a half, defective in every limb and feature. He was horrified at the sight of this object, and throwing the covering hastily over it, demanded of the porter, “What wouldst thou have me do with this frightful creature?” “My lord,” said the porter, “this is the daughter of Omar the dyer, who told me that you had espoused her out of pure inclination.” “O Allah!” exclaimed the kází, “is it possible to marry such a monster as this?” Just then, the dyer, well knowing that the kazi must be surprised, came in. “Thou wretch,” cried the kází, “how dost thou dare to trifle with me? In place of this hideous object, send hither your other daughter, whose beauty is beyond comparison; otherwise thou shalt soon know what it is to insult me.” Quoth the dyer, “My lord, I swear, by Him who out of darkness produced light, that I have no other daughter but this. I told you repeatedly that she was not for your purpose, but you would not believe my words. Who, then, is to blame?” Upon this the kází began to cool, and said to the dyer, “I must tell you, friend Omar, that this morning there came to me a most beautiful damsel, who pretended that you were her father, and that you represented her to everybody as a monster, on purpose to deter all suitors that came to ask her in marriage.” “My lord,” answered the dyer, “this beautiful damsel must be an impostor; some one, undoubtedly, owes you a grudge.” Then the kází, having reflected for a few minutes, said to the dyer, “Bid the porter carry thy daughter home again. Keep the thousand sequins of gold which I gave thee, but ask no more of me, if thou desirest that we should continue friends.” The dyer, knowing the implacable disposition of the kází, thought it advisable to content himself with what he had already gained, and the kází, having formally divorced his hideous bride, sent her away with her father. The affair soon got wind in the city and everybody was highly diverted with the trick practised on the kází.
It will be observed that in the Arabian story there are two clever devices: that of the lady who tricks the boastful merchant, whose motto was that men’s craft is superior to women’s craft, into marrying the ugly daughter of the kází; and that of the merchant to get rid of his bad bargain by disgusting the kází with the alliance. The scene at the house of the worthy judge—the crowd of low rascals piping, drumming, and capering, and felicitating themselves on their pretended kinsman the merchant’s marriage—is highly humorous. This does not occur in the Persian story, because it is the kází who has been duped into marrying the dyer’s deformed daughter, and she is therefore simply packed off again to her father’s house.
That the tales of the “Thousand and One Days” are not (as is supposed by the writer of an article on the several English versions of The Nights in the “Edinburgh Review” for July 1886, p. 167) mere imitations of Galland[[597]] is most certain, apart from the statement in the preface to Petis’ French translation, which there is no reason to doubt—see vol. x. of The Nights, p. 166, note 1. Sir William Ouseley, in his Travels, vol. ii., p. 21, note, states that he brought from Persia a manuscript which comprised, inter alia, a portion of the “Hazár ú Yek Rúz,” or the Thousand and One Days, which agreed with Petis’ translation of the same stories. In the Persian collection entitled “Shamsa ú Kuhkuha” occur several of the tales and incidents, for example, the Story of Nasiraddoli King of Mousel, the Merchant of Baghdád, and the Fair Zeinib, while the Story of the King of Thibet and the Princess of the Naimans has its parallel in the Turkish “Kirk Vazír,” or Forty Vazírs. Again, the Story of Couloufe and the Beautiful Dilara reminds us of that of Haji the Cross-grained in Malcolm’s “Sketches of Persia.” But of the French translation not a single good word can be said—the Oriental “costume” and phraseology have almost entirely disappeared, and between Petis de la Croix and the author of “Gil Blas”—who is said to have had a hand in the work—the tales have become ludicrously Frenchified. The English translation made from the French is, if possible, still worse. We there meet with “persons of quality,” “persons of fashion,” with “seigneurs,” and a thousand and one other inconsistencies and absurdities. A new translation is much to be desired. The copy of the Persian text made by Petis is probably in the Paris Library and Ouseley’s fragment is doubtless among his other Oriental MSS. in the Bodleian. But one should suppose that copies of the “Hazár ú Yek Rúz” may be readily procured at Ispahán or Tehrán, and at a very moderate cost, since the Persians now-a-days are so poor in general that they are eager to exchange any books they possess for the “circulating medium.”
NUR AL-DIN AND THE DAMSEL SITT AL-MILAH. Vol. II. p. 151.
This is an excellent tale; the incidents occur naturally and the reader’s interest in the fortunes of the hero and heroine never flags. The damsel’s sojourn with the old Muezzin—her dispatching him daily to the shroff—bears some analogy to part of the tale of Ghanim the Slave of Love (vol. ii. of The Nights), which, by the way, finds close parallels in the Turkish “Forty Vazírs” (the Lady’s 18th story in Mr. Gibb’s translation), the Persian “Thousand and One Days” (story of Aboulcasem of Basra,) and the “Bagh o Bahár” (story of the First Dervish). This tale is, in fact, a compound of incidents occurring in a number of different Arabian fictions.
TALE OF KING INS BIN KAYS AND HIS DAUGHTER. Vol. II. p. 191.
Here we have another instance of a youth falling in love with the portrait of a pretty girl (see ante, p. 328). The doughty deeds performed by the young prince against thousands of his foes throw into the shade the exploits of the Bedouin hero Antar, and those of our own famous champions Sir Guy of Warwick and Sir Bevis of Hampton.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
FIRUZ AND HIS WIFE, p. 301.
I find yet another variant of this story in my small MS. collection of Arabian and Persian anecdotes, translated from the French (I have not ascertained its source):
They relate that a lord of Basra, while walking one day in his garden, saw the wife of his gardener, who was very beautiful and virtuous. He gave a commission to his gardener which required him to leave his home. He then said to his wife, “Go and shut all the doors.” She went out and soon returned, saying, “I have shut all the doors except one, which I am unable to shut.” The lord asked, “And where is that door?” She replied, “That which is between you and the respect due to your Maker: there is no way of closing it.” When the lord heard these words, he asked the woman’s pardon, and became a better and a wiser man.
We have here a unique form of the wide-spread tale of “The Lion’s Track,” which, while it omits the husband’s part, yet reflects the virtuous wife’s rebuke of the enamoured sultan.
THE SINGER AND THE DRUGGIST, p. 305.
If Straparola’s version is to be considered as an adaptation of Ser Giovanni’s novella—which I do not think very probable—it must be allowed to be an improvement on his model. In the Arabian story the singer is first concealed in a mat, next in the oven, and again in the mat, after which he escapes by clambering over the parapet of the druggist’s roof to that of an adjoining house, and his subsequent adventures seem to be added from a different story. In Ser Giovanni’s version the lover is first hid beneath a heap of half-dried clothes, and next behind the street door, from which he escapes the instant the husband enters, and the latter is treated as a madman by the wife’s relatives and the neighbours—an incident which has parallels in other tales of women’s craft and its prototype, perhaps, in the story of the man who compiled a book of the Wiles of Woman, as told in “Syntipas,” the Greek version of the Book of Sindibad. In Straparola the lover—as in the Arabian story—is concealed three times, first in a basket, then between two boardings, and lastly in a chest containing law papers; and the husband induces him to recount his adventures in presence of the lady’s friends, which having concluded, the lover declares the story to be wholly fictitious: this is a much more agreeable ending than that of Giovanni’s story, and, moreover, it bears a close analogy to the latter part of the Persian tale, where the lover exclaims he is right glad to find it all a dream. Straparola’s version has another point of resemblance in the Persian story—so far as can be judged from Scott’s abstract—and also in the Arabian story: the lover discovers the lady by chance, and is not advised to seek out some object of love, as in Giovanni;—in the Arabian the singer is counselled by the druggist to go about and entertain wine parties. Story-comparers have too much cause to be dissatisfied with Jonathan Scott’s translation of the “Bahár-i-Dánish”—a work avowedly derived from Indian sources—although it is far superior to Dow’s garbled version. The abstracts of a number of the tales which Scott gives in an appendix, while of some use, are generally tantalising: some stories he has altogether omitted “because they are similar to tales already well known” (unfortunately the comparative study of popular fictions was hardly begun in his time); while of others bare outlines are furnished, because he considered them “unfit for general perusal.” But his work, even as it is, has probably never been “generally” read, and he seems to have had somewhat vague notions of “propriety,” to judge by his translations from the Arabic and Persian. A complete English rendering of the “Bahár-i-Dánish” would be welcomed by all interested in the history of fiction.
THE FULLER, HIS WIFE, AND THE TROOPER, p. 329.
The trick played on the silly fuller of dressing him up as a Turkish soldier resembles that of one of the Three Deceitful Women who found a gold ring in the public bath, as related in the Persian story-book, “Shamsa ú Kuhkuha:”
When the wife of the superintendent of police was apprised that her turn had come, she revolved and meditated for some time what trick she was to play off on her lord, and after having come to a conclusion she said one evening to him, “To-morrow I wish that we should both enjoy ourselves at home without interruptions, and I mean to prepare some cakes.” He replied, “Very well, my dear; I have also longed for such an occasion.” The lady had a servant who was very obedient and always covered with the mantle of attachment to her. The next morning she called this youth and said to him, “I have long contemplated the hyacinth grove of thy symmetrical stature; and I know that thou travellest constantly and faithfully on the road of compliance with all my wishes, and that thou seekest to serve me. I have a little business which I wish thee to do for me.” The servant answered, “I shall be happy to comply.” Then the lady gave him a thousand dinars and said, “Go to the convent which is in our vicinity; give this money to one of the kalandars there and say to him, ‘A prisoner whom the Amír had surrendered to the police has escaped last night. He closely resembles thee, and as the superintendent of the police is unable to account to the Amír, he has sent a man to take thee instead of the escaped criminal. I have compassion for thee and mean to rescue thee. Take this sum of money; give me thy dress; and flee from the town; for if thou remainest in it till the morning thou wilt be subjected to torture and wilt lose thy life.’” The servant acted as he was bid, and brought the garments to his mistress. When it was morning she said to her husband, “I know you have long wished to eat sweetmeats, and I shall make some to-day.” He answered, “Very well.” His wife made all her preparations and commenced to bake the sweetmeats. He said to her, “Last night a theft was committed in a certain place, and I sat up late to extort confessions; and as I have spent a sleepless night, I feel tired and wish to repose a little.” The lady replied, “Very well.”
Accordingly the superintendent of the police reclined on the pillow of rest; and when the sweetmeat was ready his wife took a little and putting an opiate into it she handed it to him, saying, “How long will you sleep? To-day is a day of feasting and pleasure, not of sleep and laziness. Lift up your head and see whether I have made the sweets according to your taste.” He raised his head, swallowed a piece of the hot cake and lay down again. The morsel was still in his throat when consciousness left and a deep sleep overwhelmed him. His wife immediately undressed him and put on him the garments of the kalandar. The servant shaved his head and made some tattoo marks on his body. When the night set in the lady called her servant and said, “Hyacinth, be kind enough to take the superintendent on thy back, and carry him to the convent instead of that kalandar, and if he wishes to return to the house in the morning, do not let him.” The servant obeyed. Towards dawn the superintendent recovered his senses a little; but as the opiate had made his palate very bitter, he became extremely thirsty. He fancied that he was in his own house, and so he exclaimed, “Narcissus, bring water.” The kalandars awoke from sleep, and after hearing several shouts of this kind, they concluded that he was under the influence of bang, and said, “Poor fellow! the narcissus is in the garden; this is the convent of sufferers, and there are green garments enough here. Arise and sober thyself, for the morning and harbinger of benefits as well as of the acquisition of the victuals for subsistence is approaching.” When the superintendent heard these words he thought they were a dream, for he had not yet fully recovered his senses. He sat quietly, but was amazed on beholding the walls and ceiling of the convent: he got up, looked at the clothes in which he was dressed and at the marks tattooed on his body, and began to doubt whether he was awake or asleep. He washed his face, and perceived that the caravan of his mustachios had likewise departed from the plain of his countenance.
In this state of perplexity he went out of the convent and proceeded to his house. There his wife, with her male and female servants, was expecting his arrival. He approached the house and placed his hand on the knocker of the door, but was received by Hyacinth, who said, “Kalandar, whom seekest thou?” The superintendent rejoined, “I want to enter the house.” Hyacinth continued, “Thou hast to-day evidently taken thy morning draught of bang earlier and more copiously than usual, since thou hast foolishly mistaken the road to thy convent. Depart! This is not a place in which vagabond kalandars are harboured. This is the palace of the superintendent of the police; and if the symurgh looks with incivility from the fastness of the west of Mount Káf at this place, the wings of its impertinence will at once become singed.” The superintendent said, “What nonsense art thou speaking? Go out of my way, for I do not relish thy imbecile prattle.” But when he wanted to enter, Hyacinth struck him with a bludgeon on the shoulder, which the superintendent returned with a box on the ear, and both began to wrestle together. At that moment the lady and her maid-servants rushed forth from the rear and assailed him with sticks and stones, shouting, “This kalandar wishes in plain daylight to force his way into the house of the superintendent. What a pity that the superintendent is sick, or else this crime would have to be expiated on the gallows!” In the meantime all the neighbours assembled, and on seeing the shameless kalandar’s proceedings they cried, “Look at that impudent kalandar who wants forcibly to enter the house of the superintendent.” Ultimately the crowd amounted to more than five hundred persons, and the gentleman was put to flight and pursued by all the little boys, who pelted him with stones till they expelled him from the town.
At the distance of three farsangs from the town there was a village where the superintendent concealed himself in the corner of a mosque. During the evenings he went from house to house and begged for food to sustain life, until his mustachios again grew and the tattooed scars gradually began to disappear. Whenever anyone inquired for the superintendent at his house, he was informed by the servants that the gentleman was sick. After one month had expired, the grief of separation and the misery of his condition had again driven him back to the city. He went to the convent because fear hindered him from going to the house. His wife happened one day to catch a glimpse of him from her window, and perceived him sitting in the same dress with a company of kalandars. She felt compassion for him, called the servant and said, “The superintendent has had enough of this!” She made a loaf of bread and put some opiate into it, and said, “When the kalandars are asleep, you must go and place this loaf under the pillow of the superintendent.” The servant obeyed, and when the gentleman awoke in the middle of the night he was surprised to find the loaf. He fancied that when his companions had during the night returned from begging, they had placed it there, and so he ate some of it. During the same night the servant went there by the command of the lady, took his master on his back and carried him home. When it was morning, the lady took off the kalandar’s clothes from her husband and dressed him in his own garments, and began to make sweetmeats as on the former occasion. After some time he began to move, and his wife exclaimed, “O superintendent, do not sleep so much. I have told you that we shall spend this day in joy and pleasure, and it was not fair of you to pass the time in this lazy way. Lift up your head and see what beautiful sweetmeats I have baked for you.” When he opened his eyes, and saw himself dressed in his own clothes and at home, the rosebush of his amazement again brought forth the flowers of astonishment, and he said, “God be praised! What has happened to me?” He sat up, and exclaimed, “Wife, things have happened to me which I can scarcely describe.” She replied, “From the uneasy motions which you have made in your sleep, it appears you must have had extraordinary dreams.” “Dreams, forsooth,” said he; “since the moment I lay down I have experienced the most strange adventures.” “Certainly,” rejoined the lady, “last night you have been eating food disagreeing with your constitution, and to-day the vapours of it have ascended into your brains, and have caused you all this distress.” The superintendent said, “Yes, last night we went to a party in the house of Serjeant Bahman, and there was roasted pillau, of which I ate somewhat more than usual, and the vapour of it has occasioned me all this trouble.”[[598]]
Strikingly similar to this story is the trick of the first lady on her husband in the “Fabliau des Trois Dames qui trouverent un Anel.” Having made him drunk, she causes his head to be shaved, dresses him in the habit of a monk, and carries him, assisted by her lover, to the entrance of a convent. When he awakes and sees himself thus transformed he imagines that God by a miraculous exercise of His grace had called him to the monastic life. He presents himself before the abbot and requests to be received among the brethren. The lady hastens to the convent in well-feigned despair, and is exhorted to be resigned and to congratulate her husband on the saintly vow he has taken. “Many a good man,” says the poet, “has been betrayed by woman and by her harlotry. This one became a monk in the abbey, where he abode a very long time. Wherefore, I counsel all people who hear this story told, that they ought not to trust in their wives, nor in their households, if they have not first proved that they are full of virtues. Many a man has been deceived by women and by their treachery. This one became monk against right, who would never have been such in his life, if his wife had not deceived him.”[[599]]
The second lady’s trick in the fabliau is a very close parallel to the story in The Nights, vol. v. p. 96.[[600]] She had for dinner on a Friday some salted and smoked eels, which her husband bade her cook, but there was no fire in the house. Under the pretext of going to have them cooked at a neighbour’s fire she goes out and finds her lover, at whose house she remains a whole week. On the following Friday, at the hour of dinner, she enters a neighbour’s house and asks leave to cook the eels, saying that her husband is angry with her for having no fire, and that she did not dare to go back, lest he should take off her head. As soon as the eels are cooked she carries them piping hot to her own house. The husband asks her where she has been for eight days, and commences to beat her. She cries for help and the neighbours come in, and amongst them the one at whose fire the eels had been cooked, who swears that the wife had only just left her house, and ridicules the husband for his assertion that she had been away a whole week. The husband gets into a great rage and is locked up for a madman.
The device of the third lady seems a reflection of the “Elopement,” but without the underground tunnel between the houses of the wife and the lover. The lady proposes to her lover to marry him, and he believes that she is only jesting, seeing that she is already married, but she assures him that she is quite in earnest, and even undertakes that her husband will consent. The lover is to come for her husband and take him to the house of Dan Eustace, where he has a fair niece, whom the lover is to pretend he wishes to espouse, if he will give her to him. The wife will go thither, and she will have done her business with Eustace before they arrive. Her husband cannot but believe that he has left her at home, and she will be so apparelled that he cannot recognise her. This plan is accordingly carried out. The lover asks the husband for the hand of his niece in marriage, to which he joyously consents, and without knowing it makes a present of his own wife. “All his life long the lover possessed her, because the husband gave and did not lend her; nor could he ever get her back.”
Le Grand mentions that this fabliau is told at great length in the tales of the Sieur d’Ouville, tome iv. p. 255. In the “Facetiæ Bebelianæ,” p. 86, three women wager which of them will play the best trick on her husband. One causes him to believe he is a monk, and he goes and sings mass; the second husband believes himself to be dead, and allows himself to be carried to that mass on a bier; and the third sings in it quite naked. (There is a very similar story in Campbell’s “Popular Tales of the West Highlands.”) It is also found, says Le Grand, in the “Convivales Sermones,” tome i. p. 200; in the “Delices de Verboquet,” p. 166; and in the Facetiæ of Lod. Doménichi, p. 172. In the “Contes pour Rire,” p. 197, three women find a diamond, and the arbiter whom they select promises it, as in the fabliau, to her who concocts the best device for deceiving her husband, but their ruses are different.