The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Volume IV

by Unknown

THE AMIR ALI BEN TAHIR AND THE GIRL MOUNIS.

There was once shown to the Amir Ali ben Mohammed ben Abdallah ben Tahir[FN#195] a slave-girl, who was excellently handsome and well-bred and an accomplished poetess; and he asked her of her name. 'May God advance the Amir,' replied she, 'my name is Mounis.' Now he knew this before; so he bowed his head awhile, then raising his eyes to her, recited the following verse:

What dost thou say of one, on whom sickness and pain have wrought, For love and longing after thee, till he is grown distraught?

'God exalt the Amir!' answered she and recited this verse in reply:

An if we saw a lover true, on whom the pangs of love Were sore,
we would to him vouchsafe the favours that he sought.

Her reply pleased him; so he bought her for threescore and ten thousand dirhems and begat on her Obeidallah teen Mohammed, after police-magistrate [at Baghdad].

THE WOMAN WHO HAD A BOY AND THE OTHER WHO HAD A MAN TO LOVER.

(Quoth Abou el Ainaä[FN#196]), There were in our street two women, one of whom had to lover a man and the other a beardless boy, and they foregathered one night on the roof of a house, not knowing that I was within hearing. Quoth one to the other, "O my sister, how canst thou brook the harshness of thy lover's beard, as it falls on thy breast, when he kisses thee, and his moustaches rub thy cheek and lips?" "Silly wench that thou art," replied the other, "what adorns the tree but its leaves and the cucumber but its bloom? Didst ever see aught uglier than a scald-head, with his beard plucked out? Knowest thou not that the beard is to men as the side-locks to women; and what is the difference between the chin and the cheek? Knowest thou not that God (blessed and exalted be He) hath created an angel in heaven, who saith, 'Glory be to Him who adorneth men with beards and women with tresses?' So, were not the beard even as the tresses in comeliness, it had not been coupled with them, O silly woman! How shall I underlie a boy, who will be hasty with me in emission and forestall me in flaccescence, and leave a man, who, when he takes breath, clips close and when he enters, goes leisurely, and when he has done, repeats, and when he pushes, pushes hard, and as often as he withdraws, returns?" The other was edified by her speech and said, "I forswear my lover by the Lord of the Kaabeh!"