Er-Rasheed wept; and Faḍl, the son of Yaḥyà, said, "The Prince of the Faithful sent for thee to divert him, and thou hast plunged him into grief." "Suffer him," said the prince; "for he hath beheld us in blindness, and it displeased him to increase it."[129]
The family of the Barmekees (one of the most brilliant ornaments of which was the Wezeer Jaạfar, who has been rendered familiar to us by the many scenes in which he is introduced in the "Thousand and One Nights") earned a noble and enduring reputation by their attachment to literature and the magnificent rewards they conferred on learned men. It was peculiarly hard, therefore, that literature contributed to their melancholy overthrow. Poets were employed by their enemies to compose songs artfully pointed against them, to be sung before the prince to whom they owed their power. Of one of these songs, the following lines formed a part:—
"Would that Hind had fulfilled the promises she made us, and healed the disease under which we suffer!
That she had once, at least, acted for herself! for imbecile, indeed, is he who doth not so."
"Yea! By Allah! Imbecile!" exclaimed the Khaleefeh, on hearing these verses: his jealousy was roused; and his vengeance soon after fell heavily upon his former favourites.[130]
One of the Khaleefehs having invited the poets of his day to his palace, a Bedawee, carrying a water-jar to fill at the river, followed them, and entered with them. The Khaleefeh, seeing this poor man with the jar on his shoulder, asked him what brought him thither. He returned for answer these words:—
"Seeing that this company had girded on the saddles
To repair to thy overflowing river, I came with my jar."
The Khaleefeh, delighted with his answer, gave orders to fill his jar with gold.[131]
It has long been a common custom of Eastern princes to bestow dresses of honour upon men of literature and science, as well as upon their great officers and other servants. These dresses were of different kinds for persons of different classes or professions. The most usual kind was an ample coat. With dresses of this description were often given gold-embroidered turbans, and sometimes to Emeers (or great military officers) neck-rings or collars (called ṭóḳs), some of which were set with jewels, as also bracelets and swords ornamented with precious stones; and to Wezeers, instead of the ṭóḳ, a necklace of jewels.[132]
The following striking record will convey an idea of the magnificence of some of these dresses of honour, or in other words of the liberality of a Muslim prince, and at the same time of the very precarious nature of his favour. A person chancing to look at a register kept by one of the officers of Hároon Er-Rasheed, saw in it the following entry:—"Four hundred thousand pieces of gold, the price of a dress of honour for Jaạfar, the son of Yaḥyà, the Wezeer." A few days after, he saw beneath this written,—"Ten ḳeeráṭs, the price of naphtha and reeds, for burning the body of Jaạfar, the son of Yaḥyà."[133]
Arab princes and other great men have generally been famous for highly respecting and liberally rewarding men of literature and science, and especially poets. El-Ma-moon and many others are well known to us for their patronage of the learned. Er-Rasheed carried his condescension to them so far as to pour the water on the hands of a blind man, Aboo-Mo´áwiyeh, one of the most learned persons of his time, previously to his eating with him, to show his respect for science.[134] We have already seen how a Khaleefeh ordered the mouth of a learned man to be filled with jewels. To cram the mouth with sugar or sweetmeats for a polite or eloquent speech, or piece of poetry, has been more commonly done; but the usual presents to learned men were, and are, dresses of honour and sums of money. Ibn-´Obeyd El-Bakhteree, an illustrious poet and traditionist who flourished in the reign of El-Musta´een, is said to have received so many presents that after his death there were found, among the property which he left, a hundred complete suits of dress, two hundred shirts, and five hundred turbans.[135] A thousand pieces of gold were often given, and sometimes ten, twenty, or thirty thousand, and even more, for a few verses; nay, for a single couplet.