"The season has become pleasant! The time of the rose is come! Take your morning potations, as long as the rose has blossoms and flowers!"
When he resumed his work, he made it known by singing aloud—
"If my Lord prolong my life until the rose-season, I will take again my morning potations: but if I die before it, alas! for the loss of the rose and wine!
"I implore the God of the supreme throne, whose glory be extolled, that my heart may continually enjoy the evening potations to the day of resurrection."
The Khaleefeh was so amused with the humour of this man that he granted him an annual pension of ten thousand dirhems to enable him to enjoy himself amply on these occasions. Another anecdote may be added to show the estimation of the rose in the mind of an Arab. It is said that Rowḥ Ibn-Ḥátim, the governor of the province of Northern Africa, was sitting one day, with a female slave, in an apartment of his palace, when a eunuch brought him a jar full of red and white roses which a man had offered as a present. He ordered the eunuch to fill the jar with silver in return; but his slave said, "O my lord, thou hast not acted equitably towards the man; for his present to thee is of two colours, red and white." The Emeer replied, "Thou hast said truly;" and gave orders to fill the jar for him with silver and gold (dirhems and deenárs) intermixed. Some persons preserve roses during the whole of the year in the following manner. They take a number of rose-buds and fill with them a new earthen jar, and, after closing its mouth with mud so as to render it impervious to the air, bury it in the earth. Whenever they want a few roses, they take out some of these buds, which they find unaltered, sprinkle a little water upon them and leave them for a short time in the air, when they open and appear as if just gathered.[182]
The rose is even a subject of miracles. It is related by Ibn-Ḳuteybeh that there grows in India a kind of rose, upon the leaves of which is inscribed, "There is no deity but God:"[183] But I find a more particular account of this miraculous rose. A person, who professed to have seen it, said, "I went into India, and I saw at one of its towns a large rose, sweet-scented, upon which was inscribed, in white characters, 'There is no deity but God; Moḥammad is God's apostle: Aboo-Bekr is the very veracious: ´Omar is the discriminator:' and I doubted of this, whether it had been done by art; so I took one of the blossoms not yet opened, and in it was the same inscription; and there were many of the same kind there. The people of that place worshipped stones, and knew not God, to whom be ascribed might and glory."[184] Roses are announced for sale in the streets of Cairo by the cry of "The rose was a thorn: from the sweat of the Prophet it blossomed!" in allusion to a miracle recorded of Moḥammad. "When I was taken up into heaven," said the Prophet, "some of my sweat fell upon the earth, and from it sprang the rose; and whoever would smell my scent, let him smell the rose." In another tradition it is said, "The white rose was created from my sweat on the night of the Meạráj;[185] and the red rose, from the sweat of Jebraeel;[186] and the yellow rose, from the sweat of El-Buráḳ."[187] The Persians take especial delight in roses; sometimes spreading them as carpets or beds on which to sit or recline in their revellings.
But there is a flower pronounced more excellent than the rose, that of the Egyptian privet, or Lawsonia inermis.[188] Moḥammad said, "The chief of the sweet-scented flowers of this world and of the next is the fághiyeh;" and this was his favourite flower.[189] I approve of his taste; for this flower, which grows in clusters somewhat like those of the lilac, has a most delicious fragrance. But, on account of discrepancies in different traditions, a Muslim may with a clear conscience prefer either of the two flowers next mentioned.
The Prophet said of the violet (benefsej), "The excellence of the extract of violets, above all other extracts, is as the excellence of me above all the rest of the creation: it is cold in summer, and hot in winter:" and, in another tradition, "The excellence of the violet is as the excellence of el-Islám above all other religions."[190] A delicious sherbet is made of a conserve of sugar and violet-flowers.
The myrtle (ás or narseen) is the rival of the violet. "Adam," said the Prophet, "fell down from Paradise with three things; the myrtle, which is the chief of sweet-scented flowers in this world; an ear of wheat, which is the chief of all kinds of food in this world; and pressed dates, which are the chief of the fruits of this world."[191]
The anemone[192] was monopolized for his own enjoyment by Noạmán Ibn-El-Mundhir (King of El-Ḥeereh, and contemporary of Moḥammad), as the rose was afterwards by El-Mutawekkil.[193]
Another flower much admired and celebrated in the East is the gilliflower (menthoor or kheeree). There are three principal kinds; the most esteemed is the yellow, or gold-coloured, which has a delicious scent both by night and day; the next, the purple, and other dark kinds, which have a scent only in the night; the least esteemed, the white, which has no scent. The yellow gilliflower is an emblem of a neglected lover.[194]