And ere she fondly bore him to his bed,
On his fair face the tear of anguish shed.
And now his task resumed, “My tale,” said he,
“Is short and sad, short may our sadness be!”
“The Caliph Harun, as historians tell,
Ruled, for a tyrant, admirably well;
Where his own pleasures were not touch’d, to men
He was humane, and sometimes even then.