“And I doubt not there are such in Yemen to this day,” added Ajeeb, the cleaner of stalls. “Was not Osman Hassan, the spice-seller, robbed and slain?”
“Soon after Yussuf had left on the secret adventure, there happened to Abou a great thing. For it should be known that at this time there ruled in Baghdad the great and wise Yianko I., Caliph of the Faithful in the valleys of the Euphrates and the Tigris and master of provinces and principalities, and the possessor of an enormous treasury of gold, which was in a great building of stone. Also he possessed a palace of such beauty that travelers came from many parts and far countries to see. It was built of many-colored stones and rare woods, and possessed walks and corridors and gardens and flowers and pools and balconies and latticed chambers into which the sun never burst, but where were always cool airs and sweet. Here were myrtle and jasmine and the palm and the cedar, and birds of many colors, and the tall ibis and the bright flamingo. It was here, with his many wives and concubines and slaves and courtiers, and many wise men come from far parts of the world to advise with him and bring him wisdom, that he ruled and was beloved and admired.
“Now by his favorite wife, Atrisha, there had been born to him some thirteen years before the beautiful and tender and delicate and loving and much-beloved Yanee, the sweetest and fairest of all his daughters, whom from the very first he designed should be the wife of some great prince, the mother of beautiful and wise children, and the heir, through her husband, whoever he should be, to all the greatness and power which the same must possess to be worthy of her. And also, because he had decided that whoever should be wise and great and deserving enough to be worthy of Yanee should also be worthy of him and all that he possessed—the great Caliphate of Baghdad. To this end, therefore, he called to Baghdad instructors of the greatest wisdom and learning of all kinds, the art of the lute and the tambour and the dance. And from among his wives and concubines he had chosen those who knew most of the art of dress and deportment and the care of the face and the body; so that now, having come to the age of the ripest perfection, thirteen, she was the most beautiful of all the maidens that had appeared in Arabia or any of the countries beyond it. Her hair was as spun gold, her teeth as pearls of the greatest price, lustrous and delicate; her skin as the bright moon when it rises in the east, and her hands and feet as petals in full bloom. Her lips were as the pomegranate when it is newly cut, and her eyes as those deep pools into which the moon looks when it is night.”
“Yea, I have heard of such, in fairy-tales,” sighed Chudi, the baker, whose wife was as parchment that has cracked with age.
“And I, behind the walls of palaces and in far cities, but never here,” added Zad-el-Din, for neither his wife nor his daughters was any too fair to look upon. “They come not to Hodeidah.”
“Ay-ee, were any so beautiful,” sighed Al Tadjaz, “there would be no man worthy. But there are none.”
“Peace!” cried Ahmed. “Let us have the tale.”
“Yea, before he thinks him to plead for more anna,” muttered Hadjaz, the sweeper, softly.
But Gazzar, not to be robbed of this evidence of interest, was already astir. Even as they talked he held out the tambour, crying: “Anna, anna, anna!” But so great was the opposition that he dared not persist.
“Dog!” cried Waidi. “Wilt thou never be satisfied? There is another for thee, but come no more.”