Then he looked at me and said, “Say me, dost thou know what they did?”[[202]] Answered I, “Yes, they are dead; Almighty Allah have mercy on them!” At this his face changed and he sprang to his feet and cried out, “How knowest thou they be dead?;” and I replied, “Were they alive they had not left thee thus.” Quoth he, “By Allah, thou art right, and I care not to live after them.” Then his side-muscles quivered and he fell on his face; and we ran up to him and shook him and found him dead, the mercy of the Almighty be on him! At this we marvelled and mourned for him and, sore mourning, laid him out and buried him.——And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.

Now when it was the Four Hundred and Twelfth Night,

She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that Al-Mubarrad thus continued:—When the man fell we mourned over him with sore mourning and laid him out and buried him. And when I returned to Baghdad and went in to the Caliph Al Mutawakkil, he saw the trace of tears on my face and said to me, “What is this?” So I told him what had passed and it was grievous to him and he cried, “What moved thee to deal thus with him?[[203]] By Allah, if I thought thou didst not repent it and regret him I would punish thee therefor!” And he mourned for him the rest of the day. And amongst the tales they tell is one of

[198]. A grammarian and rhetorician of ninth century.

[199]. Once existing in Syrian Hamáh (the Biblical Hamath); and so called because here died the Emperor Heraclius called by the Arabs “Hirakl.”

[200]. Till lately it was the custom to confine madmen in Syrian monasteries, hoping a cure from the patron Saint; and a terrible time they had of it. Every guide book relates the healing process as formerly pursued at the Maronite Convent Koshaya not far from Bayrut. The idiot or maniac was thrust headlong by the monks into a dismal cavern with a heavy chain round his neck, and was tied up within a span of the wall to await the arrival of Saint Anthony who especially affects this holy place. In very few weeks the patient was effectually cured or killed by cold, solitude and starvation.

[201]. The Moslem Eve, much nearer the Hebrew “Hawah” = the “manifester,” because (Gen. iii. 20) she was (to be) the mother of all that live (“Kull hayy”).

[202]. The mad lover says “they” for “she,” which would be too familiar in speaking to strangers.

[203]. i.e. falsely to report the death.