A passion-load for thee, O my Desire, I must endure, ✿ And boast I that to bear such load no lover hath the might.
Question the Night of me and Night thy soul shall satisfy ✿ Mine eyelids never close in sleep throughout the livelong night.
Then he wept with sore weeping and ’plained of that he suffered for stress of love-longing; but the Wazir comforted him and spoke him fair, promising him the winning of his wish; after which they fared on again for a few days, when they drew near to the White City, the capital of King Abd al-Kadir, soon after sunrise. Then said the Minister to the Prince, “Rejoice, O King’s son, in all good; for see, yonder is the White City, that which thou seekest.” Whereat the Prince rejoiced with exceeding joy and recited these couplets:—
My friends, I yearn in heart distraught for him; ✿ Longing abides and with sore pains I brim:
I mourn like childless mother, nor can find ✿ One to console me when the light grows dim;
Yet when the breezes blow from off thy land, ✿ I feel their freshness shed on heart and limb;
And rail mine eyes like water-laden clouds, ✿ While in a tear-sea shed by heart I swim.
Now when they entered the White City they asked for the Merchants’ Khan, a place of moneyed men; and when shown the hostelry they hired three magazines and on receiving the keys[[264]] they laid up therein all their goods and gear. They abode in the Khan till they were rested, when the Wazir applied himself to devise a device for the Prince,——And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased saying her permitted say.
Now when it was the Seven Hundred and Twenty-first Night,
She pursued, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the Prince and the Minister alighted at the Khan and lodged their goods in the ground-floor magazines and there settled their servants. Then they tarried awhile till they had rested when the Wazir arose and applied himself to devise a device for the Prince, and said to him, “I have bethought me of somewhat wherein, methinks, will be success for thee, so it please Almighty Allah.” Quoth Ardashir, “O thou Wazir of good counsel, do what cometh to thy mind, and may the Lord direct thy rede aright!” Quoth the Minister, “I purpose to hire thee a shop in the market-street of the stuff-sellers and set thee therein; for that all, great and small, have recourse to the bazar and, meseems, when the folk see thee with their own eyes sitting in the shop their hearts will incline to thee and thou wilt thus be enabled to attain thy desire, for thou art fair of favour and souls incline to thee and sight rejoiceth in thee.” The other replied, “Do what seemeth good to thee.” So the Wazir forthright began to robe the Prince and himself in their richest raiment and, putting a purse of a thousand dinars in his breast-pocket, went forth and walked about the city, whilst all who looked upon them marvelled at the beauty of the King’s son, saying, “Glory be to Him who created this youth ’of vile water’[[265]]! Blessed be Allah excellentest of Creators!” Great was the talk anent him and some said, “This is no mortal, ’this is naught save a noble angel’”;[[266]] and others, “Hath Rizwán, the doorkeeper of the Eden-garden, left the gate of Paradise unguarded, that this youth hath come forth?” The people followed them to the stuff-market, where they entered and stood, till there came up to them an old man of dignified presence and venerable appearance, who saluted them, and they returned his salam. Then the Shaykh said to them, “O my lords, have ye any need, that we may have the honour of accomplishing?”; and the Wazir asked him, “Who art thou, O elder?” He answered, “I am the Overseer of the market.” Quoth the Wazir, “Know then, O Shaykh, that this youth is my son and I wish to hire him a shop in the bazar, that he may sit therein and learn to sell and buy and take and give, and come to ken merchants’ ways and habits.” “I hear and I obey,” replied the Overseer and brought them without stay or delay the key of a shop, which he caused the brokers sweep and clean. And they did his bidding. Then the Wazir sent for a high mattress, stuffed with ostrich-down, and set it up in the shop, spreading upon it a small prayer-carpet, and a cushion fringed with broidery of red gold. Moreover he brought pillows and transported thither so much of the goods and stuffs that he had brought with him as filled the shop. Next morning the young Prince came and opening the shop, seated himself on the divan, and stationed two Mamelukes, clad in the richest of raiment before him and two black slaves of the goodliest of the Abyssinians in the lower part of the shop. The Wazir enjoined him to keep his secret from the folk, so thereby he might find aid in the winning of his wishes; then he left him and charging him to acquaint him with what befel him in the shop, day by day returned to the Khan. The Prince sat in the shop till night as he were the moon at its fullest, whilst the folk, hearing tell of his comeliness, flocked to the place, without errand, to gaze on his beauty and loveliness and symmetry and perfect grace and glorify the Almighty who created and shaped him, till none could pass through that bazar for the excessive crowding of the folk about him. The King’s son turned right and left, abashed at the throng of people that stared at him, hoping to make acquaintance with some one about the court, of whom he might get news of the Princess; but he found no way to this, wherefore his breast was straitened. Meanwhile, the Wazir daily promised him the attainment of his desire and the case so continued for a time till, one morning, as the youth sat in the shop, there came up an old woman of respectable semblance and dignified presence clad in raiment of devotees[[267]] and followed by two slave-girls like moons. She stopped before the shop and, having considered the Prince awhile, cried, “Glory be to God who fashioned that face and perfected that figure!” Then she saluted him and he returned her salam and seated her by his side. Quoth she, “Whence cometh thou, O fair of favour?”; and quoth he, “From the parts of Hind, O my mother; and I have come to this city to see the world and look about me.” “Honour to thee for a visitor! What goods and stuffs hast thou? Show me something handsome, fit for Kings.” “If thou wish for handsome stuffs, I will show them to thee; for I have wares that beseem persons of every condition.” “O my son, I want somewhat costly of price and seemly to sight; brief, the best thou hast.” “Thou must needs tell me for whom thou seekest it, that I may show thee goods according to the rank of the requirer.” “Thou speakest sooth, O my son,” said she, “I want somewhat for my mistress Hayat al-Nufus, daughter of Abd al-Kadir, lord of this land and King of this country.” Now when Ardashir heard his mistress’s name, his reason flew for joy and his heart fluttered and he gave no order to slave or servant, but, putting his hand behind him, pulled out a purse of an hundred dinars and offered it to the old woman, saying, “This is for the washing of thy clothes.” Then he again put forth his hand and brought out of a wrapper a dress worth ten thousand dinars or more and said to her, “This is of that which I have brought to your country.” When the old woman saw it, it pleased her and she asked, “What is the price of this dress, O perfect in qualities?” Answered he, “I will take no price for it!” whereupon she thanked him and repeated her question; but he said, “By Allah, I will take no price for it. I make thee a present of it, an the Princess will not accept it and ’tis a guest-gift from me to thee. Alhamdolillah—Glory be to God—who hath brought us together, so that, if one day I have a want, I shall find thee a helper to me in winning it!” She marvelled at the goodliness of his speech and the excess of his generosity and the perfection of his courtesy and said to him, “What is thy name, O my lord?” He replied, “My name is Ardashir;” and she cried, “By Allah this is a rare name! Therewith are Kings’ sons named, and thou art in a guise of the sons of the merchants!” Quoth he, “Of the love my father bore me, he gave me this name, but a name signifieth naught;” and quoth she in wonder, “O my son, take the price of thy goods.” But he swore that he would not take aught. Then the old lady said to him, “O my dear one, Truth (I would have thee know) is the greatest of all things and thou hadst not dealt thus generously by me but for a special reason: so tell me thy case and thy secret thought; belike thou hast some wish to whose winning I may help thee.” Thereupon he laid his hand in hers and, after exacting an oath of secrecy, told her the whole story of his passion for the Princess and his condition by reason thereof. The old woman shook her head and said, “True; but O my son, the wise say, in the current adage:—An thou wouldest be obeyed, abstain from ordering what may not be made; and thou, my son, thy name is Merchant, and though thou hadst the keys of the Hidden Hoards, yet wouldst thou be called naught but Merchant. An thou wouldst rise to high rank, according to thy station, then seek the hand of a Kazi’s daughter or even an Emir’s; but why, O my son, aspirest thou to none but the daughter of the King of the age and the time, and she a clean maid, who knoweth nothing of the things of the world and hath never in her life seen anything but her palace wherein she dwelleth? Yet, for all her tender age, she is intelligent, shrewd, vivacious, penetrating, quick of wit, sharp of act and rare of rede: her father hath no other child and she is dearer to him than his life and soul. Every morning he cometh to her and giveth her good-morrow, and all who dwell in the palace stand in dread of her. Think not, O my son, that any dare bespeak her with aught of these words; nor is there any way for me thereto. By Allah, O my son, my heart and vitals love thee and were it in my power to give thee access to her, I would assuredly do it; but I will tell thee somewhat, wherein Allah may haply appoint the healing of thy heart, and will risk life and goods for thee, till I win thy will for thee.” He asked, “And what is that, O my mother”; and she answered, “Seek of me the daughter of a Wazir or an Emir, and I will grant thy request; but it may not be that one should mount from earth to heaven at one bound.” When the Prince heard this, he replied to her with courtesy and sense, “O my mother, thou art a woman of wit and knowest how things go. Say me doth a man, when his head irketh him, bind up his hand?” Quoth she, “No, by Allah, O my son”; and quoth he, “Even so my heart seeketh none but her and naught slayeth me but love of her. By Allah, I am a dead man, and I find not one to counsel me aright and succour me! Allah upon thee, O my mother, take pity on my strangerhood and the streaming of my tears!”——And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.