Were I to set down all I feel of heart-consuming dole And all the
transport and unease that harbour in my soul,
Nor ink nor pen in all the world thereafter would remain, Nor
aught from east to west were left of paper or of scroll.'

Then she folded up the silken tresses of her hair, whose cost swallowed up treasures, in the letter, and wrapping it in a piece of rich silk, scented with musk and ambergris, laid it in a handkerchief; after which she gave it to an eunuch and bade him carry it to prince Amjed. The eunuch took it, knowing not what the future hid for him, (for He who knoweth the hidden things ordereth events according to His will,) and going in to the prince, kissed the earth before him and gave him the letter. He opened it and reading it, was ware that his father's wife was in intent an adulteress and a traitress to her husband; whereat he was exceeding wroth and railed at women and their works, saying, 'May God curse women, the traitresses, that lack reason and religion!' Then he drew his sword and said to the eunuch, 'Out on thee, thou wicked slave! Dost thou carry adulterous messages for thy lord's wife? By Allah, there is no good in thee, O black of hue and heart, O foul of face and nature!' So saying, he smote him on the neck and severed his head from his body; then, folding the letter in the handkerchief, he thrust it into his pocket and went in to his own mother and told her what had passed, reviling and reproaching her and saying, 'Each one of you is worse than the other; and by God the Great, did I not fear to transgress against the rights of my father and my brother Asaad, I would assuredly go in to her and cut off her head, even as I cut off that of her eunuch!' Then he went out in a great rage; and when the news reached Queen Heyat en Nufous of what he had done with her messenger, she reviled him and cursed him and plotted perfidy against him. He passed the night, sick with anger and disgust and concern, nor was meat nor drink nor sleep sweet to him. Next morning, prince Asaad went out in his turn to rule the folk in his father's stead and sat in the audience-chamber, judging and administering justice, appointing and deposing, ordering and forbidding, giving and bestowing, till near the time of afternoon-prayer, when Queen Budour sent for a crafty old woman and discovering to her what was in her heart, wrote a letter to prince Asaad, complaining of the excess of her love and longing for him, as follows: 'From her who perisheth for passion and love-longing to the goodliest of mankind in form and nature, him who is conceited of his own loveliness and glories in his amorous grace, who turneth away from those that seek to enjoy him and refuseth to show favour unto the lowly and the self-abasing, him who is cruel and disdainful; from the despairing lover to prince Asaad, lord of surpassing beauty and excelling grace, of the moon-bright face and the flower-white brow and dazzling splendour. This is my letter to him whose love consumes my body and rends my skin and my bones. Know that my patience fails me and I am at a loss what to do: longing and wakefulness weary me and sleep and patience deny themselves to me; but mourning and watching stick fast to me and desire and passion torment me, and the extremes of languor and sickness. Yet may my life be thy ransom, though it be thy pleasure to slay her who loveth thee, and may God prolong thy life and preserve thee from every ill!' After this, she wrote the following verses:

Fate hath so ordered it that I must needs thy lover be, O thou
whose charms shine as the moon, when at the full is she!
All beauty and all eloquence thou dost in thee contain And over
all the world of men thou'rt bright and brave to see.
That thou my torturer shouldst be, I am indeed content, So but
thou wilt one glance bestow, as almous-deed, on me.
Happy, thrice happy is her lot who dieth for thy love! No good is
there in any one that doth not cherish thee.

And these also:

To thee, O Asaad, of the pangs of passion I complain; Have pity
on a slave of love, that burns for longing pain.
How long, I wonder, shall the hands of passion sport with me And
love and dole and sleeplessness consume me, heart and brain?
Whiles do I plain me of a sea within my heart and whiles Of
flaming; surely, this is strange, O thou my wish and bane!
Give o'er thy railing, censor mine, and set thyself to flee From
love that maketh eyes for aye with burning tears to rain.
How oft, for absence and desire, I cry, "Alas, my grief!" But all
my crying and lament in this my case are vain.
Thou hast with rigours made me sick, that passed my power to
bear: Thou'rt the physician; do thou me with what befits
assain.
O thou my censurer, forbear to chide me for my case, Lest, of
Love's cruel malady, perdition thee attain.

Then she scented the letter with odoriferous musk and winding it in the tresses of her hair, which were of Irak silk, with tassels of oblong emeralds, set with pearls and jewels, delivered it to the old woman, bidding her carry it to prince Asaad. She undertook the errand, to pleasure her, and going in straightway to the prince, found him in his closet and delivered him the letter; after which she stood waiting for the answer. When Asaad had read the letter and knew its purport, he wrapped it up again in the tresses and put it in his pocket, cursing false women; then, for he was beyond measure wroth, he sprang up and drawing his sword, smote the old woman on the neck and cut off her head. Then he went in to his mother, Queen Heyat en Nufous, whom he found lying on her bed, sick for that which had betided her with prince Amjed, and railed at her and cursed her; after which he left her and betook himself to his brother, to whom he related what had befallen him with Queen Budour, adding, 'By Allah, O my brother, but that I feared to grieve thee, I had gone in to her forthright and smitten her head off her shoulders!' 'By Allah, O my brother,' replied Amjed, 'the like of what hath befallen thee befell me also yesterday with thy mother Queen Heyat en Nufous.' And he told him what had passed, adding, 'By Allah, O my brother, nought but respect for thee withheld me from going in to her and dealing with her even as I dealt with the eunuch!' They passed the rest of the night in trouble and affliction, conversing and cursing false women, and agreed to keep the matter secret, lest their father should hear of it and kill the two women.

On the morrow, the King returned with his suite from hunting and sat awhile in his chair of estate; after which he dismissed the Amirs and went up to his harem, where he found his two wives lying on the bed, exceeding sick. Now they had made a plot against the two princes and concerted to do away their lives, for that they had exposed themselves before them and feared to be at their mercy. When Kemerezzeman saw them on this wise, he said to them, 'What ails you?' Whereupon they rose and kissing his hands, answered, perverting the case and saying, 'Know, O King, that thy sons, who have been reared in thy bounty, have played thee false and outraged thee in the persons of thy wives.' When he heard this, the light in his eyes became darkness and his reason fled for the excess of his rage; then said he to them, 'Expound this thing to me.' 'O King of the age,' answered Budour, 'know that these many days past thy son Asaad has been wont to send me letters and messages to solicit me to lewdness, and I still forbade him from this, but he would not be forbidden. When thou wentest forth to hunt, he rushed in on me, drunk and with a drawn sword in his hand, and smiting my eunuch, slew him. Then he mounted on my breast, still holding the sword, and I feared lest he should slay me even as he had slain my eunuch, if I gainsaid him; so he took his will of me by force; and now an thou do me not justice on him, O King, I will slay myself with my own hand, for I reck not of life in the world after this foul deed.' Queen Heyat en Nufous, choking with tears, told him a like story respecting prince Amjed, after which she fell a- weeping and wailing and said, 'Except thou avenge me on him, I will tell my father, King Armanous.' Then they both wept sore before King Kemerezzeman, who, when he saw their tears and heard their words, concluded that their story was true and waxing beyond measure wroth, went out, thinking to fall upon his two sons and put them to death. On his way he met his father-in-law King Armanous, who hearing of his return from the chase, had come to salute him and seeing him with the naked sword in his hand and the blood dripping from his nostrils, for excess of rage, enquired what ailed him. Kemerezzeman told him what his sons Amjed and Asaad had done and added, 'I am now going in to them, to slay them on the foulest wise and make of them the most shameful of examples.' 'O my son,' said King Armanous, (and indeed he too was wroth with them,) 'thou dost well, and may God not bless them nor any sons that offend thus against their father's honour! But, O my son, the proverb says, "Whoso looks not to the issues, Fortune is no friend to him." In any case, they are thy sons, and it befits not that thou put them to death with thine own hand, lest thou drink of their agony and after repent of having slain them, whenas repentance will avail thee nothing. Rather do thou send one of thine officers with them into the desert and let him kill them there, out of thy sight, for, as says the adage, "When the eye sees not, the heart grieves not."' Kemerezzeman saw his father-in-law's words to be just, so he sheathed his sword and turning back, sat down upon his throne and called his treasurer, a very old man, versed in affairs and in the shifts of fortune, to whom he said, 'Go in to my sons Amjed and Asaad; bind fast their hands behind them and lay them in two chests and set them on a mule. Then take horse and carry them into the mid-desert, where do thou put them to death and fill two vials with their blood and bring them to me in haste.' 'I hear and obey,' answered the treasurer and went out forthright to do his bidding. On his way, he met the princes coming out of the palace-vestibule, for they had donned their richest clothes and were on their way to salute their father and give him joy of his safe return from the chase. When he saw them, he laid hands on them, saying, 'O my sons, know that I am but a slave commanded and that your father hath laid a commandment on me: will ye obey his commandment?' 'Yes,' answered they; whereupon he bound their hands and laying them in the chests, set the latter on the back of a mule, with which he left the city and rode into the open country, till near midday, when he halted in a waste and desert spot and dismounting, set down the two chests. He opened them and took out Amjed and Asaad; whom when he saw, he wept sore for their beauty and grace; then drawing his sword, he said to them, 'O my lords, indeed it irks me to deal so foully by you; but I am to be excused in this, being but a slave commanded, for that your father King Kemerezzeman hath bidden me strike off your heads.' 'O Amir,' answered they, 'do the King's bidding, for we submit with patience to that which God (to whom be ascribed might and majesty) hath decreed to us; and thou art quit of our blood.' Then they embraced and bade each other farewell, and Asaad said to the treasurer, 'God on thee, O uncle, spare me the sight of my brother's agony and make me not drink of his anguish, but kill me first, that it may be the easier for me.' Amjed said the like and entreated the treasurer to kill him before Asaad, saying, 'My brother is younger than I; so make me not taste of his anguish.' And they both wept sore, whilst the treasurer wept for their weeping, and they said to each other, 'All this comes of the malice of those traitresses, our mothers; and this is the reward of our forbearance towards them. But there is no power and no virtue but in God the Most High, the Supreme! Verily, we are His and unto Him we return.' And Asaad embraced his brother, sobbing and repeating the following verses:

O Thou to whom the sad complain, to whom the fearful flee, Thou
that art evermore prepared for all that is to be,
Lord, there is left me no resource but at Thy door to knock; Yea,
at whose portal shall I knock, if Thou be deaf to me?
O Thou, the treasures of whose grace are in the one word "Be," Be
favourable, I beseech, for all good is with Thee!

When Amjed heard his brother's weeping, he wept also and pressed him to his bosom, repeating the following verses:

O Thou, whose bounties unto me are more than one, I trow, Whose
favours lavished on my head are countless as the sand,
No blow of all the blows of fate has ever fall'n on me, But I
have found Thee ready still to take me by the hand.