Arabian Nights

My slender waisted youth, of thine,

Can darkness round creation throw,

Or make it brightly shine,

The dusky mole that faintly shows

Upon his cheek, ah! blame it not;

The tulip-flower never blows

Undarkened by its spot.

And as another also said:

His scent was musk and his cheek was rose;

His teeth are pearls and his lips drop wine;

His form is a brand and his hips a hill;

His hair is night and his face moonshine.

They named the boy Badr al-Din Hasan and his grandfather, the Wazir of Bassorah, rejoiced in him and, on the seventh day after his birth, made entertainments and spread banquets which would befit the birth of King’s sons and heirs. Then he took Nur al-Din and went up with him to the Sultan, and his son-in-law, when he came before the presence of the King, kissed the ground between his hands and repeated these verses, for he was ready of speech, firm of sprite and good in heart as he was goodly in form:

‘The world’s best joys long be thy lot, my lord!

And last while darkness and the dawn o’erlap:

O thou who makest, when we greet thy gifts,

The world to dance and Time his palms to clap.’

Then the Sultan rose up to honour them and, thanking Nur al-Din for his fine compliment, asked the Wazir, ‘Who may be this young man?’ and the Minister answered, ‘This is my brother’s son,’ and related his tale from first to last. Quoth the Sultan, ‘And how comes he to be thy nephew and we have never heard speak of him?’ Quoth the Minister, ‘O our lord the Sultan, I had a brother who was Wazir in the land of Egypt and he died, leaving two sons, whereof the elder hath taken his father’s place and the younger, whom thou seest, came to me. I had sworn I would not marry my daughter to any but to him; so when he came I married him to her. Now he is young and I am old; my hearing is dulled and my judgment is easily fooled; wherefore I would solicit our lord the Sultan to set him in my stead, for he is my brother’s son and my daughter’s husband; and he is fit for the Wazirate, being a man of good counsel and ready contrivance.’

The Sultan looked at Nur al-Din and liked him, so he stablished him in office as the Wazir had requested and formally appointed him, presenting him with a splendid dress of honour and a she-mule from his private stud: and assigning to him solde, stipends and supplies. Nur al-Din kissed the Sultan’s hand and went home, he and his father-in-law, joying with exceeding joy and saying, ‘All this followeth on the heels of the boy Hasan’s birth!’ Next day he presented himself before the King and, kissing the ground, began repeating:

‘Grow thy weal and thy welfare day by day:

And thy luck prevail o’er the envier’s spite;

And ne’er cease thy days to be white as day.

And thy foeman’s day to be black as night!’

The Sultan bade him be seated on the Wazir’s seat, so he sat down and applied himself to the business of his office and went into the cases of the lieges and their suits, as is the wont of Ministers; while the Sultan watched him and wondered at his wit and good sense, judgment and insight. Wherefore he loved him and took him into intimacy. When the Divan was dismissed Nur al-Din returned to his house and related what had passed to his father-in-law who rejoiced. And thence-forward Nur al-Din ceased not so to administer the Wazirate that the Sultan would not be parted from him night or day; and increased his stipends and supplies till his means were ample and he became the owner of ships that made trading voyages at his command, as well as of Mamelukes and blackamoor slaves; and he laid out many estates and set up Persian wheels and planted gardens.

When his son Hasan was four years of age, the old Wazir deceased, and he made for his father-in-law a sumptuous funeral ceremony ere he was laid in the dust. Then he occupied himself with the education of this son and, when the boy waxed strong and came to the age of seven, he brought him a Fakih, a doctor of law and religion, to teach him in his own house and charged him to give him a good education and instruct him in politeness and good manners. So the tutor made the boy read and retain all varieties of useful knowledge, after he had spent some years in learning the Koran by heart, and he ceased not to grow in beauty and stature and symmetry, even as saith the poet:

In his face-sky shines the fullest moon;

In his cheeks’ anemone glows the sun:

He so conquered Beauty that he hath won

All charms of humanity one by one.

The professor brought him up in his father’s palace teaching him reading, writing and cyphering, theology and belles lettres. His grandfather the old Wazir had bequeathed to him the whole of his property when he was but four years of age. Now during all the time of his earliest youth he had never left the house, till on a certain day his father, the Wazir Nur al-Din, clad him in his best clothes and, mounting him on a she-mule of the finest, went up with him to the Sultan. The King gazed at Badr al-Din Hasan and marvelled at his comeliness and loved him. As for the city-folk, when he first passed before them with his father, they marvelled at his exceeding beauty and sat down on the road expecting his return, that they might look their fill on his beauty and loveliness and symmetry and perfect grace even as the poet said is these verses:

As the sage watched the stars, the semblance clear

Of a fair youth on ’s scroll he saw appear,

Those jetty locks Ganopus o’er him threw,

And tinged his temple curls a musky hue;

Mars dyed his ruddy cheek; and from his eyes

The Archer-star his glittering arrow flies:

His wit from Hermes came; and Soha’s care

(The half-seen star that dimly haunts the Bear)

Kept off all evil eyes that threaten and ensnare.

The sage stood mazed to see such fortunes meet,

And Luna kissed the earth beneath his feet.

And they blessed him aloud as he passed and called upon Almighty Allah to bless him. The Sultan entreated the lad with especial favour and said to his father, ‘O Wazir, thou must needs bring him daily to my presence;’ whereupon he replied, ‘I hear and I obey.’ Then the Wazir returned home with his son and ceased not to carry him to court till he reached the age of twenty. At that time the Minister sickened and, sending for Badr al-Din Hasan, said to him, ‘Know, O my son, that the world of the Present is but a house of mortality, while that of the Future is a house of eternity. I wish, before I die, to bequeath thee certain charges and do thou take heed of what I say and incline thy heart to my words.’ Then he gave him his last instructions as to the properest way of dealing with his neighbours and the due management of his affairs; after which he called to mind his brother and his home and his native land and wept over his separation from those he had first loved.

Then he wiped away his tears and, turning to his son, said to him, ‘Before I proceed, O my son, to my last charges and injunctions, know that I have a brother, and thou hast an uncle, Shams al-Din hight, the Wazir of Cairo, with whom I parted, leaving him against his will. Now take thee a sheet of paper and write upon it whatso I say to thee.’ Badr al-Din took a fair leaf and set about doing his father’s bidding and he wrote thereon a full account of what had happened to his sire first and last; the dates of his arrival at Bassorah and of his foregathering with the Wazir; of his marriage, of his going in to the Minister’s daughter and of the birth of his son; brief, his life of forty years from the day of his dispute with his brother, adding the words, ‘And this is written at my dictation and may Allah Almighty be with him when I am gone!’ Then he folded the paper and sealed it and said, ‘O Hasan, O my son, keep this paper with all care; for it will enable thee to stablish thine origin and rank and lineage and, if anything contrary befall thee, set out for Cairo and ask for thine uncle and show him this paper and say to him that I died a stranger far from mine own people and full of yearning to see him and them.’

So Badr al-Din Hasan took the document and folded it; and, wrapping it up in a piece of waxed cloth, sewed it like a talisman between the inner and outer cloth of his skull-cap and wound his light turband round it. And he fell to weeping over his father and at parting with him, and he but a boy. Then Nur al-Din lapsed into a swoon, the forerunner of death; but presently recovering himself he said, ‘O Hasan, O my son, I will now bequeath to thee five last behests, the FIRST BEHEST is, Be over-intimate with none, nor frequent any, nor be familiar with any; so shalt thou be safe from his mischief; for security lieth in seclusion of thought and a certain retirement from the society of thy fellows; and I have heard it said by a poet:

‘In this world there is none thou mayst count upon

To befriend thy case in the nick of need:

So live for thyself nursing hope of none.

Such counsel I give thee: enow, take heed!

‘The SECOND BEHEST is, O my son: Deal harshly with none lest fortune with thee deal hardly; for the fortune of this world is one day with thee and another day against thee and all worldly goods are but a loan to be repaid. And I have heard a poet say:

‘Take thought nor haste to win the thing thou wilt;