26
follow us; for our mistress bids thee to her.” So he rose and accompanied the girls, who escorted him, smiting on tabrets and other instruments of music, to another saloon, bigger than the first and decorated with pictures and figures of birds and beasts, passing description. Sherkan wondered at the fashion of the place and repeated the following verses:
My rival plucks, of the fruits of the necklets branching wide, Pearls of the breasts in gold enchased and beautified
With running fountains of liquid silver in streams And cheeks of rose and beryl, side by side.
It seemeth, indeed, as if the violet’s colour vied With the sombre blue of the eyes, with antimony dyed.[1]
When the lady saw Sherkan, she came to meet him, and taking him by the hand, said to him, “O son of King Omar ben Ennuman, hast thou any skill in the game of chess?” “Yes,” replied he; “but do not thou be as says the poet.” And he repeated the following verses:
I speak, and passion, the while, folds and unfolds me aye; But a draught of the honey of love my spirits thirst could stay.
I sit at the chess with her I love, and she plays with me, With white and with black; but this contenteth me no way.
Meseemeth as if the king were set in the place of the rook And sought with the rival queens a bout of the game to play.
And if I looked in her eyes, to spy the drift of her moves, The amorous grace of her glance would doom me to death straightaway.
Then she brought the chess-board and played with him; but instead of looking at her moves, he looked at her face and set the knight in the place of the elephant[2] and the elephant in the place of the knight. She laughed and said to him, “If this be thy play, thou knowest nothing of the game.” “This is only the first bout,” replied he; “take no count of it.” She beat him, and he replaced the pieces
