Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 3.djvu/396

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the youth, saluted him, saying, ‘The Commander of the Faithful calls for thee.’ So he returned with him to the palace, in great concern by reason of the summons, and going in to the Khalif, kissed the earth before him. Then said he, ‘Peace be on thee, O Commander of the Faithful and Protector of the people of the Faith!’ And offered up a prayer for the endurance of his glory and prosperity, for the accomplishment of his desires and the continuance of his bounty and the cessation of evil and punishment, ordering his speech as best he might and ending by repeating the following verses:

Still may thy threshold as a place of adoration^[1] Be sought and on men’s brows its dust bespeak prostration,
That so in every land be made this proclamation, “Thou, thou art Abraham and this his very station.”^[2]

The Khalif smiled in his face and returned his salute, looking on him with the eye of favour. Then he bade him draw near and sit down before him and said to him, ‘O Mohammed Ali, I wish thee to tell me what befell thee last night, for it was rare and passing strange.’ ‘Pardon, O Commander of the Faithful!’ replied the youth. ‘Give me the handkerchief of immunity, that my trouble may be appeased and my heart set at rest.’ Quoth the Khalif, ‘Thou art safe from fear and trouble.’ So the young man told him his story from first to last, whereby the Khalif knew him to be a lover and severed from his beloved and said to him, ‘Wilt thou that I restore her to thee?’ ‘This were of the bounty of the Commander of the Faithful,’ answered the youth and repeated the following verses:

1. Lit. Kaabeh.
2. Referring to the station in the Temple of Mecca, known as the Mecam or standing-place of Abraham. The wish inferred is that the Khalif’s court may be as favourite a place of reverent resort as the station in question.