perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.
When it was the Three Hundred and Ninety-second Night,
She said, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that the man, taking with him the money, departed by stealth. But when they told Yahya of this, he said, By Allah, though he had tarried with me to the end of his days, yet had I not stinted him of my largesse nor cut off from him the bounties of my hospitality! For, indeed, the excellences of the Barmecides were past count nor can their virtues be committed to description, especially those of Yahya bin Khalid, for he was an ocean [FN#132] of noble qualities, even as saith the poet of him,
I asked of Bounty, Art thou free? Quoth she, * No, I am slave to Yahyá Khálid-son! Boughten? asked I. Allah forfend, quoth she, * By heirship, sire to sires transmission!
And the following is related of MOHAMMED AL-AMIN AND THE SLAVE-GIRL
Jaafar bin Musá al-Hádi [FN#133] once had a slave-girl, a lutist, called Al-Badr al-Kabír, than whom there was not in her time a fairer of face nor shapelier of shape nor a more elegant of manners nor a more accomplished in the art of singing and striking the strings; she was indeed perfect in beauty and extreme in every charm. Now Mohammed al-Amín, [FN#134] son of Zubaydah, heard of her and was urgent with Jaafar to sell her
