Old Man. I give faith to her falsehood for fear of her turning from me; I am content to listen to her folly through dread that she should fly me.

Youth. I deem her tormenting to be sweet; and as often as she renews my torment the love of being kindly to her is renewed in me.

Old Man. She is forgetful of duty, and to forget is a fault; she angers my heart—the heart which guards her secret.

Youth. What is most wonderful in her is the glorying of her vanity; yet do I make too much of her for me to speak to her of her pride.

Old Man. From me she has praise sweet of fragrance; but my lot from her is a folding up of love after its out-spreading.

Youth. Oh! if she were just she would not be fault-finding; but she wrongs me; another, and not I, gathers the dew of her mouth.

Old Man. Were it not for her graceful motion I would turn my rein in haste to another, the light of whose full moon I might look upon.

Youth. But notwithstanding the discordance between her and me, I hold the bitter as sweet through my docility to her command.

Now when in alternation they had recited these verses to the Governor, he was amazed at the wit of two so justly balanced,—And said, “I testify before God that ye are the Farḳadân of heaven, and like a pair of fire-staves in their case.—Now surely this youth, he spends of what God has given him; through his own wealth he is independent of another.—So, old man, repent of thy suspicion of him, and turn again to honouring him.”—Said the old man, “Far be it that my love should return to him, or my confidence cleave to him;—For I have proved his ingratitude for kind­ness; I have been tried by him with shameful revolt.” —But the lad interrupted him and said, “O friend, know that contention is ill luck, and spite meanness; to hold suspicion as truth is a sin; to vex the innocent is a wrong.—And granted that I have committed an offence and wrought a crime, rememberest thou not what thou didst thyself recite to me in the season of thy familiarity?

Pardon thy brother when he mingles his right aiming with error;

And shrink from rebuking him if he swerve or decline;

Keep to thy kind dealing towards him whether he thank the kindness or slight it:

Be thou obedient when he revolts; be thou lowly when he magni­fies himself; draw near to him when he goes from thee:

Keep faith with him even though he fail in what thou and he have stipulated;

And know that if thou seek a perfect man thou desirest beyond bounds.

Who is there who has never done ill? Who is there whose deed is always fair?

Dost thou not see the loved and the hated linked together in one class,

As the thorn comes forth on the branches with the fruit that is gathered.

And the delight of long life, lo! there mingles with it the trouble of hoariness.

If thou examine well the sons of the time thou wilt find the most of them but refuse.

Then began the old man to dart his tongue as darts the serpent, and to gaze with the gazing of the towering hawk.—And he said, “By Him who hath adorned the heaven with its fires, and sent down the water from the clouds, truly my declining from reconciliation is but from fear of ignominy.—For this lad was accustomed that I should victual him, and have regard to his affairs. —And erewhile fortune poured plenteously, and I was not a niggard.—But as for now, the time is frowning, the contents of life are misery: so that this my garb is a loan, and my house not a mouse approaches it.”— Then the heart of the Governor grew tender at their speech, and he was pitiful to them because of the changes of their nights.—And he inclined to distinguish them by his help, and he bade the lookers-on to with­draw.—Said the narrator: Now I had been gazing at the face of the old man, that perchance I might get a knowledge of him when I should spy his features.— But the crowding would not discover him, nor open to me that I might approach him.—But when the rows were broken, and the bystanders sped off, I marked him, and behold he was Ābû Zayd, and the lad was his lad, and I knew then his purpose in what he had done.—And I was near swooping down on him, to make myself known to him, but he threw me off with a glance of his eye, and stopped me with a sign of his hand.—So I kept my place, and delayed my departing: and the Governor said, “What is thy wish, and wherefore is thy staying?”—Quickly the old man took him up, and said, “He is my friend, the owner of my clothes.”—Then the Governor was pleased to be friendly with me, and per­mitted me to take seat.—And he made largess to them of two robes of honour and presented them with a sum in coin.—And stipulated with them that they should live together in kindness until the coming on of the Day of Fear.—Then they rose up from his hall, lifting their voices in thanks for his benefits.—But I followed them that I might know their abode, that I might supply myself of their talk.—And when we had traversed the domain of the Governor, and had come to the empty plain, one of his guards overtook me, recalling me to his court.—So I said to Abû Zayd, “I think he does not send for me save that he may question me: now what shall I say, and in what valley shall I roam with him?” —He said, “Shew him the folly of his heart, and how I have played with his understanding, that he may know that his breeze has met with a whirlwind, that his streamlet has encountered the deep.”—I said, “I fear that his anger will be kindled, and so his blaze scorch thee; or that his caprice will quicken, and so his vio­lence come upon thee.”—He said, “I am now setting off for Roha, and how should Sohayl and Soha meet together?”

Now when I was in presence of the Governor, whose hall was by this time empty, and whose austerity had cleared away, he took to describing Abû Zayd and his worth, and blaming his evil fortune.—Then he said, “I conjure thee by God, art thou not he who lent him the suit?” (dast)—I said, “No, by Him who has set thee on that cushion, (dast) I am not the owner of the suit, (dast) but thou art he against whom the game (dast) has gone.”—Then his eye-balls went askance, and his cheeks reddened.—And he said, “By Allah, it never baffled me yet to expose a suspicious person, or to discover a knave.—But I never heard of a Shaykh who cheated after he donned the saintly cloak; yet, as for this one, he has deceived to the last.—Now how call you that monkey.”—I said, “Abû Zayd.” He said, “Abû Kayd is more fitting for him than Abû Zayd: and dost thou know where the villain is strolling to?”—I said, “He dreaded thee on account of having overstepped his bound, and he journeyed away from Bagdad at once.”— He said, “May God not shorten his journey, or keep him where he sojourns: for I never dealt with aught sharper than his cunning, or tasted aught more bitter than his fraud:—And were it not for the sacredness of his scholarship, I would urge on in search of him, until he came in sight for me to fall foul of him.— And now do I loathe that what he has done should be spread abroad in the City of Peace; so should I be dis­honoured among men, and my dignity come to nought be­fore the Imâm, and I be made a laughing-stock to gentle and mean.”—Then he stipulated with me that I should not speak of what Abû Zayd had done as long as I remained a sojourner in this city.—Said Al Ḥârith, son of Hammâm, And I stipulated with him as one who does not equivocate, and I kept faith with him as Samuel kept it.