The young man was now convinced that the scandalous wretch, from vice and wickedness, had concerted with the governor’s brother, and scattered the filth of criminality on the vest of her chastity. From thence, having disguised his person in a clay-coloured vest, and rubbed his head and face with ashes, like world-roaming dirveshes,* he began to measure the road of search, and eagerly pursued the path of enquiry. In each city and town on his route, he examined every street and window of the houses, till at last he arrived at the place where the two impures were con­cealed; and, as it happened, at once came to the door of the house they inhabited. The old procuress, whom he knew, coming out, the young man (now superior to her in experience) asked, “What is a certain female doing?” The simple matron replied without hesitation, “She is quaffing with her lover the cup of mutual enjoyment.” The young man continued, “Tell her, Thy husband stands at the gate, and if thy coming here was without thy will, hasten now, and seize the opportunity of escape.” The weak old woman immediately returned, and delivered the message of the husband to the infamous wife; who, on hearing it, lost the trea­sure of her senses, and the colour faded upon her cheeks. Putting her head out of a window, she beheld her husband standing in a beggar’s habit, greatly distressed and agitated; upon which, coming in confused haste to her lover, she informed him of the circumstance, and said, “Before my husband can seize us, and while the ability is not lost from our hands, it is proper to go hence, or our affairs will end in dis­appointment.” The wicked gallant instantly taking her out by a back door, mounted her upon a courser fleet as the wind, and commanded two of his ser­vants, on whose courage and alertness he could place full dependance, that travel­ling upon the wings of speed they should conduct her to another city, and conceal her in a habitation where no one would suspect her to be.

The husband, when he saw his wife put her head out of the window, sud­denly turned another way, and seemed not to observe her. Listening after this, he heard no voices within doors; upon which he guessed it was she who had kindled the fire of calamity, and that she was the scatterer of the dust of her own dishonour. He then thought within himself, “It is not improbable, but that this house may have two entrances, that she may go out at the other while I am standing at this, and am measuring the air with my hands.” He now hastened to the back part of the house, where he saw a female closely veiled, and mounted on horseback, attended by two shaters* completely armed, holding a stirrup on each side, and hurrying away with the utmost precipi­tation. From her size and appearance, he knew her to be his dishonourable wife. Exerting his agility, and having come up with them, he drew from the scabbard a flint-piercing scymetar, with which, at one blow, he struck one of the attendants to the ground of annihilation. The other, on beholding his companion in this state, alarmed for his own life, turned his face to flight, and the valiant young man seizing the bridle, mounted the horse, and speeded with his wife before him towards his own city. On his arrival near it, reflecting upon the scandal of appearing thus in daylight, he stopped in a garden; intending, under the darkness of night, to punish* his wicked partner in a way that the veil of secrecy might not drop off, and then to return home. As he had undergone much fatigue in travelling from town to town, and searching every street, lane, and alley, weariness and pain had benumbed his limbs. He lay down, and ordered the wife to chafe* his feet, when suddenly, the ambushed robbers of drowsiness having attacked the cafila* of his vigilance, plundered the treasure of his senses; and under the influence of his slumbering stars, having extended his limbs like those of a body bereaved of its soul, he lay entirely overcome by sleep.

As the juggling sky in every revo­lution brings forth some novel deception, the governor’s brother, learning what had happened, followed in pursuit, and, by tracing the marks of his horse’s shoes on the road, at length reached the gate of the garden. He entered, and beheld the drowsy-starred husband fast asleep, like his own neglectful fortune, and the wife sitting by him. Esteeming the opportunity precious, he drew from its scabbard an highly tempered blade, intending to lay the unfortunate man more torpid on the bed of death; but the savage woman, innately wicked, pre­vented him from it, and said, “This black-starred wretch is not deserving enough to pass in so easy a manner to hell, but merits a variety of punish­ment and torture. It is necessary first to impress our revenge in this world of retaliation on the mind of this evil-fated wretch, and afterwards dispatch him head downwards to the infernal regions, so that to his last moments, in his heart may remain, like the streaks of a tulip,* the wounds of agonizing pain.” She then assisted her gallant in binding his hands and feet with a cord.

During this operation, the poor hus­band, opening his eyes, beheld fate sitting at his elbow, the messenger of death hovering over his head, and any possible relief lost from his hands. He blamed his own simplicity and want of foresight, but remediless, according to the maxim, that it is impossible to erase the written decrees of fate, resigned him­self to destiny. The infamous woman, throwing the cord over the branch of a tree, drew it up till her husband became suspended head downwards, and, like a rope-dancer, dangled in the air; while she, with impudent smiles and leers, sat before his face with her gallant, and quaffed wine from the goblet of mirth.

“Now is the period arrived,” said this infamous adulteress, “that I shall enjoy ample revenge, and pour the venomous dregs of agony into the throat of this heaven-deserted wretch. In the moment of expiring life, he shall taste the bitterness of witnessing the happiness of a rival. With mul­tiplied torture shall his head be severed from his impure neck, and hung upon his shoulders. For such crimes as his, a milder punishment ought not to await him.”

The unfortunate husband, when he beheld what he ought not to have seen, though tortured by bodily pain, in extreme agony and distress of soul, sought redress from the power of the All-seeing, under conviction that, “whoever trusts firmly in God, will assuredly be delivered.”*

At length, (by divine decree) from intoxication of liquor, the brains of the wicked adulterers became exhausted of understanding, and they fell down sense­less from excessive drunkenness on the bed of evil destiny, while their goblets, filled to the brim, remained upon the carpet. The husband, suspended head downwards, beheld the wretched situa­tion of these abandoned beings, but had not the power of revenge.

At this crisis, by command of the omnipotent director of fate, a black snake, devourer of blood, suddenly descending from an upper branch of the tree, entwined himself round the unhappy husband, and with venom-swol’n mouth glided his head close to his face, bending over his eyebrows with fierce and poi­sonous look. The young man, from alarm at this life-endangering peril, emblematic of sudden death, was over­powered, and said in his heart, “Gracious God! what is this that has happened to me! Suspended head downwards from the branch of a tree, and tied hand and foot by cords, having witnessed under my own eye such heart-afflicting disgrace; with all this calamity, a destructive demon, at sight of whose form the gall dissolves to water, rests upon my head, threat­ening at every breath my dissolution. What evil deed or unworthy action can have been committed by me, all guilty as I am, that God in retribution for it hath involved me in such tor­ments, and sentenced me to such variety of punishment in this world? Most probably, this life-destroying monster, after a few more respirations of life, to which death is preferable, will with his blood-devouring venom blot the characters of my being from the tablet of existence. Since, how­ever, the pen of almighty providence must have inserted in the volume of decree his commands respecting such an ill-fated wretch as myself, and that I should hurry to the bourn of annihilation in this disgrace and dis­appointment; what resource is there, but that I should resign myself to my lot, and give up the treasure of life to the demand of death. Yet my severest grievance is, that these abandoned and infamous profligates, having escaped from my hands, have met again in the enjoyment of their wishes, while I depart from the prison of this trouble-founded mansion, according to the wish of my enemies. In my grave I will utter the fire-heated sigh; and from the clay of my tomb, the vapours of my sorrows shall ascend to the heavens.”