This Assembly, like several others that will be met with in the course of the work, is so essentially Arabic as almost to forbid intelligible translation. Two suitors, an old man and a youth, appear before the Kadi of Ma‘arrah. The former narrates to the Kadi that he had possessed a beautiful and attractive, yet obedient and active, slave girl; that the youth had borrowed her, treated her roughly, and then returned her in an infirm state. The youth admits the charge, but declares that he had offered sufficient com­pensation; and then complains that the old man detained as a pledge a male slave of his, who was of good origin and qualities, and highly serviceable to his master. The Kadi perceives from the style of these addresses that the language is enigmatical, and bids the litigants speak plainly. The youth then improvises some verses to explain that by a slave girl the old man meant a needle which the youth had borrowed, and the eye of which he had broken by accident as he was drawing the thread through it; the male slave which the old man detained was a pencil or stylus for the applica­tion of koḥl, the dark pigment with which Orientals anoint the eyelid to heighten by contrast the lustre of the eye. The old man in his turn admits the truth of this, but pleads in mournful verse his poverty and his inability to bear the loss even of a needle. The Kadi, touched with pity, bestows a trifle on both, and they depart joyously. But almost immediately he suspects that he has been deceived, and sends an attendant after them to bring them back. When they are again in the court, the Kadi charges them with deceit. The boy is abashed, but the old man steps forward boldly and con­fesses that he is the noted impostor of Serûj, and that the boy is his son; that they never had either needle or koḥl pencil, but had devised the story to excite pity. The Kadi, charmed with their literary skill, pardons their offence and dismisses them with a caution. The chief feature in the composition is the enigmatical description of the needle and pencil, which depends on the double meanings of the words and phrases contained in it. Some of these are so subtle that even the native commentators are undecided about them; and we may assume that the double-entente of passages like this, and the similar address in the Thirteenth Assembly, was among the lessons which Ḥarîri is said to have taught to his pupils. The commentators, who are often profuse of interpretation where there is no difficulty, are somewhat brief when they have to deal with these dark compositions. Even the loquacious Sherîshi, who some­times gives whole pages of anecdote and poetical quotation to illustrate a single word, passes over in silence phrases where there evidently lurks a second and hidden sense. The present transla­tion is, it is hoped, an adequate interpretation of the author’s meaning.

Al Ḥârith, son of Hammâm, related: Among the wonders of time, I saw that two suitors came before the Kadi of Ma‘arrat an No‘mân:—From the one of them the two excellencies of life had departed, while the other was as a bough of the ben tree.—And the old man said: God strengthen the judge, as by him He strengthens whoever seeks judgment.—Behold I had a slave girl, elegant of shape, smooth of cheek, patient to labour;— At one time she ambled like a good steed, at another she slept quietly in her bed: even in July thou wouldst feel her touch to be cool.—She had understanding and discretion, sharpness and wit, a hand with fingers, but a mouth without teeth: yet did she pique as with tongue of snake, and saunter in training robe; and she was displayed in blackness and whiteness; and she drank, but not from cisterns.—She was now truth-telling now beguiling; now hiding, now peeping forth; yet fitted for employment, obedient in poverty and in wealth: if thou didst spurn she showed affection, but if thou didst put her from thee, she remained quietly apart.—Generally would she serve thee, and be courteous to thee, though sometimes she might be froward to thee and pain thee, and trouble thee.* —Now this youth asked her service of me for a purpose of his own, and I made her his servant, without reward;—On the condition that he should enjoy the use of her, but not burden her with more than she could bear.—But he forced on her too hard a work, and exacted of her long labour;—Then returned her to me broken in health, offering a compensation which I accept not.

Then said the youth: Sure the old man is more truth­ful than the Ḳaṭa: but as for my hurting her it fell out by mistake.—And now have I pledged to him in pay­ment of his damage, a slave* of mine, of equal birth as regards either kin, tracing his lineage to Al Ḳayn, free from stain and disgrace, whose place was the apple of his master’s eye.—He shewed forth kindness, and called up admiration; he nourished mankind, and set guard on his tongue.—If he was placed in power he was generous, if he marked aught for his own he was noble with it; if he was supplied he gave of his supply, and when he was asked for more he added.—He stayed not in the house, and rarely visited his wives, save two by two.—He was generous with his possession, he was lofty in his bounty; he kept with his spouse although she was not of his own clay; and there was pleasure in his comeliness, although he was not desired for his effeminacy.

Then said to them the Kadi, “Now either explain or depart.” Then pressed forward the lad, and said:

He lent me a needle to darn my rags, which use has worn and blackened;

And its eye broke in my hand by chance, as I drew the thread through it.

But the old man would not forgive me the paying for it when he saw that it was spoiled;

But said, “Give me a needle like it, or a price, after thou hast mended it.”

And he keeps my koḥl pencil by him as a pledge: oh, the shame that he has gotten by so doing:

For my eye is dry through giving him this pledge; my hand fails to ransom its anointer.

Now by this statement fathom the depth of my misery and pity one unused to bear it.

Then turned the Kadi to the old man, and said, “Come, speak without glozing,” and he said—

I swear by the holy place of sacrifice, and the devout whom the slope of Mina brings together;

If the time had been my helper, thou wouldst not have seen me taking in pledge the pencil which he has pledged to me.

Nor would I bring myself to seek a substitute for a needle that he had spoiled, no nor the price of it.

But the bow of calamities shoots at me with deadly arrows from here and there:

And to know my condition is to know his; misery, and distress, and exile, and sickness.

Fortune has put us on a level: I am his like in misery, and he is as I.

He cannot ransom his pencil now that it lies pledged in my hand:

And, through the narrowness of my own means, it is not within my bounds to forgive him his offending.

Now this is my tale and his: so look upon us, and judge between us, and pity us.

Now when the Kadi had learnt their stories, and was aware of their penury and their distinction,—He took out for them a denar from under his prayer cushion, and said, “With this end and decide your contention.”—But the old man caught it before the youth, and claimed the whole of it in earnest, not in jest;—Saying to the youth, “Half is mine as my share of the bounty, and thy share is mine, in payment for my needle:—Nor do I swerve from justice, so come and take thy pencil.”—Now there fell on the youth, at the words of the old man, a sadness at which the heart of the Kadi grew sullen, stirring its sorrow for the lost denar.—Yet did he cheer the concern of the youth and his anguish by a few dirhems which he doled to him.—Then he said to the two, “Avoid transac­tions, and put away disputes, and come not before me with wranglings, for I have no purse of fine-money for you.”—And they rose to go out from him, rejoicing at his gift, fluent in his praise.—But as for the Kadi, his ill-humour subsided not after his stone had dripped; his sad look cleared not away after his rock had oozed.—But when he recovered from his fit he turned to his attend­ants,—And said, “My perception is imbued with the thought, and my guess announces to me, that these are practisers of craft, not suitors in a claim:—But what is the way to fathom them, and to draw forth their secret?”—Then said to him the Knowing One of his assemblage, the Light of his following:—“Surely the dis­covery of what they hide must be through themselves.”— So he bade an attendant follow them and bring them back; and when they stood before him he said to them, “Tell me truly your camel’s age: so shall ye be secure from the consequence of your deceit.”—Then did the lad shrink back and ask for pardon; but the old man stepped forward and said:

I am the Serûji and this is my son; and the cub at the proving is like the lion.

Now never has his hand nor mine done wrong in matter of needle or pencil:

But only fortune, the harming, the hostile, has brought us to this, that we came forth to beg

Of each one whose palm is moist, whose spring is sweet; of each whose palm is close, whose hand is fettered;

By every art, and with every aim: by earnest, if it prosper, and if not, by jest.

That we may draw forth a drop for our thirsty lot, and consume our life in wretched victual.

And afterward Death is on the watch for us: if he fall not on us to-day he will fall to-morrow.

Then said the Kadi to him, “Oh rare! how admirable are the breathings of thy mouth; well done! should I say of thee, were it not for the guile that is in thee.— Now know that I am of those that warn thee, and will beware of thee.—So act not again deceitfully with judges, but fear the might of those who bear rule.—For not every minister will excuse, and not at every season will speech be listened to.”—Then the old man promised to follow his counsel, and to abstain from disguising his character.—And he departed from the Kadi’s presence, while the guile beamed from his forehead.—Said Al Ḥârith, son of Hammâm: Now I never saw aught more wonderful than these things in the changes of my jour­neys, nor read aught like them in the records of books.