This Assembly presents another of those exercises of ingenuity in which the author delights. Al Ḥârith, being in the town or district of Ahwâz in a state of great poverty, determines to seek his fortune elsewhere. On the road he comes upon a tent whose wealthy owner, attended by his slaves, is reposing during a halt. The stranger invites him to rest himself, and Al Ḥârith soon dis­covers that he is Abû Zayd. He inquires the cause of this sudden prosperity, and is informed that it was produced by the improvisa­tion of an elegant address or composition, the merits of which a great personage had thus munificently rewarded. Al Ḥârith, with his usual literary curiosity, desires to hear it; but Abû Zayd will consent only on condition that his friend shall first accompany him to Sûs, the ancient Susa, which is distant a day’s journey from Ahwâz. Al Ḥârith consents, and Abû Zayd detains him in the city for a month on various pretences. At last, when Al Ḥârith will no longer stay, the adventurer tells how he had been oppressed with debt, and been delivered from it, and loaded with presents, by the Governor of Ṭûs, in Khorasan, in reward for an eulogistic compo­sition, in which the alternate letters were pointed and unpointed. He asks Al Ḥârith whether he would prefer a sum of money or a copy of this “spotted” composition. His friend chooses the latter, and Abû Zayd dictates it, not failing to accompany it with a present to relieve his necessities.

Al Ḥârith, son of Hammâm, related: I descended at the two markets of Ahwâz, clothed in the garb of need. —And I delayed there a space enduring adversity, passing sombre days,—Until I looked upon the length­ening of my stay as if it were one of the hurts of vengeance,—And I viewed the city with the eye of him that hates, and I parted from it as one parts from the mouldering camp-ruin.—And I set forth from its stream­let, girded up of skirt, spurring to the abundant waters; —Until when I had journeyed from it two stations, and was distant the march of two nights, there came to my sight a pitched tent and a kindled fire.—Then I said, “I will go to them; perchance I may quench thirst or find guidance at the fire.”—And when I had arrived at the shadow of the tent I saw some fair boy-servants, and furniture which thou wouldest gaze at, and an old man; on him was noble apparel, and by him was newly plucked fruit,—And I greeted him and then went aside from him.—But he laughed to me and made kindly his answer towards me, and said, “Wilt thou not take seat by one whose fruit is choice, whose pleasantry charms?”—Then I took my seat to get the prize of conversing with him, not to swallow down what was before him.—And as soon as he unveiled his accom­plishments and bared his teeth, I knew that he was Abû Zayd by the beauty of his choice sayings, and the ugliness of those yellow teeth.—And we knew each other then, and two joys compassed me in that hour.— Nor could I learn by which I was purer in rejoicing and more perfect of delight;—Whether it was at his dawning forth from the darkness of his journeys, or at the plenty of his dwelling after its dearth.—Then my soul yearned that I should break the seal of his secret and enter into the cause of his prosperity.—So I said to him, “Whence is thy returning, and whither is thy going onward, and how have thy wardrobes been filled?” —He said, “As for my coming it is from Ṭûs; and as for my destination, it is Sûs; and as for the wealth which I have reached, it is from an Address which I improvised.”—Then I begged him that he would lay before me his secret, and rehearse his Address to me.— He said, “The war of Al Basûs was a less thing than what thou desirest, unless, indeed, thou wilt accompany me to Sûs.”

So I followed him thither perforce, and I attached myself to him there a month.—And he, he watered me to the full with the cups of beguiling and made me to bear the bridle of expectation;—Until when my breast was straitened and my patience overcome, I said to him, “There remains to thee no pretext, nor to me aught that can divert me.—To-morrow I shall take omen of the raven of separation, and saddle away from thee with the shoes of Ḥonayn.”—He said, “God forbid that I should break promise with thee or thwart thee! I have not deferred to relate to thee save that I might make thee stay.—But since thou hast doubted concerning my promise, and the suspicion of ill treatment urges thee to depart from me,—Listen to the story of my lengthened journey, and add it to the Tales of Pleasure after Pain.”—I said, “Go on, how long is thy tether! how various are thy wiles!”—He said: Know that the frowning time cast me to Ṭûs, and then was I poor and laden; I had not the sprout or the split of a date-stone.—So the bareness of my hands made me resort to haltering myself with debt;—And I took credit by evil chance from one who was hard of nature;—For I fancied it would be easy to find a market for my poetry, and I enlarged in spend­ing;—And recovered not until that debt burdened me, whose due attached to me, whose claimant beset me.— Then was I bewildered at my state, and showed my creditor my difficulty;—But he believed not my poverty and drew not off from worrying me;—Nay, he was instant in demanding and obstinate in carrying me to the Kadi;—And as often as I humbled myself to him in speech, and besought of him the grace of the gene­rous,—And would dispose him to show mercy to me by lenity, or to wait for me till competence,—He said, “Set not thy desire on being waited for while thou holdest fast the bright gold;—For, by thy existence, thou seest not the paths of deliverance ere thou show me the meltings of the pure ore.”—And when I saw the sharpening of his contention, and that there was no refuge to me from his hand, I made a quarrel with him, and then I assaulted him,—That he might carry me up to the Governor having authority over offences, not to the Judge of civil wrongs.—And this was by reason of what had reached me of the eminence of the Governor and his virtue, and the severity of the Kadi and his meanness.—Now when we were present at the gate of the ruler of Ṭûs, I perceived that I should have nor hurt nor harm.—So I called for ink-flask and paper, and composed for him a Spotted Address, and this it it:

The qualities of our Lord are loved, and at his court­yard there is abiding;—And nearness to him is as gifts, and farness from him as destruction;—And his friend­ship is as pedigree, and his estrangement as calamity;— His sword’s edge is sharp, and the stars of his virtue gleam.—His continence adorns, and the rectitude of his road is plain.—His understanding turns and tries, and his fame goes east and west.

The ruler, the intelligent; surpassing, excelling; understanding, ingenious; impatient of baseness, loathing it;

Replacing, consuming; distinguished, incomparable; illustrious, virtuous; quick-witted, fastidious;

Marvellous when he discourses; able when the stir of ill befals, and the dreaded calamity grows mighty.

The chaplets of his honour are self-strung, and the rain-storm of his largess showers;—The gift of his hand flows freely, while avarice from his heart sinks away.— The teat of his liberality is milked, and the gold of his chests is spoiled.—He whom his band gathers to itself prospers and overcomes; the merchant of his gate makes gain by beguiling him.—He refrains from wronging the innocent, and is free from the foulness of the transgressor. —He unites his gentleness with dignity, and turns aside from the path of the niggardly.—He is not given to leap at the opportunity of evil, but abstains with the abstain­ing of the righteous.

And therefore is he loved, and his continence merits the infatuation he inspires, since its pure essence beguiles all.

His qualities are bright, and gleam; and his arrow is an arrow which overcomes when thou shootest against it.

He is gentle, he is cheerful; one who makes good when his friend slips, nor is there any doubt of his desert.

Not miserly, nay, but bountiful; open when he is solicited; one who goes forth, his gate keeps him not close.

When want bites, he breaks the edge of its biting by his succour, and its tooth falls out.

And it is fitting that whoever is wise and under­standing, whoever is near and far, should submit himself to the hero of the time, the restorer of the palsied.—For since he sucked the breast of his fostering, he has been distinguished by the abundance of his shower.—He raises the fallen, and comforts him; if he helps he gladdens; if he contends in honour, he routs his ad­versary, and returns with a clear right.—He prepares fatigue for him who shall rule after him; he is lauded as often as men move him to kindness, or prove him in deed; he crowns his virtues with the love of his suppliants.

May he never become void of gladness, may the shadow of his prosperity be lengthened.

For he is virtuous in the sight of whoever contemplates the shining of his stars.

He adorns the graces of his culture by clothing himself with the fear of his Lord.

And may there prosper my Lord his gain of honours, firmly rooted and large, and his excelling in benefits that are perfect, that publish themselves:—And may the helping of his servant with a portion from his abundance accord with the pious offerings of His Honour:—For his servant is a child of the noble, though a wanderer from dearth; one wounded by calamities that have scarred him, who strings chaplets that voyage afar.—When he surges to the harangue there is found none to speak like him; for Ḳoss would then be as Bâḳil.—For when he embellishes thou wouldst say, “Garments of Yemen have been embroidered,” thou wouldst think that a garden had sprouted.—This is so, and then also his draught is but a draining, and his food is borrowed; his dawn is the glooming, and his cloak is worn out.—And now does he quake at the raging of a tyrannous creditor, who harasses him because of a debt that attaches to him.— But if my Lord will mercifully avert him from me by the gifts of his hand, he will belt himself with glory that surpasses, and come off with the reward of loosing me from the chain.—May the qualities of his disposition never fail to aid whoever watches the promise of his lightning-cloud.—By the grace of the Lord, who is without beginning, who liveth now, and is without end.

Said Abû Zayd: Now when the Governor had dis­cerned the pearls of my Address, and caught a glance of the secret committed to it,—He made sign at once for the paying of my debt, and decided what was between my adversary and myself.—Then he appropriated me for his ostentation, and distinguished me by his preference. —And I remained a few years prospering in guestship with him, and pasturing in the oasis of his bounty,— Until, when his gifts had overwhelmed me, and his gold had lengthened my skirt, I contrived to depart in the fair condition that thou seest.

Said Al Ḥârith: Then I said to him, “Thanks to Him who destined to thee the meeting with the kind one, the noble, and delivered thee by him from the pressure of thy creditor.”—He said, “Praise to God for happiness of fortune and freedom from the contentious adversary.”—Then he said, “Which is more pleasing to thee, that I should share with thee of the gift, or pre­sent thee with the Spotted Address?”—I said, “The dictation of the Address will be more pleasing to me.” He said, “And that too, by thy Truth, is the lighter upon me: for truly the gift of that which goes in at the ears is easier than the gift of that which comes out of the sleeves.”—But then it was as if he scorned the meanness, and grew ashamed, for he gave me the Ad­dress and a present together.—Thus I gained from him two lots, and parted from him with two booties, and returned to my home, cool of eye, through having gotten both the Address and the coin.