The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 14 by Anonymous
page 129 of 450 (28%)
page 129 of 450 (28%)
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this host's taking the field was that the King of Al-Irak, the
father of the three maidens, after he appointed the ship and saw her set out, felt uneasy at heart, presaging evil, and feared with sore fear the shifts of Time. So he went forth, he and his high Officials and his host, and marched adown the longshore till, by decree of the Decreer, he suddenly and all unexpectedly came upon his Queen who was under charge of the ship's captain. Presently, seeing the cavalcade and its ensigns the Rais went forward and recognising the King hastened up to him and kissed his stirrup and his feet. The Sultan turned towards him and knew him; so he asked him of his state and the Rais answered by relating all that had befallen him. Thereupon the King commanded his power to alight in that place and they did so and set up their tents and pavilions. Then the Sultan took seat in his Shamiyanah[FN#174] and bade them bring his Queen and they brought her, and when eye met eye the pair greeted each other fondly and the father asked concerning her three children. She declared that she had no tidings of them after the shipwreck and she knew not whether they were dead or alive. Hereat the King wept with sore weeping and exclaimed, "Verily we are Allah's and unto Him we are returning!" after which he gave orders to march from that place upon his capital. Accordingly they stinted not faring for a space of four days till they reached the city and he entered his citadel-palace. But every time and every hour he was engrossed in pondering the affair of the three Princesses and kept saying, "Would heaven I wot are they drowned or did they escape the sea; and, if they were saved, Oh, that I knew whether they were scattered or abode in company one with other and whatever else may have betided them!" And he ceased not brooding over the issue of things and kept addressing himself in speech; and neither meat |
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