the elbows, I beat him till I stripped him of his skin and he
lost his senses and he had no breath wherewith to speak.
Thereupon I arose and fell to searching the hall, where I found
sundry valuables amongst which was a box, so I opened it and came
upon three hundred gold pieces and a store of reals[FN#333] and
silverlings and jadids.[FN#334] I laid hands on the whole of it
and bore off somewhat of the most sumptuous dresses; and, having
wrapped them all up in a sheet, I carried them away; and about
dawn I went in to my mother and cried, "Take thee to the price of
the calf, which I have received from the purchaser." But when the
day was high and the sun waxed hot the whole troop of the Shaykh
collected and said, "Verily our Elder hath slept till the undurn
hour;" and one of them declared, "'Tis from enjoying so much
pleasure and luxury, he and the girl; and doubtless their night
hath been a white[FN#335] night." So they ceased not talking
together and each of them had his word until the noon was high,
when certain of them said, "Come with us and let us rouse him
from sleep:" and, saying thus, all went to the door of the hall
and opened it. Hereupon they found their Shaykh hanging up and
his body bleeding profusely;[FN#336] so they asked him, "What
hath befallen thee?" and he answered in a weak voice, "Verily
that girl is no girl at all, but she is the youth who owned the
calf." They replied, "By Allah, there is no help but that we
seize him and slay him;" whereto the Edler said, "Loose me and
lead me to the Hammam that I may wash clean my skin of all this
blood." Then they let him down and after mounting him upon a
donkey they bore him to the baths. Hereat I went to the
slaughterhouse and and covered my body with bullocks' blood and
stuck to it pledgets of cotton so that I became like one sorely
diseased and I repaired to the same Hammam propped upon a staff