صفحة 740 من 1116

Thereupon I swooned away, and she sprinkled some powder of

healing herbs upon the stumps and when the blood was staunched, I

said, "Never again will I eat of cumin ragout without washing my

hands forty times with potash and forty times with galangale and

forty times with soap!" And she took of me an oath and bound me

by a covenant to that effect. When, therefore, you brought me the

cumin ragout my colour changed and I said to myself, "It was this

very dish that caused the cutting off of my thumbs and great

toes;" and, when you forced me, I said, "Needs must I fulfil the

oath I have sworn." "And what befell thee after this?" asked

those present; and he answered, "When I swore to her, her anger

was appeased and I slept with her that night. We abode thus

awhile till she said to me one day, "Verily the Palace of the

Caliph is not a pleasant place for us to live in, and none ever

entered it save thyself; and thou only by grace of the Lady

Zubaydah.