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On her fair bosom caskets twain I scanned, * Sealed fast with

musk seals lovers to withstand With arrowy glances stand on guard

her eyes, * Whose shafts would shoot who dares put forth a hand.

With her I spent a most goodly night; and, to be brief, O my

mistress, I remained with them in all solace and delight of life,

eating and drinking, conversing and carousing and every night

lying with one or other of them. But at the head of the new year

they came to me in tears and bade me farewell, weeping and crying

out and clinging about me: whereat I wondered and said, "What may

be the matter? verily you break my heart!" They exclaimed, "Would

Heaven we had never known thee; for, though we have companied

with many, yet never saw we a pleasanter than thou or a more

courteous." And they wept again. "But tell me more clearly,"

asked I, "what causeth this weeping which maketh my

gall-bladder[FN#291] like to burst;" and they answered, "O our

lord and master, it is severance which maketh us weep; and thou,

and thou only, art the cause of our tears.