• Preface
  
• Author's Preface
  
• Preliminary Excursus
  

1. The Signs Of Love
   
2. On Falling In Love While Asleep
   
3. On Falling In Love Through A Description
   
4. On Falling In Love At First Sight
   
5. On Falling In Love After Long Association
   
6. On Falling In Love With A Quality And Thereafter Not Approving Any Other Different
   
7. Of Allusion By Words
   
8. Of Hinting With The Eyes
   
9. Of Correspondence
   
10. Of The Messenger
    
11. Of Concealing The Secret
    
12. Of Divulging The Secret
    
13. Of Compliance
    
14. Of Opposition
    
15. Of The Reproacher
    
16. Of The Helpful Brother
    
17. Of The Spy
    
18. Of The Slanderer
    
19. Of Union
    
20. Of Breaking Off
    
21. Of Fidelity
    
22. Of Betrayal
    
23. Of Separation
    
24. Of Contentment
    
25. Of Wasting Away
    
26. Of Forgetting
    
27. Of Death
    
28. Of The Vileness Of Sinning
    
29. Of The Virtue Of Continence
    

PREFACE

THE Arabs carrying Islam westwards to the Atlantic Ocean first set foot on Spanish soil during July 710 the leader of the raid, which was to prove the forerunner of long Moslem occupation of the Iberian Peninsula, was named Tarif, and the promontory on which he landed commemorates his exploit by being called to this day Tarifa. The main invasion followed a year later; Tariq Ibn Ziyad, a Berber by birth, brought over from the African side of the narrows a comparatively small army which sufficed to overthrow Roderick the Visigoth and to supplant the Cross by the Crescent; he gave his name to that famous Rock of Gibraltar (Jabal Tariq, the Mountain of Tariq), which has been disputed by so many conquerors down the ages, and over which the British flag has fluttered since the early years of the eighteenth century.
      When Ibn Hazm, the author of the book here translated, was born on 7 November 994, Islam had been established in Andalusia for nearly three hundred years. Since 756 Cordova, his birthplace, had been the capital of the Umaiyad rulers of this now independent kingdom;' for it was in the far West of the Moslem Empire that the remnant of the first dynasty of Caliphs found shelter and renewed greatness after being supplanted in Baghdad by their conquerors the Abbasids. The two centuries which followed the inauguration of the Western Caliphate witnessed the rise of a brilliant civilization and culture which have left an ineradicable impress on the peninsula, embodied in so many fine Moorish buildings; the Cathedral Mosque of Cordova, founded in 786, mentioned several times in the pages of this book, was converted into a Christian cathedral by Ferdinand III in 1236, but its familiar name " La Mesquita " still recalls the purpose for which it was originally erected. It was during Ibn Hazm's own lifetime that the Umaiyad Caliphate was finally extinguished.
      Abu Muhammad `Ali Ibn Muhammad Ibn Sa'id Ibn' Hazm, to give our author his full name-for the Arabs call a man first after his son, secondly by his own name, and thirdly after his father and his ancestors-belonged to a notable family converted from Christianity several generations before. His father was a high official in the service of al-Mansur, regent of Hisham II, and of his son al-Muzaffar; al-Mansur and al-Muzaffar were members of the Banu 'Amir who had succeeded in arrogating to themselves all the power and privileges of the Caliphate but its name. Being the son of such a man, to whom he always refers as " the late vizier ", Ibn Hazm enjoyed a happy though secluded childhood, and the advantages of an excellent education; he tells us that most of his early teachers were women. The fall of the Banu 'Amir led soon after to the dismissal and house-arrest of their faithful minister, who died four years later on 22 June 1012. The Umaiyads were now near their end; Andalusia was in a state of anarchy; in 1013 the Berber insurgents seized and sacked Cordova, and on 13 July of that year Ibn Hazm fled from the city of his birth and set out upon extensive wanderings, of which he gives us fascinating glimpses in the pages of this book. In 1 o 16 `Ali Ibn Hammud proclaimed himself Caliph, but did not long survive his usurpation of power. The next fourteen years were chaotic in the extreme, as Umaiyad and Hammudid pretenders struggled for possession of the precarious throne. In 1030 the citizens of Cordova, weary of so much disorder, declared the Caliphate to be at an end and set up in its place a sort of republic; but the authority of Cordova had meanwhile dwindled away, and Andalusia was split between numerous independent principalities. The way was being prepared for the Reconquista. The fall of Granada in 1492 drove the Moslems from their last foothold in the Iberian Peninsula.
      Ibn Hazm's first refuge after his flight from Cordova was Almeria, where he lived quietly and in comparative security for a time. But in 1016 Khairan, the governor of that city, having made common cause with `Ali Ibn Hammud against the Umaiyad Sulaiman, accused Ibn Hazm of harbouring Umaiyad sympathies, and after imprisoning him for some months banished him from his province. Our author made a brief stay at Aznalcazar, and then betook himself to Valencia, where `Abd al-Rahman IV al-Murtada the Umaiyad had just announced his succession to the Caliphate. He served al-Murtada as vizier and marched with his army to Granada; but the cause he supported was not successful, and he was captured and thrown into prison. However his release was not long delayed; and in February 1019 he returned to Cordova, after an absence of six years, to find al-Qasim Ibn Hammud in power. In December 1023 the Umaiyads again seized the Caliphate, and Ibn Hazm became vizier to 'Abd al-Rahman V al-Mustazhir. He had only seven weeks' enjoyment of this turn of fortune, for al-Mustazhir was assassinated and he himself was once again in jail. History does not record how long his new incarceration lasted; we only know that in 1027 he was in Jativa, where he composed the present book. He appears to have kept clear of politics for the rest of his days, which ended on 15 August 1064; but he by no means kept clear of trouble, for his religious views were in conflict with the prevalent orthodoxy and his writings were publicly burnt in Seville during his lifetime.
      The Ring of the Dove was Ibn Hazm's only experiment in the field of elegant literature; for he was primarily interested in theology and law, on which he wrote voluminously. Its survival hangs upon the tenuous thread of a single manuscript, itself in fact an epitome rather than a complete transcription of the original. This precious codex, which is dated Rajab 738 of the Mohammedan reckoning, or February 1338 of the Christian era, is preserved in the fine Leiden collection, and was first studied by R. Dozy, the eminent historian of Moslem Spain. In 1914 the Russian savant D. K. Petrof published the text, which was reprinted as it stood, at Damascus in 1931. The editio princeps was necessarily somewhat defective textually, for the copyist of the manuscript was not very careful; but many improved readings were proposed by a succession of learned reviewers, prominent among them being I. Goldziher, C. Brockelmann, W. Marcais and A. R. Nykl. In 1931 an English translation was published by Nykl at Paris; ten years later M. Weisweiler produced an amiable German rendering, which has had a very considerable success. In 194.9 F. Gabrieli offered an Italian version; and in the same year L. Bercher issued at Algiers a revised edition of the text, accompanied by an interleaved French translation. Finally in 1952 an elegant Spanish translation was published by E. Garcia Gdmez.
      The present writer is profoundly indebted to the labors of these his distinguished predecessors, which have illuminated most of the obscurities that disfigured Petrof's text. He has been eclectic, he hopes judiciously, in his interpretations of those not infrequent passages where scholars have been in conflict; and he has taken into his translation a few emendations of his own. He feels reasonably confident, though by no means complacent, that all but a very small number of cruxes have now been resolved.
      The extremely interesting and learned introduction with which Nykl prefaced his meritorious but inelegant and somewhat unsatisfactory rendering disposes of the necessity of covering the same ground again; in brief, that most widely-read and humane scholar has discussed the relationship between The Ring of the Dove and the writings of the Troubadours, a subject which he has studied further in his excellent Hispano-Arabic Poetry (Baltimore, 194,6). My own intentions are in any case more modest; I have aimed at making an accurate and, I trust, tolerably readable translation for the perusal of the general public, and not so much for the consideration of experts. I do not propose therefore to adventure into the perilous arena of comparative literature, and shall confine the remainder of these brief comments to a discursive appreciation of the contents of Ibn Hazm's book.
      Arabic literature, which is exceedingly extensive in bulk, does not abound in books of the sort that modern taste finds readable. The explanation of this paradox is fairly obvious. Before the advent of Islam the Arabs appear to have had no tradition of writing and reading, and their literary instinct was satisfied by the composition of poetry and proverbial sayings, all transmitted by word of mouth. The fast book to be compiled in Arabia was the Koran; and that, according to native report, was put together by an editor after the death of Mohammed. Though poetry was regarded as a suspect pursuit by the narrowly orthodox, even they could not deny its value as an instrument of religious propaganda; and since religion in Islam soon became entangled with politics, the age-old forms of panegyric and satire continued to flourish in the brave new age of faith in action. Meanwhile the requirements of dogma, ritual and law encouraged the growth of a kind of literature which soon found acceptance as a respectable and indeed a meritorious occupation; wandering scholars made it their care to collect the traditional sayings of Mohammed, carried into remote provinces of the far-flung Moslem empire by the victorious expeditionaries of the cause. These traditions were in time organized into digests following a set pattern, the arrangement being by topics of ritual and law. In this way the Arabs came to regard the book as a collection of anecdotes written down in accordance with a premeditated scheme; though some still considered the memory to be a superior medium of transmission to the written word.
      Contact with other peoples presently made the Arabs aware of the existence of other literatures. The Persians introduced them to the idea of adab, a term most difficult to translate; broadly speaking, adab is a form of prose composition whose primary purpose is not religious but secular, and which is intended not merely for instruction but also for enjoyment. It was the Persians who taught the Arabs to appreciate and to write elegant prose; they also initiated their rude conquerors into the pleasures of amusing fiction, and encouraged them to amorous adventures. From the Greeks the Arabs learned science and philosophy, the art and the delight of discussion and dialectic. Persians and Greeks together persuaded the austere and somewhat joyless Arabs that concubinage could be an Tsthetic and' intellectual as well as a physical pleasure. They taught them many other things besides, but these are not relevant to the present subject. Many of these lessons were naturally rejected with horror by the strictly religious, but they left their impress on Arabic literature.
      The Arabs had certainly known and appreciated the joys of the flesh, long before Islam persuaded them that these were inferior to the delights of the spirit. So the poets inform us; and it is significant that poets were the heroes of the numerous desert romances, which now passed into wide circulation. Islam made it increasingly difficult for the situation to develop in which boy meets girl. Love became a complicated and dangerous exploit; though marriage was of course never difficult; the romantic drama acquired its stock characters and conventional scenes. Moreover the puritanical spirit of Islam, making a virtue out of social necessity, discovered as much satisfaction in the quest as in the conquest. The idealization of a sort of. Platonic love, in which the lover never achieved union with the beloved, inspired much of the finest poetry of the Arabs; it supplied the mystics with a favourite theme of meditation, when they substituted the Divine for the human object of the most powerful of man's natural passions.
       In The Ring of the Dove we find these various tendencies and influences meeting together, to form a perfect blend of sacred learning and profane delectation. Ibn Hazm never lets us forget that he is a Moslem, with a reverence for and an expert knowledge of the traditional-Moslem values and sciences. He freely illustrates his discourse with quotations from the Koran, and the Traditions of the Prophet, these latter supported by all the paraphernalia of what the Arabs called `ilm al-hadith, those chains of transmission " which are considered to guarantee the authenticity of the sayings put into Mohammed's mouth. He contrives to keep the discussion on a high moral level, though he occasionally takes a plunge into more dangerous depths; he rounds off his book with a pair of erudite and ethically irreproachable chapters (though even these contain a shocking anecdote or two) which he hoped would conciliate even the most austere spirit. At the same time he tells his stories, many of them autobiographical, in polished prose, embellished with extracts from his I own poetry; which would have been considerably s more extensive, had they not been drastically pruned by the copyist. In order that he may escape the charge of amusing without instructing, he binds his scattered narratives together with connecting links of theoretical discussion, in which he betrays his acquaintance with Greek philosophy-and we have yet to appreciate the full extent of Plato's influence on the Arabs-and organizes the whole material into a systematic pattern. He has written not a collection of tales, but a book.
      Ibn Hazm's prose, judged by the canons of adab accepted in his day, is of a very high quality; it is learned without becoming frigid, rhetorical without being bombastic, fluent without degenerating into flatulence. His poetry, of which he appears to have had a considerable conceit, is in truth very mediocre, and we need shed few tears over its cavalier treatment at the hands of the scribe; nevertheless it is not wholly lacking in merit, and if in translation it comes out somewhat pedestrian and humdrum-and the fault is not entirely the translator's-yet for all that it succeeds to some extent in fulfilling the author's purpose of varying the pitch and pattern of his composition. The book as a whole is a book in our understanding of the word, and as such belongs to the very rare category of Arabic book which merits translation exactly as it stands.
      For the sad but plain truth is that extremely few Arabic books translate well. Apart from that passion for the display of traditional religious learning which animated most Arab writers and recommended them to their fellows but inevitably set up a barrier between them and the outside world, grammar and philology were also held to be indispensable weapons in the armory of the ambitious author. The Arabs were fiercely proud of the complexities of "their syntax and the opulence of their vocabulary where learning conflicted with taste, learning generally won the day. Ibn Hazm is therefore surprisingly free of pedantry; it is doubtful whether any other Arab writer so well qualified as he would have resisted, as he does in one striking passage, the temptation to enumerate all that earlier scholars had said on the derivation of the Arabic word for " passion ". Yet Ibn Hazm was after all only human, and therefore indulges occasionally in poetic images drawn from the technicalities of grammar and syntax or from the obscurities of scholasticism. As a mirror to the society in which he was brought up he is almost uniquely valuable.
       I have tried to translate as faithfully as possible, given the difficulties posed by the task of rendering a Semitic into an Aryan idiom. I do not think that the prose parts of this version need too much apology; but something ought certainly to be said on behalf of the pieces in metre and rhyme. The first thing to repeat and this is quite honestly not a case of an indifferent workman blaming his tools-is that Ibn Hazm was not a great poet; and as every translator is aware, there is no more baffling labour than to endeavor to do justice to the mediocre; the result is bound to be mediocre at best, and at worst it may be intolerable. If the translator possesses a sufficient degree of technical dexterity in versifying, he usually finds that indifferent verse is easier to stomach -when put into metre and rhyme than when dissected into strips of prose. And since his original for his part said what he had to say in rhyme and metre, it seems, at least to my way of thinking, that the interpreter should take the same trouble, for there is always the off-chance that he may occasionally produce something memorable. Those modern critics who decry the tradition, established in our own literature over several centuries, of rendering classical poetry into the traditional forms of English verse, have yet to prove, so far at least as Arabic is concerned, that their alternative solution of the problem is either theoretically more sound, or in practice, more successful.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

PRELIMINARY EXCURSUS

THE SIGNS OF LOVE


LOVE has certain signs, which the intelligent man quickly detects, and the shrewd man readily recognizes. Of these the first is the brooding gaze: the eye is the wide gateway of the soul, the scrutinizer of its secrets, conveying its most private thoughts, and giving expression to its deepest-hid feelings. You will see the lover gazing at the beloved unblinkingly; his eyes follow the loved one's every movement, withdrawing as he withdraws, inclining as he inclines, just as the chameleon's stare shifts with the shifting of the sun. I have written a poem on this topic, from which the following may be quoted.



My eye no other place of rest
Discovers, save with thee;
Men say the lodestone is possessed
Of a like property.

To right or left it doth pursue
Thy movements up or down,
As adjectives in grammar do
Accord them with their noun.

       The lover will direct his conversation to the beloved, even when he purports however earnestly to address another: the affectation is apparent to anyone with eyes to see. When the loved one speaks, the lover listens with rapt attention to his every word; he marvels at everything the beloved says, however extraordinary and absurd his observations may be; he believes him implicitly even when he is clearly lying, agrees with him though he is obviously in the wrong, testifies on his behalf for all that he may be unjust, follows after him however he may proceed and whatever line of argument he may adopt. The lover hurries to the spot where the beloved is at the moment, endeavors to sit as near him as possible sidles up close to him, lays aside all occupations that might oblige him to leave his company, makes light of any matter however weighty that would demand his parting from him, is very slow to move when he takes his leave of him. I have put this somewhere into verse. 



No captive for the gallows bound
With more reluctance quits his cell
Than I thy presence, in profound
Regret to say farewell.

But when, my darling, comes the time
That we may be together, I
Run swiftly as the moon doth climb
The ramparts of the sky.

At last, alas! That sweet delight
Must end anew; I, lingering yet,
Turn slowly, as from heaven's height
The fixed stars creep to set.

       Other signs of love are that sudden confusion and excitement betrayed by the lover when he unexpectedly sees the one he loves coming upon him unawares, that agitation which overmasters him on beholding someone who resembles his beloved or, on hearing his name suddenly pronounced. This I have put into verse, as the following extract indicates.



Whene'er my ranging eyes descry
A person clad in red,
My heart is split with agony
And sore discomforted.

His roguish glance, as I conclude,
Has shed such human blood
That now his garments are imbrued
All saffron from the flood.

       A man in love will give prodigally to the limit of his capacity, in a way that formerly he would have refused; as if he were the one receiving the donation, he the one whose happiness is the object in view; all this in order that he may show off his good points, and make himself desirable. How often has the miser opened his purse strings, the scowler relaxed his frown, the coward leapt heroically into the fray, the clod suddenly become sharp-witted, the boor turned into the perfect gentleman, the stinker transformed himself into the elegant dandy, the sloucher smartened up, the decrepit recaptured his lost youth, the godly gone wild, the self-respecting kicked over the traces-and all because of love!
       All these signs are to be observed even before the fire of Love is properly kindled, ere its conflagration truly bursts forth, its blaze waxes fierce, its flames leap up. But when the fire really takes a hold and is firmly established, then you will see the secret whispering, the unconcealed turning away from all present but the beloved. I have some verses in which I have contrived to bring together many of these signs, and will now quote from these.



I love to hear when men converse
And in the midst his name rehearse;
The air I breathe seems redolent
That moment with the amber's scent,
But when he speaketh, I give ear
Unto no other sitting near,
But lean to catch delightedly
His pretty talk and coquetry,
Nor yet, though my companion there
The Prince of All the Faithful were,
Permit my mind to be removed
On his account from my beloved.
And if, through dire compulsion, I
Stand up at last to say good-bye,
Still glancing fondly at my sweet
I stumble, as on wounded feet;
My eyes upon his features play
The while my body drifts away,
As one the billows tumble o'er
Yet gazes, drowning, on the shore.
When I recall how distant he
Now is, I choke in sorrow's sea,
Weary as one who sinks, to expire
In some deep bog, or raging fire.
Yet, if thou sayest, " Canst thou still
Aspire to heaven? " " That I will ",
I answer boldly, " and I know
The stairs that to its summit go! "

        Other outward signs and tokens of love are the following, which are apparent to all having eyes in their heads: abundant and exceeding cheerfulness at finding oneself with the beloved in a narrow space, and a corresponding depression on being together in a wide expanse; to engage in a playful tug-of-war for anything the one or the other lays hold of; much clandestine winking; leaning sideways and supporting oneself against the object of one's affection; endeavoring to touch his hand, and whatever other part of his body one can reach, while engaged in conversation ; and drinking the remainder of what the beloved has left in his cup, seeking out the very spot against which his lips were pressed.
        There are also contrary signs that occur according to casual provocations and accidental incitements, and a variety of motivating causes and stimulating thoughts. Opposites are of course likes, in reality; when things reach the limit of contrariety, and stand at the furthest bounds of divergence, they come to resemble one another. This is decreed by God's omnipotent power, in a manner that baffles entirely the human imagination. Thus, when ice is pressed a long time in the hand, it finally produces the same effect as fire. We find that extreme joy and extreme sorrow kill equally; excessive and violent laughter sends the tears coursing from the eyes. It is a very common phenomenon in the world about us. Similarly with lovers: when they love each other with an equal ardour, and their mutual affection is intensely strong, they will turn against one another without any valid reason, each purposely contradicting the other in whatever he may say; they quarrel violently over the smallest things, each picking up every word that the other lets fall and willfully misinterpreting it. All these devices are aimed at testing and proving what each is seeking in the other.
        Now the difference between this sham, and real aversion and contrariness born of deep-seated hatred and inveterate contention, is that lovers are very quickly reconciled after their disputes. You will see a pair of lovers seeming to have reached the extreme limit of contrariety, to the point that you would reckon not to be mended even in the instance of a person of most tranquil spirit, wholly exempt from rancour, save after a long interval, and wholly irreparable in the case of a quarrelsome man; yet in next to no time you will observe them to have become the best of friends once more; silenced are those mutual reproaches, vanished that disharmony; forthwith they are laughing again and playfully sporting together. The same scene may be enacted several times at a single session. When you see a pair of lovers behaving in such a fashion, let no doubt enter your mind, no uncertainty invade your thoughts; you may be sure without hesitation, and convinced as by an unshakable certainty, that there lies between them a deep and hidden secret-the secret of true love. Take this then for a sure test, a universally valid experiment: it is the product only of an equal partnership in love, and a true concord of hearts. I myself have observed it frequently.
        Another sign is when you find the lover almost entreating to hear the loved one's name pronounced, taking an extreme delight in speaking about him, so that the subject is a positive obsession with him; nothing so much rejoices him, and he is not in the least restrained by the fear that someone listening may realise what he is about, and someone present will understand his true motives. Love for a thing renders you blind and deaf. If the lover could so contrive, that in the place where he happens to be there should be no talk of anything but his beloved, he would never leave that spot for any other in the whole world.
        It can happen that a man sincerely affected by love will start to eat his meal with an excellent appetite; yet the instant the recollection of his loved one is excited, the food sticks in his throat and chokes his gullet. It is the same if he is drinking, or talking he begins to converse with you gaily enough, and then all at once he is invaded by a chance thought of his dear one. You will notice the change in his manner of speaking, the instantaneous failure of his conversational powers; the sure signs are his long silences, the way he stares at the ground, his extreme taciturnity. One moment he is all smiles, lightly gesticulating; the next, and he has become completely boxed up, sluggish, distrait, rigid, too weary to utter a single word, irritated by the most innocent question.
        Love's signs also include a fondness for solitude and a pleasure in being alone, as well as a wasting of the body not accompanied by any fever or ache preventing free activity and liberty of movement. The walk is also an unerring indication and never-deceiving sign of an inward lassitude of spirit. Sleeplessness too is a common affliction of lovers; the poets have described this condition frequently, relating how they watch the stars, and giving an account of the night's interminable length. I too have some verses on this topic, in which I also touch on the guarding of Love's secret, and mention the signs from which it may be prognosticated.



The clouds, when they my tears discerned,
A lesson from my weeping learned
And covered all the parched domain
With deluges of flooding rain.

And has the night because of thee
Now come to share my misery,
Or will it succour bring, perchance,
To this my weary vigilance?

For if the shadows of the night
Will ne'er disperse, and turn to light,
Until my eyes, pressed down by woes,
At last in weary slumber close;

I do not think that any way
Remains, to lead me back to day,
But still augmenting sleeplessness
My every moment shall oppress.

And now dark clouds o'erspread the
And hide the starlight from my eyes,
Concealing from my anxious gaze
The comfort of their fitful blaze.

Such inward torment of the mind,
Thee loving, dearest heart, I find,
Surmise alone can fully guess
And advertize my soul's distress.

       Another poem of mine-I quote an extract-deals with the same notion.



I am the shepherd of the skies,
Deputed to preserve
The planets as they sink and rise,
The stars that do not swerve.

Those, as they swing their lamps above
Our earth, by night possessed,
Are like the kindled fires of love
Within my darkling breast.

Or I am now the gardener
Of some green mead, methinks,
And through the grasses, here and there,
A white narcissus winks.

Were Ptolemy alive to-day,
And did he know of me,
" Thou art the maestro ", he would say,
" Of all astronomy! "

       A thing is sometimes mentioned on account of that which causes it to occur. In the verses I have just cited, I have compared two pairs of things with each other in one and the same stanza, the second of the poem beginning " Those, as they swing their lamps above this is considered very unusual in poetry. However, I can also quote an even more perfect example of virtuosity from my own works-the likening of three, and even four pairs of things in a single stanza; both these feats have been accomplished in the piece here following.



Still yearning, and disquieted,
Still sleepless tossing on his bed,
Wits drunken and disorderly
With the coarse wine of calumny;

He shows to thee in one brief hour
Marvels defeating reason's power
Now hostile, now the friend sincere,
Now running off, now pressing near

As if this passion, this reproof,
To be complacent, or aloof,
Were stars conjoining, or in flight,
Fortune's benevolence, or spite.

After so long refusal, he
Took pity on my love, and me,
And I, who envied others' chance,
Am target now for envy's glance.

Together in a garden gay
With bloom we passed our happy day,
The while the bright and whispering flowers
Gave thanks to God for morning's showers

As if the matin rains, indeed,
The clouds, and that sweet-scented mead,
Were dropping tears, and eyes bedewed,
And cheeks with roses all imbued.

       Let none find fault with me or object to my use of the term "conjoining ", for those who have knowledge of the stars speak of the meeting of two stars in a single degree as a " conjunction ".
       I have not yet exhausted my repertoire, but can cite a still more perfect example, the likening of five pairs of things in a single stanza, as in my next quotation.



She sat there privily with me,
And wine besides, to make us three,
While night profound o'ershadowing
Stretched out its long and stealthy wing.

A damsel fair-I would prefer
To die, than not live close with her;
And is it such a dreadful crime
To wish to live this little time?

It was as if myself, and she,
The cup, the wine, the obscurity,
Were earth, and raindrops, and pearls set
Upon a thread, and gold, and jet.

       That is a point beyond which it is impossible for anyone to go; neither prosody nor the structure of words will tolerate more than five comparisons in the same stanza.
       Trepidation overtakes lovers in two situations. The first is when the lover hopes to meet the beloved, and then some obstacle intervenes to prevent it. I know a man whose loved one had promised to visit hi; thereafter I never saw him but that he was coming and going the whole time, quite unable to be still or to remain in one place; now he would advance, anon he would retire; joy had made him positively nimble and spritely, though formerly he was exceedingly grave and sedate. I have some verses on the subject of awaiting the visit of the beloved.



I waited still, until night came
Upon me, hoping yet
To meet thee, O my quest, and aim
On which my heart is set!

Then I, who never any day
Despaired, though long the night,
At last to dark despair gave way
When dark o'ercame my light.

Moreover I a proof will cite
That cannot tell a lie;
The like such problems solve aright
As reason else defy:

To wit, if thou shouldst ever deign
One night to visit me,
No longer darkness would remain,
But light eternally.

       The second cause of trepidation is when a quarrel breaks out between the loving couple, in the course of which reproaches fly about, the true grounds whereof only a detailed explanation can make clear. Then the lover's agitation becomes violent indeed, and continues until the matter comes completely into the open; when either the burden under which he has been struggling is lifted, if he has cause to hope for forgiveness, or his trepidation converts into sorrow and despair, if he is fearful that the beloved will thenceforward banish him. The lover may however submit humbly to the loved one's cruelty, as shall be expounded hereafter in its proper context, God willing.
       Among the accidents of Love may be mentioned an extreme impatience under affliction, such a paroxysm of emotion as completely overwhelms the lover and leaves him speechless, as when he sees his beloved turning from him in undisguised aversion. I have a line or two referring to this.



Fair fortitude imprisoned lies,
And tears flow freely from the eyes.

        Another sign of Love is that you will see the lover loving his beloved's kith and kin and the intimate ones of his household, to such an extent that they are nearer and dearer to him than his own folk, himself, and all his familiar friends.        Weeping is a well-known sign of Love; except that men differ very greatly from one another in this particular. Some are ready weepers; their tear-ducts are always overflowing, and their eyes respond immediately to their emotions, the tears rolling down at a moment's notice. Others are dry-eyed and barren of tears; to this category I myself belong. This is the result of my habit of eating frankincense to abate the palpitation from which I have suffered since childhood. I will be afflicted by some shocking blow, and at once feel my heart to be splitting and breaking into fragments; I have a choking sensation in my heart more bitter than colocynth, that prevents me from getting my words out properly, and sometimes well nigh suffocates me. My eyes therefore respond to my feelings but rarely, and then my tears are exceedingly sparse.
       Writing the above paragraph has put me in mind of a certain day when I, with my companion Abu Bakr Muhammad Ibn Ishaq, was bidding farewell to our dear friend Abu `Amin Muhammad Ibn 'Amir (God have him in His mercy!) prior to his departure for the East on that journey after which we were never to see him again. Abu Bakr, as he said good-bye, began to weep, and cited the following verses to illustrate his grief.



When thou on Wasit field didst lie
Felled to the dust, what eye
Grudged its last tears on thee to shed,
Was dry indeed and dead.

       The stanza is taken from an elegy on Yazid Ibn `Umar Ibn Hubaira (God have mercy on his soul!). We were standing on the seashore at Malaga, and I began to feel more and more distressed and heartbroken, yet my eyes would not come to my aid. Then I said, in response to the verses quoted by Abu Bakr:



The heart that shed not, still the Stoic,
Its fortitude heroic,
When thou wast gone, and it alone
That heart was made of stone!

       I also have an ode, composed before reaching puberty, in which I follow the usual conventions observed by those who treat this theme; I will quote the opening lines.



The sign of sorrow is a flame
That strikes the heart, and burns the same,
As too the tears that freely go
Adown the cheeks in ceaseless flow.

For when the man by Love possessed
Conceals the secret of his breast,
His tears the guarded truth betray
And bare it to the light of day.

So, when the tear-ducts overfill
The eyelids, and their torrent spill,
Be sure, if thou observant art,
Love's painful sickness rends that heart.

       It will happen in Love that the lovers have evil thoughts of one another; each suspects every word the partner utters, and misconstrues it willfully; which is the origin of those reproaches which lovers often level each against each. I have an acquaintance who is normally the most unsuspicious man in the world, extremely broad-minded, possessed of great patience and untold tolerance, indulgent to a fault; yet when he is in love, he cannot endure the slightest thing between him and the object of his affection; let the least difference arise between them, and he will forthwith utter all kinds of reproaches and give voice to every manner of mistrust. I have put this situation into verse.



I have a dark, suspicious mind,
And nothing negligible find
Thou doest; despicable they,
Who do despise Love's least affray-!

They will not see, until too late,
The roots of rupture and of hate,
Forgetting, to their own despite,
A spark may set a town alight.

Things of the greatest moment in
The humblest origins begin;
Witness the date-tree, hugely grown
To heaven from a little stone.

       You will see the lover, when unsure of the constancy of his loved one's feelings for him, perpetually on his guard in a way that he never troubled to be before; he polishes his language, he refines his gestures and his glances, particularly if he has the misfortune and mischance to be in love with one given to making unjust accusations, or of a quarrelsome disposition.
       Another sign of Love is the way the lover pays attention to the beloved; remembering everything that falls from his lips; searching out all the news about him, so that nothing small or great that happens to him may escape his knowledge; in short, following closely his every movement. Upon my life, sometimes you will see a complete dolt under these circumstances become most keen, a careless fellow turn exceedingly quick-witted.
        I was seated one day at Almeria, with a knot of other people, in the shop of Ismail Ibn Yunus, the Hebrew physician who was also a shrewd and clever physiognomist. Mujahid Ibn al-Hasin al-Qaisi said to him, pointing to a certain man named Hatim-he was familiarly known as Abu 'l-Baga'-who was withdrawn apart from the rest of us, " What do you say about his man? " He looked at him for a brief moment, and then said, "He is passionately in love ". Mujahid exclaimed, " You are right; what made you say this? " Ismail answered, " Because of an extreme confusion apparent in his face. Simply that; otherwise all the rest of his movements are unremarkable. I knew from his that he is in love, and not suffering from any mental disorder."




OF FALLING IN LOVE WHILE ASLEEP


EVERY love affair must necessarily have some original cause. I shall now begin with the most unlikely of all causes of love, so that the discourse may proceed in due order, starting as ever with the simplest and easiest example. Love indeed is sometimes caused by things so strange, that but for having myself observed them I would not have mentioned them at all.
       Now here is an instance from my own experience. One day I visited our friend Abu '1-Sari 'Ammar Ibn Ziyad, the freedman of al-Mu'aiyad, and found him deep in thought and much preoccupied. I asked him what was amiss; for a while he refused to explain, but then he said, "An extraordinary thing has happened to me, the like of which I have never heard." "What is that? I enquired. " Last night ", he answered, " I saw in a dream a young maiden, and on awaking I found that I had completely lost my heart to her, and that I was madly in love with her. Now I am in the most difficult straits possible, with this passion I have conceived for her." He continued cast down and afflicted for more than a month; nothing would cheer him up, so profound was his emotion. At last I scolded him, saying, " It is a vast mistake to occupy your soul with something unreal, and to attach your fantasy to a non-existent being. Do you know who she is? " " No, by Allah! " he replied. " Really ", I went on, " you have very little judgment, --and your discretion must be affected, if you axe actually in love with a person whom you have never seen, someone moreover who was never created and does not exist in the world at all. If you had fallen for one of those pictures they paint on the walls of the public baths, I would have found it easier to excuse you." So I continued, until at last by making a great effort he forgot his trouble. Now my opinion is that his case is to be explained as a pure fantasy of the mind, a nightmare illusion, and falls into the category of wishful thinking and mental hallucination. I have expressed this situation actually in verse.



Ah, would I knew who she might be,
And how she walked by night!
Was she the moon that shone on me,
The sun's uprising light?

A mere conjecture of the mind
By cogitation wrought?
An image that the soul designed,
Revealed to me by thought?

A picture that my spirit drew,
My hopes to realize,
And that my sight imagined to
Perceive in fleshly guise?

Or was she nothing of all these,
But just an accident
Contrived for me by Fate's decrees
With murderous intent?





OF FALLING IN LOVE THROUGH A DESCRIPTION


ONE of the strangest origins of passion is when a man falls in love through merely hearing the description of the other party, without ever having set eyes on the beloved. In such a case he will progress through all the accustomed stages of love; there will be the sending to and fro of messengers; the exchange of letters, the anxiety, the deep emotion, the sleeplessness; and all this without actual sight of the object of affection. Stories, descriptions of beautiful qualities, and the reporting of news about the fair one have a manifest effect on the soul; to hear a girl's voice singing behind a wall may well move the heart to love, and preoccupy the mind.
       All this has occurred to more than one man. In my opinion, however, such a love is a tumbledown building without any foundations. If a man's thoughts are absorbed by passionate regard for one whom he has never seen, the inevitable result is that whenever he is alone with his own reflections, he will represent to himself a purely imaginary picture of the person whose identity he keeps constantly before his mind; no other being than this takes shape in his fantasy; he is completely carried away by his imagination, and visualizes and dreams of her only. Then, if some day he actually sees the object of his fanciful passion, either his love is confirmed, or it is wholly nullified. Both these alternatives have actually happened and been known.
       This kind of romance usually takes place between veiled ladies of guarded palaces and aristocratic households and their male kinsfolk; the love of women is more stable in these cases than that of men, because women are weak creatures and their natures swiftly respond to this sort of attraction, which easily masters them completely. I have described this type of love in verse.



O thou who chidest me
Because my heart has been
Entranced by passion utterly
For one I have not seen

Thou dost exaggerate
In all that thou dost speak
Upon my passion, and dost state
My love is poor and weak.

For say: what do men know
Of Paradise above,
Save they have heard that it is so
And what they hear they love?

       I also have some lines on the theme of admiring the beauty of a singing voice, without ever having seen the singer.



Love's soldiery assailed mine ear
And now do occupy
My heart; their triumph doth appear
In my submissive eye.

       In the lines which follow I describe the situation of truth belying conjecture, when the lover actually claps eyes on his beloved.



They spoke in glowing terms of thee,
But when at last I chanced to see
That they described, at once I knew
Their words were nonsense and untrue.

Such is the drum: in origin
'Tis nothing but an empty skin,
But when the drummer beats its hide
A man is scared, and terrified!

       I have also stated the converse case.



So, too, the stories men recite
To picture the supreme delight
Of Paradise, fall short by far
Of those its actual pleasures are.

       These conditions also obtain in the relations between friends and comrades, as I shall show in a personal reminiscence. There was once a strong bond of affection between myself and a member of a noble family; we corresponded frequently, but had never set eyes on one another. Then Allah granted me the boon of meeting him; and but a few days elapsed when a violent aversion and strong antipathy arose between us, that has continued uninterruptedly down to to the present day. I have put this incident into verse, and will quote a line or two.



Thou didst convert my loving dream
To loathing, and to hate extreme
So copyists have oft times slipped
And quite transformed a manuscript

       The opposite transpired in the case of my relations with Abu `Amin Ibn Abi `Amin (God keep him in His mercy!). Once I truly detested him, and he fully reciprocated my feelings; this was before I had seen .him, and he me. The root of the matter was a slanderous report, which had been carried to each of us about the other, aggravated by an aversion existing between our respective fathers that sprung from their mutual rivalry in the race for preferment at Court and worldly promotion. Then Allah so ordained that we should come together; thereafter he became my dearest friend, and I his likewise, until the day that death parted us. The following verses were written by me to commemorate this friendship.



He was a brother, whom I gained
By meeting, and thereby obtained
A truly noble treasure;
His friendship was not wished by me,
And I supposed his company
Would yield me little pleasure

But he, who was my erstwhile foe,
Became my friend, he, whom I so
Abhorred, my heart's sweet rapture;
And having ever sought to fly
From meeting him, thereafter I
Sought ever him to capture.

        As for Abu Shakir 'Abd al-Rahman Ibn Muhammad al-Qabri, he was my friend for a long while before I ever saw him; then we met, and our love was confirmed; and it has continued without interruption right down to the present time.




---

OF FALLING IN LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT


OFTEN it happens that Love fastens itself to the heart as the result of a single glance. This variety of Love is divided into two classes.
       The first class is the contrary of what we have just been describing, in that a man will fall head over heels in love with a mere form, without knowing who that person may be, what her name- is, or where she lives. This has happened to more than one man.
       Our friend Abu Bakr Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Ishaq informed me, quoting a trustworthy authority whose name has escaped me-though I think it was Judge Ibn al-Hadhdha' that the poet Yusuf Ibn Harun, better known as al-Ramadi, was one day passing the Gate of the Perfumers at Cordova, a place where ladies were wont to congregate, when he espied a young girl who, as he said, "entirely captured my heart, so that all my limbs were penetrated by the love of her ". He therefore turned aside from going to the mosque and set himself instead to following her, while she for her part set off towards the bridge, which she then crossed and came to the place known as al-Rabad. When she reached the mausolea of the Banu Marwan (God have mercy on their souls!) that are erected over their graves in the cemetery of al-Rabad, beyond' the river, she observed him to have gone apart from the rest of the people and to be preoccupied solely with her. She accordingly went up to him and said, " Why are you walking behind me?" He told her how sorely smitten he was with her, and she replied, "Have done with that! Do not seek to expose me to shame; you have no prospect of achieving your purpose, and there is no way to you're gratifying your desire. -" He countered, " I am satisfied merely to look at you." " That is permitted to you ", she replied. Then he asked her, " My lady, are you a freewoman, or are you a slave? " " I am a slave ", she answered. "And what is your name?" he enquired. " Khalwa ", she told him. "And to whom do you belong? " He asked next. To this she retorted, " By Allah, you are likelier to know what inhabits the Seventh Heaven, than the answer to that question. Seek not the impossible! " " My lady ", he begged, " Where may I see you again? " " Where you saw me to-day", she replied, " at the same hour, every Friday." Then she added, " Will you go off now, or shall I? " " Do you go off, in Allah's protection! " he replied. So she went off in the direction of the bridge; and he could not follow her, because she kept looking round to see if he was accompanying her or not. When she had passed the gate of the bridge, he came after her but could find no trace of her whatsoever. "'And by Allah ", said Abu `Umar (that is to say, Yusuf Ibn Harun), recounting the story of his adventure, " I have frequented the Perfumers' Gate and al-Rabad the whole time from then till now, but I have never come upon any further news of her. I know not whether the heavens have devoured her, or whether the earth has swallowed her up; and the feeling I have in my heart on her account is hotter than burning coals." This is the Khalwa whose name he celebrates in his love lyrics. Thereafter he had news of her after he journeyed to Saragossa for her sake, but that is a long story.
        This sort of thing happens frequently enough; I have a poem on the subject, from which I here quote.



Against my heart mine eye designed
Great wrong, and anguish to my mind,
Which sin my spirit to requite
Hath loosed these tears against my sight.

How shall mine eye behold in fact
This justice that my tears exact,
Seeing that in their flood profound
My weeping eye is wholly drowned?

Since I had never seen her yet
I could not know her, when we met;
The final thing of her I knew
Was what I saw at that first view.

       The second class of the variety of Love now under discussion is the contrary of what we shall be describing in the chapter next following, if Allah wills. This is for a map to form an attachment at first sight with a young lady whose name, place of abode and origin are known to him. The difference here is the speed or tardiness with which the affair passes off. When a man falls in love at first sight, and forms a sudden attachment as the result of a fleeting glance, that proves him to be little steadfast, and proclaims that he will as suddenly forget his romantic adventure; it testifies to his fickleness and inconstancy. So, it is with all things; the quicker they grow, the quicker they decay; while on the other hand slow produced is slow consumed.
       A young fellow I know, the son of a clerk, was one day observed by a lady of noble birth, high position and strict seclusion; she saw him passing by, while peeping out from a place of vantage in her home, and conceived an attachment for him which he reciprocated. They exchanged epistles for a time, by ways more delicate than the edge of a fine-ground sword; and were it not that I purpose not in this essay to uncover such ruses and make mention of such subterfuges, I could have set down here such things as I am certain would have confounded the shrewdest and astonished the most intelligent of men. I pray that God in His great bounty will draw over us and all good Moslems the curtain of His mercy. He is indeed sufficient for our needs.




OF FALLING IN LOVE AFTER LONG ASSOCIATION


SOME men there are whose love only becomes true after long converse, much contemplation, and extended familiarity. Such a one is likely to persist and to be steadfast in his affection, untouched by the passage of time what enters with difficulty goes not out easily. That is my own way in these matters, and it is confirmed by Holy Tradition. For God, as we are informed by our teachers, when He commanded the Spirit to enter Adam's body, that was like an earthen vessel-and the Spirit was afraid, and sorely distressed -said to it, "Enter in unwillingly, and come forth again unwillingly! "        I have myself seen a man of this description who, whenever he sensed within himself the beginnings of a passionate attachment, or conceived a penchant for some form whose beauty he admired, at once employed the device of shunning that person and giving up all association with him, lest his feelings become more intense and the affair get beyond his control, and he find himself completely stampeded. This proves how closely Love cleaves to such people's hearts, and once it lays hold of them never looses its grip. I have a poem on this subject, and will quote an extract.



I am resolved to keep afar
Wherever Love's attractions are;
The man of sense, as I detect,
Is ever shrewd and circumspect.

I have observed that love begins
When some poor fellow for his sins,
Thinks, it is thrilling, ever so,
To gaze on cheeks where roses glow.

But while he sports so joyfully
With not a care to mar his glee,
The links are forging, one by one,
And he's enchained, before he's done.

So there he is, deluded fool;
Stepping benignly in the pool
He slips, and ere he can look round
He's swept along the flood, and drowned.

       I indeed marvel profoundly at all those who pretend to fall in love at first sight; I cannot easily prevail upon myself to believe their claim, and prefer to consider such love as merely a kind of lust. As for thinking that that sort of attachment can really possess the inmost heart, and penetrate the veil of the soul's recess, that I cannot under any circumstances credit. Love has never truly gripped my bowels, save after a long lapse of time, and constant companionship with the person concerned, sharing with him all that while my every occupation, be it earnest or frivolous. So I am alike in consolation and in passion; I have never in my life forgotten any romance, and my nostalgia for every former attachment is such that I well nigh choke when I drink, and suffocate when I eat. The man who is not so constituted quickly finds complete relief and is at rest again; I have never wearied of anything once I have known it, and neither have I hastened to feel at home with it on first acquaintance. Similarly I have never longed for a change for change's sake, in any of the things that I have possessed; I am speaking here not only of friends and comrades, but' also of all the other things a man uses-clothes, riding-beast, food, and so on. Life holds no joy for me, and I do nothing but hang my head and feel utterly cast down, ever since I first tasted the bitterness of being-separated from those I love. It is an anguish that constantly revisits me, an agony of grief that ceases not for a moment to assail me. My remembrance of past happiness has abated for me every joy that I may look for in the future. I am a dead man, though counted among the living, slain by sorrow and buried by sadness, entombed while yet a dweller on the face of this mortal earth. Allah be praised, whatever be the circumstances that befall us; there is indeed no other God but He!

       I have meditated upon this theme in verse as follows.



True love is not a flower
That springeth in an hour;
Its flint will not strike fire
At casual desire.

Love is an infant rare
Begotten, slow to bear;
Its lime must mingle long
Before its base is strong.

And then not soon will it
Be undermined, and split;
Firm will its structure stand,
Its fabric still expand.

This truth is readily
Confirmed, because we see
That things too quickly grown
Are swiftly overthrown.

Mine is a stubborn soil
To plough with arduous toil,
Intractible indeed
To tiller and to seed.

But once the roots begin
To strike and thrive therein,
Come bounteous rain, come drought,
The lusty stem will sprout.

       Now let no man think or imagine that what I have here said is contrary to my statement, inscribed in the exordium of this treatise, that Love is a union of souls effected within the substance of their supernal world. On the contrary, my present remarks confirm that assertion. For we know that in this lower world the soul is shrouded in many veils, that it is overtaken By divers accidents, that it is encompassed by all those earthy, mundane instincts; in consequence many of true attributes are obscured. And although all these obstacles do not preclude the soul entirely from achieving union with its fellow-soul, nevertheless they undoubtedly stand in the way of that union, which may therefore only be truly realized after long and careful preparation and making ready. The soul must first be made aware of its points of resemblance and concord with its fellow-soul; it must confront its own hidden temperaments with the corresponding temperaments of the beloved. Then and then only will veritable union be consummated, and that without further let or hindrance.
       As for what transpires at first blush as a result of certain accidental circumstances-physical admiration, and visual enchantment which does not go beyond mere external forms-and this is the very secret and meaning of carnal desire; when carnal desire moreover becomes so overflowing that it surpasses these bounds, and when such an overflow coincides with a spiritual union, in which the natural instincts share equally with the soul; the resulting phenomenon is called passionate love. Herein lies the root of the error, which misleads a man into asserting that he loves two persons, or is passionately enamored of two entirely different individuals. All this is to be explained as springing out of carnal' desire, as we have just described; it is called love only metaphorically, and not in the true meaning of the term. As for the true lover, his yearning of the soul is so excessive as to divert him from all his religious and mundane occupations; how then should he have room to busy himself with a second love affair?

       I have put this point into verse.



He lies, and perjures all that's true;
Who swears he is in love with two
He shares in falsehood equally
With that damned miscreant, Manichee.

The heart has not sufficient place
To hold two sweets in one embrace,
Nor may the second love affair
Claim with the first an equal share.

For as the Reason is unique
It cannot know, though it may seek,
Another Power to create
Besides the All Compassionate.

And so the Heart, that's likewise one,
Is constituted to love none
Except that single darling dear,
Be he afar or be he near.

The man who claims a dual love
Is thus, as these examples prove,
A doubtful follower of Love's laws,
A traitor to Religion's cause.

And by that selfsame reasoning
True Faith is too a single thing;
He who a second serves as well
Condemns himself an infidel.

       I know a certain young man who is rich, of noble birth, and of the finest education, and who made a practice of purchasing slave-girls. The girl would be o begin with innocent of any regard for him; still worse, she would positively dislike him, for indeed his ways were not very engaging, with that perpetual scowl which never left his face, particularly when he was with women; yet within a very short time he had mastered her to his will. Thereupon her -aversion would be changed into excessive love, extreme affection, and quite shameless infatuation; whereas formerly she was irritated to be in his company, now she could not endure to be parted from him. The same thing happened with a remarkable number of the girls. A friend of mine asked him once how he explained his success; in a detailed reply he ascribed it to his unusual dexterity in lovemaking.
       This example-and I could quote others-proves that when a spiritual concord is once established, love is immediately engendered. Physical contact completes -the circuit and thus enables the current of love to flow freely into the soul.




OF FALLING IN LOVE WITH A QUALITY AND THEREAFTER NOT APPROVING ANY OTHER DIFFERENT


KNOW now-may God exalt you! -that Love exercises an effective authority, a decisive sovereignty over the soul; its commands cannot be opposed, its ordinances may not be flouted, its rule is not to be transgressed; it demands unwavering obedience, and against its dominion there is no appeal. Love untwists the firmest plaits, and looses the tightest strands it dissolves that which is most solid, undoes that which is most firm; it penetrates the deepest recesses of the heart, and makes lawful things most strictly forbidden.
       I have known many men whose discrimination was beyond suspicion, men not to be feared deficient in knowledge, or wanting in taste, or lacking discernment, and who nevertheless described their loved ones as possessing certain qualities not by any means admired by the general run of mankind, or approved according to the accepted canons of beauty. Yet those qualities had become an obsession with them, the sole object of their passion, and the very last word (as they thought) in elegance. Thereafter their loved ones vanished, either into oblivion, or by separation, or jilting, or through some other accident to which love is always liable; but those men never lost their admiration for the curious qualities which provoked their approval of them, neither did they ever afterwards cease to prefer these above other attributes that are in.-reality superior to them. They had no inclination whatsoever for any qualities besides these; indeed, the very features which the rest of mankind deem most excellent were shunned and despised by them. So they continued until the day of their death; all their lives were spent in sighing regretfully for the loved ones they had lost, and taking joyous delight in their remembered companionship. I do not consider, that this was any kind of affectation on their part; on the contrary, it was their true and natural disposition to admire such eccentric qualities; they chose them unreservedly, they thought none other worthy of regard, and in the very depths of their souls they did not believe otherwise.
       I know a man whose loved one was somewhat short of neck; thereafter he never admired anyone, man or girl, whose neck was long and slender. I also know a man whose first attachment was with a girl inclined to be petite; he never fell in love with a tall woman after that. A third man I know was madly enamoured of a girl whose mouth was a trifle wide; lie thought small mouths positively disgusting, he abused them roundly, and clearly felt an authentic aversion in regard to them. Now the men of whom I have been speaking are by no means under-endowed knowledge and culture; on the contrary they are men of the keenest perception, truly worthy to be described as intelligent and understanding.
       Let me add a personal touch. In my youth I loved a slave-girl who happened to be a blonde; from that time I have never admired brunettes, not though their lark tresses set off a face as resplendent as the sun, or the very image of beauty itself. I find this taste to have become a part of my whole make-up and constitution since those early days; my soul will not suffer me to acquire any other, or to love any type but that. This very same thing happened to my father also God be pleased with him!), and he remained faithful his first preference until the term of his earthly life was done.
       All the Caliphs of the Banu Marwan (God have mercy on their souls!), and especially the sons of al-Nasir, were without variation or exception disposed by nature to prefer blondes. I have myself seen them, and known others who had seen their forebears, from the days of al-Nasir's reign down to the present day; every one of them has been fair-haired, taking after, their mothers, so that this has become a hereditary trait with them; all but Sulaiman al-Zafir (God have mercy on him!), whom I remember to have had black ringlets and a black beard. As for al-Nasir and al-Hakam al-Mustansir (may God be pleased with them!), I have been informed by my late father, the vizier, as well as by others, that both of them were blond and blue-eyed. The same is true of Hisham al-Mu'aiyad, Muhammad al-Mahdi, and `Abd al-Rahman al-Murtada (may God be merciful to them all!); I saw them myself many times, and had the honour of being received by them, and I remarked that they all had fair hair and blue eyes. Their sons, their brothers, and all their near kinsmen possessed the selfsame characteristics. I know not whether this was due to a predilection innate in them all, or whether it was in consequence of a family tradition handed down from their ancestors, and which they followed in their turn. This comes out clearly in the poetry of `Abd al-Malik Ibn Marwan Ibn `Abd al-Rahman Ibn Marwan, the descendant of the Caliph al-Nasir, better known as al-Taliq; he was the greatest poet of Andalusia in those times, and in most of his love lyrics he serenades blondes. I have seen him personally, and sat in his company.
       It is not so remarkable that a man who has once fallen in love with an ill-favored wench should not carry that foible with him for the rest of his amatory career; it is one of those things that are always liable to happen. Neither is it astonishing that a man should prefer the inferior article, when such an eccentricity is part of his inborn nature. What is truly amazing, is that a man formerly accustomed to see things with the eye of truth should suddenly be overcome by a casual passion, after he has been out about in society a long time, and that this accident of caprice should so completely transform him from his previous habits as to become a second nature with him, entirely displacing his first. In such extraordinary cases he will know well enough the superiority of his former disposition, but when he comes back to his senses he finds that his soul now refuses to have anything to do with any but the baser sort of goods. Marvelous indeed is the mighty domination, the splendid tyranny of the human passion. Such a man is a sincere and devoted lover, and not he who apes the manners of folk with whom he has no connexion whatever, and pretends to a character which belongs to him not at all. The latter sort of man asserts indeed that he chooses at will whom he will love; but if love had really taken possession of his powers of discernment, if love had extirpated his native reason and swept away his natural discretion, then love would have so dominated his soul that he would no longer be free to pick and choose, as he so boasts to do.

       I have a poem or two on this theme also.



I know a youth that loved a lass
Whose neck was short and somewhat stout;
And now, when long-necked maidens pass,
He thinks them jinn's, without a doubt.

He is content, to justify
His claim that he has chosen well,
Upon a logic to rely
That has some substance, truth to tell.

Thus he would argue: " The wild cow
Is famed in proverb and in song,
And no man lives, but will allow
Beauty doth to the cow belong.

"Now never was the wild cow born
Whose neck was long and angular;
And are not camels held inn scorn
Because their necks stick out so far?"

I know another lad who loved
A most uncommon wide-mouthed dame
He said, " Her loveliness is proved
By the gazelle, whose mouth's the same."

And still a third young chap I know
Whose well-beloved was unco small;
" Tall women ", he would say, " are so
Stuck up-they're devils, one and all."

       Another poem of mine is worth quoting here.



They blame the girl of whom I'm fond
Because her lovely hair is blond:
"But that's exactly", I reply,
"What makes her pretty, to my eye!"

They criticize the colour bright
Of glittering gold, and shimmering light,
And they are crazy so to do,
And stupid, and erroneous, too.

Is there just a cause to crab, think you,
The tender-sweet narcissus' hue,
Or is the twinkle of a star
So hateful to behold afar?

Of all God's creatures, I declare
That man of wisdom has least share
Who chooses, in his darkened soul,
To love a body black as coal.

Black is the hue, the Scriptures tell,
Of the inhabitants of Hell;
Black is the robe the mourner dons,
And mothers who have lost their sons.

Moreover, since from Khorasan
The black Abbasid banners ran,
The souls of men know, to their cost,
The cause of righteousness is lost.





OF ALLUSION BY WORDS


WHATEVER it may be that one is seeking after, one must inevitably contrive some means of coming in to it, some expedient whereby one may achieve access to and attainment of it. There is but one person uniquely able to create without intermediary; the Prime Omniscient Himself, be He ever exalted and extolled!
       The first device employed by those who seek union, being lovers, in order to disclose their feelings to the object of their passion, is allusion by means of words. Either they will quote a verse of poetry, or despatch an allegory, or rhyme a riddle, or propose an enigma, or use heightened language. Men vary in their methods according to the degree of their perspicacity, or the amount of aversion or sympathy, wit or dullness, which they remark in their loved ones. I know a man who commenced his declaration of love by quoting to his lady some verses of my own composition. This and the like are the shifts resorted to in the first stages of the love-quest. If the lover detects some sign of sympathy and encouragement, he then proceeds further. When he observes one or other of the characteristics we have described, while in the actual course of quoting some such verses, or hinting obliquely at the meaning he wishes to convey in the manner we have defined, then as he waits for his reply, whether it is to be given verbally, or by a grimace, or a gesture, he finds himself in a truly fearful situation, torn between hope and despair; and though the interval may be brief, enough, yet in that instant he becomes aware if his ambition is attainable, or if it must be abandoned.
        There is another variety of verbal allusion, which is only to be brought into play when an accord has been reached, and the lover knows that his sentiments are reciprocated. Then it is that the complaints begin, the assignations, the reproaches, the plighting of eternal troths. All this is accomplished by means of verbal allusions, which to the uninitiated hearer appear to convey a meaning quite other to that intended by the lovers; he replies in terms entirely different from the true purport of the exchanges, following the impression which his imagination forms on the basis of what his ears have picked up. Meanwhile each of the loving pair has understood his partner's meaning perfectly, and answered in a manner not to be comprehended by any but the two of them; unless indeed the listener is endowed with a penetrating sensibility, assisted by a sharp wit and reinforced by long experience. Especially is this the case if the intelligent bystander has some sense of what the lovers are hinting at; rarely indeed does this escape the detection of the trained observer. In that event, no single detail of what the lovers are intending remains hidden from him.
       I know of a youth and a girl who were very much in love with each other. In the course of one of his interviews with her, the young man made a slightly improper suggestion. At this the girl exclaimed, " By Allah! I shall make a public complaint against you, and I shall put you to shame privately." Some days later the girl found herself in a company of great princes and the leading statesmen of the realm; present also were a great number of women and of servants, against whom it would be well to be on one's guard. The youth in question was in the concourse too, for he was in the entourage of the master of ceremonies. Other singing girls besides her were in attendance. When it came to her turn to sing, she tuned her lute and began to chant the words of an ancient song.



Sweet fawn adorable,
Fair as the moon at full,
Or like the sun, that through
Dark clouds shines out to view

With that so languid glance
He did my heart entrance,
With that lithe stature, he
As slender as a tree.

I yielded to his whim,
I humbled me to him,
As lovesick suitor still
Obeys his darling's will.

Let me thy ransom be!
Embrace me lawfully
I would not give my charms
Into licentious arms.

       I myself have known this situation, and put it into verse.



Harsh words of bitter blame
And false complaining came
From one most cruel, who
Was judge, and plaintiff too!

She laid her nameless charge
Before the world at large,
But none knew her intent
Save him, whose hurt she meant.


---

OF HINTING WITH THE EYES


AFTER verbal allusion, when once the lover's advance has been accepted and an accord established, the next following step consists in hinting with the glances of the eyes. Glances play an honourable part in this phase, and achieve remarkable results. By means of a glance the lover can be dismissed, admitted, promised, threatened, upbraided, cheered, commanded, forbidden; a glance will lash the ignoble, and give warning of the presence of spies; a glance may convey laughter and sorrow, ask a question and make a response, refuse and give-in short, each, one of these various moods and intentions has its own particular kind of glance, which cannot be precisely realized except by ocular demonstration. Only a small fraction of the entire repertory is capable of being sketched out and described, and I will therefore attempt to describe here no more than the most elementary of these forms of expression.
        To make a signal with the corner of the eye is to, forbid the lover something; to droop the eye is an indication of consent; to prolong the gaze is a sign of suffering and distress; to break off the gaze is a mark of relief; to make signs of closing the eyes is an indicated threat. To turn the pupil of the eye in a certain direction and then to turn it back swiftly, calls attention to the presence of a person so indicated. A clandestine signal with the corner of both eyes is a question; to turn the pupil rapidly from the middle of the eye to the interior angle is a demonstration of refusal; to flutter the pupils of both eyes this way and that is a general prohibition. The rest of these signals can only be understood by actually seeing them demonstrated.
       You should realize that the eye takes the place of a messenger, and that with its aid all the beloved's intention can be apprehended. The four senses besides are also gateways of the heart, and passages giving admission to the soul; the eye is however the most eloquent, the most expressive, and the most efficient of them all. The eye is the true outrider and faithful guide of the soul; it is the soul's well-polished mirror, by means of which it comprehends all truths, attains all qualities, and understands all sensible phenomena. It is a well-known saying that hearing of a thing is not like seeing it; this was already remarked by Poleron, the master of physiognomy, who established the eye as the most reliable basis for forming judgment.
        Here, if you will, is a sufficient proof of the eye's power of perception. When the eye's rays encounter some clear, well-polished object-be it burnished steel or glass or water, a brilliant stone, or any other polished and gleaming substance having lustre, glitter and sparkle-whose edges terminate in a coarse, opaque, impenetrable, dull material, those rays of the eye are reflected back, and the observer then beholds himself and obtains an ocular vision of his own person. This is what you see when you look into a mirror; in that situation you are as it were looking at yourself through the eyes of another.
        A visual demonstration of this may be contrived in the following manner. Take two large mirrors, and hold one of them in your right hand, behind your head, and the other in your left hand, in front of your face; then turn the one or the other obliquely, so that the two meet confronting each other. You will now see your neck and the whole of your backward parts. This is due to the reflection of the eye's radiation against the radiation of the mirror behind you; the eye cannot find any passage through the mirror in front of you, and when it also fails to discover an outlet behind the second mirror, its radiation is diverted to the body confronting it. Though Salih, the pupil of Abu Ishaq al-Nazzam, held a contrary view on the nature of perception to this which I have advanced, his theory is in fact rubbish, and has not been accepted by anyone
       Even if all this were not due to any superior virtue in the eye itself, yet the fact remains that the substance of the eye is the loftiest and most sublime of all substances. For the eye possesses the property of light, and by it alone may colours by perceived; no other organ surpasses it in range and extent, since by the eye the bodies of the stars themselves in their distant spheres may be observed, and the heavens seen for all their tremendous elevation and remoteness. This is simply because the eye is united in the nature of its constitution with the mirror of which we have been speaking. It perceives those things, and reaches then as in a single bound, needing not to traverse the intervening distance by stages, or to alight at halting-places en route. The eye does not travel through space by laboured movements.
       These properties belong to none of the other senses. The taste and the touch, for instance, perceive objects only when they are in, their neighborhood, and the hearing and the smell apprehend them solely if they are close by. As proof of that immediate perception of which we have spoken, consider how you see an object that produces a sound before you hear the sound itself, for all that you may try to see and hear that thing simultaneously. If ocular and aural perception were one and the same, the eye would not outstrip the ear.




OF CORRESPONDENCE


NOW that the lovers are fairly intermingled in their relations, they will begin to correspond in writing. Letters assuredly tell their own tale. Some men I have seen, that were given to correspondence, who made all haste to tear their letters up, to dissolve them in water, and to rub out all trace of them. Many a shameful exposure has been occasioned by a letter, as I have remarked in verse.



It grieves me mightily, to tear
Thy letter up this day, my dear;
But there is nothing, that I swear,
Can ever break my love sincere.

For I would rather see this ink
Erased, and that our love endure;
The branch will always sprout, I think,
If but the trunk remains secure.

Too oft a letter sent in haste
Has been the death of him, who penned,
But guessed not, while his fingers traced
The missive, what would be its end.

       The letter should be designed after the most elegant pattern, and should be as pretty as can be contrived. For by my life, the letter is sometimes the lover's tongue, either because he is faltering in speech, or bashful, or awe-struck. Indeed, the very delivery of the letter to his loved one, and the knowledge that it is at that moment in the beloved's hands, will provoke in the lover a wonderful joy, that is a consoling substitute for an actual sight of the object of his affection; while the receiving of the reply, and gazing fondly upon it, delight him fully as much as a lovers' meeting. It is on this account that you will see the passionate swain laying the letter upon his eyes, or against his heart, fondling it and kissing it. I have myself known a lover who was certainly not ignorant of what and how he should speak, a man of fine eloquence, well able to express his thoughts in the language of the tongue, of penetrating insight, and minute comprehension of subtle truths, -and who nevertheless did not abandon the device of correspondence, for all that he lived close by his beloved and could readily come to her, and be with her as often as he chose: he told me that he savoured in correspondence many different varieties of delight. I have also been told of a base and worthless fellow who put his sweetheart's letters to a particularly disgusting use, that was in fact a horrible sort of sensuality, a foul type of lechery.
       As for watering the ink of the love-letter with one's tears, I know of a man who did this regularly, and his beloved repaid him by watering the ink of her missives with her saliva. I have some verses which refer to this sort of practice.



I wrote a letter to my love
She sent me a reply thereto
That stilled the agitation of
My heart, then stirred it up anew.

I watered every word I penned
With tears o'erflowing from my eyes,
As lovers will, who do intend
In love no treacherous surprise.

And still the tears flowed down apace,
And washed the careful lines away
O wicked waters, to efface
The lovely things I strove to say!
Behold, where first I set my pen
The tears have made my writing plain,
But as I came to close, ah! then
The script is vanished in their rain.

       I once saw a' letter written by a lover to his beloved he had cut his hand with a knife, and as the blood gushed forth he used it for ink, and wrote the entire letter with it. I saw the same letter after the blood had dried, and would have sworn that it was written with a tincture of resin.




OF THE MESSENGER


THE next scene in the love-play, now that confidence prevails and complete sympathy has been established, is the introduction of the Messenger. He needs to be sought and chosen with great care, so that he shall be both a good and an energetic man; he is the proof of the lover's intelligence, for in his hands (under God's Providence) rest the life and death of the lover, his honour and his disgrace.
       The Messenger should be presentable, quick-witted, able to take a hint and to read between the lines, possessed of initiative and the ability to supply out of his own understanding things which may have been overlooked by his principal; he must also convey to his employer all that he observes with complete accuracy; he ought to be able to keep secrets and preserve trusts; he must be loyal, cheerful and a sincere well-wisher. Should he be wanting in these qualities, the harm he will do to the lover for whom he is acting will be in strict proportion to his own shortcomings. I have put all this in verse



The messenger is like a blade
In thy right hand; pick to thy like
Thy sword, and when thy choice is made
Polish it well, ere thou dost strike.

Whoever ventures to rely
On a blunt weapon, is a fool;
The price he pays is pretty high
For trusting such a useless tool.

       Lovers for the most part employ as their messengers to the beloved either a humble and insignificant fellow to whom nobody will pay much attention, because of his youthfulness or his scruffy look or untidy appearance; or a very respectable person to whom no sort of suspicion will attach on account of his show of piety, or because he is of advanced years. Women too are frequently used, especially those who hobble along on sticks, and carry rosaries, and are wrapped up in a pair of red cloaks. I remember how at Cordova young women had been put on their guard against such types, wherever they might happen to see them. Women plying a trade or profession, which gives them ready access to people, are popular with lovers-the lady doctor for instance, or the blood-letter, the peddler, the broker, the coiffeuse, the professional mourner, the singer, the soothsayer, the schoolmistress, the errand girl, the spinner, the weaver, and the like. It is also found convenient to employ a person who is closely related to the beloved, and who will therefore not be grudged admittance.
       How many an inaccessible maiden has proved approachable by using messengers like these! How often have apparently insurmountable difficulties been easily overcome, and the one who seemed so far off proved close at hand, the one most refractory been readily tamed! How many disagreeable surprises have befallen well-protected veils, thick curtains, close guarded boudoirs, and stoutly fashioned doors, at the hands of suchlike persons! But for my desire to call attention to them, I would never have mentioned these types at all; but I felt bound to do so, in order that others may have their eyes open, and not readily trust in any of their sort. Happy is the man who takes warning by another's experience, even if he be his enemy! I pray that Allah may cover us and all good Moslems with the veil of His protection, and never suffer the shadow of His preservation to pass away from any one of us.
       I know of a pair of lovers whose messenger was a well-trained dove; the letter would be fastened to its wing. On this topic I have the following verses.



Old Noah chose a dove, to be
His faithful messenger, and he
Was not confounded so to choose:
She brought him back the best of news.

So I am trusting to this dove
My messages to thee, my love,
And so I send her forth, to bring
My letters safely in her wing.





OF CONCEALING THE SECRET


ONE of the attributes of Love is holding the tongue; the lover will deny everything if interrogated, affect a great show of fortitude, and make it appear that he is extremely continent and a confirmed bachelor. For all that the subtle secret will out. The flames of passion raging in his breast will be glimpsed in his gestures and in the expression of his eyes; they will creep slowly but surely into the open, like fire among coals or water through dry clay. It is possible in the early stages to delude those lacking in finer sensibility; once Love has firmly established itself, however, that is entirely out of the question.
       Sometimes the reason for such reticence is the lover's desire to avoid branding himself with that mark in the eyes of his fellows; he professes that philandering is a sign of frivolity, and therefore (he says) he flees from love and will have naught of it. But this is not at all the right line of approach; it is sufficient for a good Moslem to abstain from those things which Allah has forbidden, and which, if he choose to do, he will find charged to his account on the Day of Resurrection. But to admire beauty, and to be mastered by love that is a natural thing, and comes not within the range of Divine commandment and prohibition; all hearts are in God's hands, to dispose them what way He will, and all that is required of them is that they should know and consider the difference between right and wrong, and believe firmly what is true. Love itself is an inborn disposition; man can only control those motions of his members, which he has acquired by deliberate effort. I have put this all in verse



Men who nothing know of love
For thy sake do me reprove
Let them scold, or silent be,
It is all the same to me.

"Shame on thee!" I hear them say,
" To put all reserve away,
While men gaze on thee in awe
As a zealot for the Law."

"What you charge", I say, "to me
Is indeed hypocrisy
Patent; and, if I may boast,
I hate hypocrites the most.

"And yet, when was loving banned?
Did Mohammed so command,
Or is man forbidden it
By the words of Holy Writ?

"O, since I have nothing wrought
Save what Faith declares I ought,
Nothing I should face with gloom
On the dreadful Day of Doom;

"Naught I care for others' blame
Who declare my love a shame;
Let them whisper, let them shout,
I can face their scandal out.

"Shall a man be judged, think you,
Save for what he willed to do,
Or have charged against his head
Words that he has never said?"

       I know a man who was tried in a very similar way. Passion had lodged itself in his breast, and he strove to deny it; but in the end the matter became so obviously serious that everyone divined it in his behaviour, whether he happened previously to be aware of it or not. Yet whenever anyone alluded to his trouble, he rounded on him abusively and drove him away; so that if one of his comrades desired to stand in well with him, he let him imagine that he believed his denials, and thought anyone a liar who had a contrary opinion. This would please him mightily. Now I recall that one day I happened upon him when he was seated with someone who kept hinting at his inward feelings all these suggestions my friend denied strenuously. Just at that moment, the very person he was suspected of having a crush on chanced to pass by; no sooner did his eyes light on his beloved, than he became all confused; his former sangfroid entirely deserted him; he grew pale, and his well-turned phrases lapsed into incoherency. His interlocutor thereupon broke off the argument, and he invited him to resume the previous discussion. Someone remarked, "Actions speak louder than words! " " Think what you please ", the poor fellow retorted. " Excuse me or blame me as you will, it is all the same." This is how I have versified the topic.



He liveth but by grace of Death,
Compassionate to see
The fearful pains he suffereth
In passion's agony.

       I have another poem on the same subject.



The tears of passion flow
And flow again;
The veil, of love, I know,
Is rent in twain.

My heart, as she floats past,
Is fluttering yet
Like a poor partridge, fast
Trapped in the net.

O my companions true,
Come, counsel me
So all good comrades do
Advice is free.

How long, how long must I
This secret hide
Which I cannot deny,
Nor lay aside?

       This however only happens when the instinct for concealment and self-protection conflicts with and overcomes the lover's natural disposition; the victim, caught between two raging fires, feels utterly bewildered.
       Sometimes the reason for concealment is- that the lover wishes to spare his beloved; then it is a proof of loyalty, a mark of true nobility of character. I have put this point in verse.



All they that know me, know in truth
I am a poor and lovelorn youth,
Cast down and weary, full of care
For whom? Ah, none can this declare.

When they behold me face to face,
They feel quite certain of my case,
Which when they would more clearly state
They can no more than speculate.

My love is like a written screed;
The characters seem plain, indeed,
But when the reader seeks to know
What they portend, that does not show.

Or like the cooing of a dove
Within the thicket is my love
He modulates with perfect art
The sweet outpourings of his heart.

We listen spellbound and intent
To his delightful argument;
But though the melody is clear,
Its meaning quite escapes the ear.

"For Allah's sake", they plead with me,
" Name thou her name to us, that we
May we apprised what passion deep,
For whom, has robbed thee of thy sleep."

No, no; before I tamely yield
The secret they would have revealed
I'd sooner see my reason go,
And plunge into the depths of woe.

So they are buffeted about
By wild conjecture, wilder doubt,
Not knowing whether what they know,
Or what they think they think is so.

       I have another little poem on concealing the secret.



There is a place wherein I hide
My secret; ' there if living man
Will shelter, Fate may be defied,
Death dared, "Come catch me, if you can!"

I slay my secret: ask you why?
A secret that would live must die
Precisely as the love-sick boy
Finds in his grief his greatest joy.

       Sometimes, again, the reason for discretion is that the lover would protect himself against the consequences of his secret's disclosure, on account of the illustrious rank of his beloved.
       A certain poet in Cordova composed a love-poem in which he celebrated' the charms of Subh, the mother of al-Mu'aiyad (God have mercy on his soul!). A slave-E brought before al-Mansur Muhammad Ibn Abi `Amin with a view to his purchasing her, chose this very song to sing to him: he promptly ordered her to be executed. It was for the same reason that Ahmad Ibn Mughith was put to death, the Mughith clan exterminated, and proclamation issued that not one of their numbers should ever be taken into the royal service-a decree which resulted in their utter destruction, and the entire wiping out of the house, none surviving but a wretched handful of outcaste fugitives. This was all because Ahmad Ibn Mughith composed a love lyric in honour of a Caliph's daughter. Such instances are numerous.
       It is related of al-Hasan Ibn Hani' that he was deeply smitten by Muhammad Ibn Harun, better known as Ibn Zubaida. The latter had an inkling of the situation, and upbraided the poet for gazing at him so intently. It is reported that al-Hasan remarked, that he would never have ventured to concentrate his gaze on Muhammad so long, if it had not been for the fact that the latter was overcome by his potations.
       Sometimes the reason for concealment is so that the beloved may not take fright, or be made off with. I know of a man whose beloved was completely friendly and at ease with him; but if he had disclosed by the least gesture that he was in love, the beloved would have become as remote from him as the Pleiades, whose stars hang so high in heaven. It is a sort of statesmanship that is required in such cases; the party concerned was enjoying the pleasure of his loved one's company intensely and to the last degree, but if he had so much as hinted at his inner feelings he would have attained but a miserable fraction of the beloved's favour, and endured into the bargain all the arrogance and caprice of which love is capable. He would have been denied that confidence of the heart's mastery; all the joy would have gone out of his romance; his little idyll would have given place to affectation and unjust accusation. Where formerly he was treated as a brother and an equal, now he would have been regarded as a slave and a prisoner. And had he divulged his sentiments further, to such a point that the beloved's circle of intimates came to know of it, he would never have seen the object of his affection again, save perchance in a dream; everything would have been over between them; the final result would have been his own great discomfiture.
       Finally, sometimes the reason for concealment is an overpowering shyness from which some men suffer; or because the lover observes that his beloved is turning away from his and shunning his advances, and being of a proud spirit he hides his feelings so that no enemy may gloat over him, and so as to show them, and his beloved, how lightly he regards the whole business.

---

OF DIVULGING THE SECRET


SOMETIMES it happens in Love that the secret is divulged. This is one of the most deplorable accidents that can befall a romance: its causes are various. It may be that a man resorts to this action merely because he is ambitious to dress himself up in the lover's guise, and so be enrolled in their ranks. This is a contemptible deceit, a disgusting effrontery, a most counter feit pretence to love.
       Disclosure is sometimes due to loves overpowering mastery; publicity prevails over modesty. In such a case a man is quite unable to control himself or regulate his actions. This is one of the furthest extremes which passionate love can reach; it then so strictly dominates the reason, that the mind represents beauty in the shape of ugliness, and ugliness in the form of beauty good is thought to be evil, and evil good. How many a man of the severest respectability, veiled as it were in the closest veil and shrouded in the most impenetrable curtains, has seen his robe of modesty ripped off by love, his heart's shrine violated, his holy of holies desecrated, so that his respectability has been turned into notoriety, his quiet retirement changed so that he is a public laughing-stock! To be a scandal is then his fondest ambition; he will commit actions which, if they had been so much as pictured to him hitherto, he would have shivered all over at their very mention, and prayed long and earnestly to be delivered from them. What was formerly hard has now become smooth, what was once most grave now seems to him of no account, what was difficult suddenly proves easy.
       I once knew a youth, the scion of a noble house and one of my most aristocratic friends, who was smitten with love for a cloistered girl. He became quite crazy for her, and his love of her cut him off from many of his most virtuous pursuits; the signs of his infatuation were evident to all having eyes to see. In the end she felt constrained to chide him for the manifest follies into which passion was leading him.
       Musa Ibn 'Asim Ibn `Amr told me the following story. " I was once with my father Abu 'l-Path (God have mercy upon him!), writing a letter for him at his behest. Suddenly my eyes caught a glimpse of a slave girl with whom I was infatuated; unable to master myself, I threw the letter away and started after her. My father was dumbstruck, and thought that something serious had happened to me. Then my reason returned to me; wiping my face, I came back and begged pardon, saying that I had been overcome by a haemorrhage of the nose! "
       You should know that this kind of behaviour is enough to scare the beloved away; it is a poor way of managing things, and betrays incompetent statesmanship. In every enterprise there is a proper way to begin, and an appropriate course to follow after; the venturer who transgresses the norm or strays from the right path brings all his labours back on his own head; his toil is to no purpose, his weariness is in vain, his searching's are superfluous. The more he swerves from the straight course, the futher he deviates from it and perseveres along the wrong turning, the more remote will he become from the object of his quest. I have a piece of poetry on this, from which I will venture to quote.



When difficulties challenge thee
Confront them not too jestingly,
Nor, when upon an easy quest,
Let all thy effort be expressed.

Time has a wide variety
Of knavish tricks, and Destiny
A thousand oscillating moods
And infinite vicissitudes.

However Fate may play his game,
Adjust thy style to suit the same;
Against a little little strive,
Match much with much, to keep alive

Hast thou not seen, and learned by it,
How, when a: lamp is freshly lit,
The flame burns feebly, and one puff
To put it out is quite enough?

But when the wick is well alight
And blazing broadly through the night,
To puff and puff will only go
To fan it into fiercer glow.

       I was once acquainted with a man of Cordova, the son of one of the principal clerks in the civil service his name was Ahmad Ibn Fath-and I had always known him as most circumspect, a keen student of science and letters; in reserve he excelled all his companions, in quiet dignity he was supreme. He was never to be seen anywhere but in the most virtuous circles, and the parties he attended were always strictly respectable; in short; his behaviour was most praiseworthy, his conduct beyond reproach; he went his own way, and kept himself to himself. Then the fates decreed that we should be far sundered. The first news that came to me, after I had taken up residence in Jativa, was that he had cast off all restraint on falling in love with a certain goldsmith's son called Ibrahim Ibn Ahmad. I knew this young man, well enough to be aware that his qualities did not merit his being loved by a person of a good family, in a prominent position, and possessed of broad estates and an ample patrimony. Then I had it confirmed that my friend had uncovered his head, shown his face abroad, cast off his head-rope, bared his countenance, rolled up his sleeves-in a word, that he had given himself over to the lusts of the flesh. He had become the talk of the town; all tongues wagged of his adventure; his name was banded through' the countryside, and the scandalmongers ran everywhere with tales of his amazing escapade. All that he had achieved was that the veil of his private feelings had been stripped off, his secret had been divulged, his name besmirched, his reputation blackened; the object of his passion had run away from him altogether, and forbidden him ever to see him again. Yet he might well have spared himself these troubles; he could easily have escaped, and kept far away from it all. If indeed he had only concealed his deep secret and hidden his heart's afflictions, he might have continued to wear the robe of well-being, and the garment of his respectability would never have become threadbare; he could still have nourished his hopes, and found ample consolation in meeting and conversing and sitting with the one for whom he was so badly smitten. But alas, the cord of his excuses was snapped; the evidence against him was overwhelming, and the only argument that might be urged in his favour was that his judgment was deranged, his reason affected by his shattering experience. That would certainly have been a valid excuse. But if only a fraction of his understanding remained intact, if the merest fragment of his mind was still unimpaired, then he was gravely at fault in acting in a manner which he was well aware would grievously affront and distress his well-beloved. That is not how true lovers behave, as we shall explain fully in the chapter on Compliance, God willing.
       There remains yet a third reason for disclosing the secret: this is condemned by all right-minded men as a despicable motive and a base manner of conduct. The lover sees that his beloved has betrayed him, or grown tired of him, or dislikes him; and the only way he can find to get even with him is to disclose everything and make the affair notorious-a shift which indeed harms him far more than the person he seeks to injure. This is a most shocking disgrace and a most foul shame; it is the strongest possible proof that the one so behaving is entirely bereft of reason, and no more in his right mind.
       Sometimes disclosure occurs as the result of gossip and rumours to which the lover pays insufficient heed; he is quite content for his secret to be discovered, either out of conceit, or because he thinks in that way to attain some part of his ambition. I actually saw this trick done by a friend of mine, a general's son.
       I have read in some Bedouin tale that their womenfolk do not feel satisfied and convinced that a man is really in love with them, until his romantic feelings become public-knowledge and are completely divulged; he must advertise and broadcast his attachment, and sing their praises for all to hear. I know not what to make of that, considering they have such a reputation for chastity: what chastity does a woman in fact possess, if her greatest desire and joy is to be notorious after this fashion?




OF COMPLIANCE


ONE of the wonderful things that occur in Love is the way the lover submits to the beloved, and adjusts his own character by main force to that of his loved one. Often and often you will see a man stubborn by disposition, intractable, jibbing at all control, determined, arrogant, always ready to take umbrage; yet no sooner let him sniff the soft air of love, plunge into its waves, and swim in its sea, than his stubbornness will have suddenly changed to docility, his intractability' to gentleness, his determination to easy-going, his arrogance to submission. I have some verses on this.



Shall I be granted, friend,
To come once more to thee,
Or will there be an end
Of changeful destiny?

The sword (O strange to tell!)
Is now the baton's page,
The captive, tame gazelle
A lion full of rage

       These verses tell the same story.



Though thou scoldest me, yet I
Am the cheapest man to die,
Slipping swiftly like false gold
Through the tester's fingers rolled.

Yet what joy it is for me
To be slain for loving thee!
Marvel, then, at one who dies
Smiling pleasure from his eyes.

       I have still another trifle on this topic.



Were thy features shining fair
Viewed by critics Persian,
Little would they reck of their
Mobedh and their Hormosan!

       Sometimes the beloved is unsympathetic to the manifesting of complaints, and is too impatient to listen to tales of suffering. In those circumstances you will see the lover concealing his grief, suppressing his despair, and hiding his sickness. The beloved heaps unjust accusations on his head; and he is full of apologies for every fault he is supposed to have committed, and confesses crimes of which he is wholly innocent, simply to submit to what his loved one says and to avoid resisting the charges. I know a man who was afflicted in just this way; his beloved was continually leveling accusations against him, though he was entirely blameless; he was evermore being reproached and scolded, yet he was as pure as driven snow. Let me quote here some verses which I addressed- once to one of my comrades; though they do not exactly fit this context, still they come very near to the topic under' discussion.



Once thou wouldst greet me with a smile,
Delighted at my near approach,
And if I turned from thee awhile
Thy features registered reproach.

My nature is not so averse
To listen to a little blame
White hairs are ugly, but no worse,
Yet they are always called a shame.

A man, when looking in the glass,
May think himself uncommon plain;
But moles and spots for beauty pass,
And do not need to give such pain.

They are an ornament, when few,
And only count for ugliness
When they exceed a measure due
And who has ever praised excess?

       A little later in the same poem I have the following verse.



O come thou to his succour, then;
By so great cares his soul is gripped
That lo, he moves to tears the pen,
The ink, the paper, and the script!

       Let no man say that the patience displayed by the lover when the beloved humiliates him is a sign of pusillanimity: that would be a grave error. We know that the beloved is not to be regarded as a match or an equal to the lover, that the injury inflicted by him on the lover should be repaid in kind. The beloved's 'insults and affronts are not such as a man need regard as dishonoring him; the memory of them is not preserved down the ages; neither do they occur in the Courts of Caliphs and the salons of the great, where endurance of an insult would imply humiliation, and submission would lead to utter contempt.
       Sometimes you will see a man infatuated with his slave-girl, his own legal property, and there is nothing to prevent him from having his way with her if he so desires; what point would there be then in his revenging himself on her? No; the real grounds for being angered by insults are entirely different; anger is fully justified when the insults are offered as between men of high rank, whose every breath is studied, whose every word is examined closely for its meaning, and given a most profound significance. For such men do not utter words at random, or let fall remarks negligently; but as for the beloved, she is at one time an unbending lance, at another a pliant twig, now cruel, now complaisant, just as the mood takes her and for no valid reason. On this theme I can quote an apposite poem of mine.



It is not just to disapprove
A meek servility in love
For Love the proudest men abase
Themselves, and feel it no disgrace.

Then do not marvel so at me
And my profound humility;
Ere I was overthrown, this state
Proud Caliphs did humiliate.

No peer is the beloved one,
No parfit knight, no champion,
That it should shame to thee procure,
Her hateful insults to endure:

An apple falling from the tree
Struck and a trifle injured thee
Would it be triumph worth thy pain
To cut the apple into twain?

       Abu Dulaf the stationer told me the following story, which he heard from the philosopher Maslama Ibn Ahmad, better known as al-Majriti. In the mosque which lies to the east of the Quraish cemetery in Cordova, opposite the house of the vizier Abu `Umar Ahmad In' Muhammad Ibn Hudair (God have mercy upon him!)-in this mosque Muqaddam Ibn al-Asfar was always to be seen hanging about during his salad days, because of a romantic attachment which he had formed for 'Ajib, the page-boy of the afore-mentioned Abu `Umar. He gave up attending prayers at the Masrur mosque (near where he lived), and came to this mosque night and day on account of 'Ajib. He was arrested more than once by the guard at night, when he was departing from the mosque after praying the second evening prayer; he had done nothing but' sit and stare at the page-boy until the latter, angry and infuriated, went up to him and struck him some hard blows, slapping his cheeks and punching him in the eye. Yet the young man was delighted at this and exclaimed, " By Allah! This is what I have dreamed of; now I am happy." Then he would walk alongside of 'Ajib for some minutes. Abu Dulaf added that he had been, told this story by Maslama several times in the presence of 'Ajib himself, when observing the high position, influence and prosperity to which Muqaddam Ibn al-Asfar had attained; the latter had indeed become most powerful; he was on extremely intimate terms with al-Muzaffar Ibn Abi `Amin, and enjoyed friendly relations with al-Muzaffar's mother and family; he built a number of mosques and drinking-fountains, and established not a few charitable foundations; besides all which he busied himself with all the various kinds of benevolent and other activities, with which men in authority like to concern themselves.
       Here is an even more outrageous example. Sa'id Ibn Mundhir Ibn Sa'id, who used to lead the prayers in the cathedral mosque of Cordova during the days of al-Hakam al-Mustansir Billah (God be merciful to his soul Q, had a slave-girl with whom he was deeply in love. He, offered to manumit and marry her, to which she scornfully replied-and I should mention that he had a fine long beard-" I think your beard is dreadfully long; trim it up, and then you shall have your wish." He thereupon laid a pair of scissors to his beard, until it looked somewhat more gallant; then he summoned witnesses, and invited them to testify that he had set the girl free. But when in due course he proposed to her, she would not accept him. Among those present was his brother Hakam Ibn Mundhir, who promptly said to the assembled company, " Now I am going to propose marriage to her." He did so, and she consented; and he married her then and there. Sa'id acquiesced in this frightful insult; for all that he was a man known for his abstinence, piety and religious zeal. I myself met this same Sa'id; he was slain by the Berbers, on the day when they stormed and sacked Cordova. His brother Hakam was the head of the Mu'tazilites of Andalusia, their leader, professor and chief schoolman, as well as the most famous among them for his piety; at the same time he was a poet, a physician and a lawyer. His brother `Abd al-Malik Ibn Mundhir was also suspected of belonging to the same sect; in the days of al-Hakam (God be well pleased with him!) he was in charge of the Office for the Defence of the Oppressed, but was crucified by al-Mansur Ibn Abi 'Amir on the charge, preferred against him, and a whole group of Cordovan lawyers and judges, of secretly swearing allegiance to `Abd al-Rahman Ibn `Ubaid Allah, grandson of Caliph al-Nasir (God be well pleased with them!) as lawful Caliph. `Abd a1-Rahman himself was executed, `Abd al-Malik Ibn Mundhir was crucified, and the entire faction accused of the conspiracy were liquidated. The father of these three brothers, the Lord Chief Justice Mundhir Ibn Sa'id, came under the same suspicion of holding Mu'tazilite opinions; he was a most eloquent preacher, profoundly learned in every branch of knowledge, of the utmost piety, and withal the wittiest and most amusing of men. The son Hakam aforementioned is still living at the time of writing this epistle; he is now very advanced in years, and quite blind.
       A wonderful example of how the lover will submit to the beloved is provided by a man I knew who lay awake for many nights, endured extreme suffering, and had his heart tom asunder by the deepest emotions, until he finally overcame his, beloved's resistance, who thereafter refused him nothing and could no more resist his advances. Yet when the lover observed that the beloved felt a certain antipathy towards his intentions he forthwith discontinued relations, not out of chastity or fear but solely in order to accord with the beloved's wishes. For all the intensity of his feelings, he could not bring himself to do anything for which he had seen the beloved had no enthusiasm. I know another man who acted in the same way, and then repented on discovering that his beloved had betrayed; him. I have put this situation into verse.



Seize the opportunity
As it opens up to thee;
Opportunities depart
Swiftly as the lightnings dart.

Ah, the many things that I
Might; have done, but let slip by,
And the intervening years
Brought me naught but bitter tears.

Whatsoever treasure thou
Findest, pounce upon it now
Wait no instant: swoop to day
Like a falcon on thy prey.

       This very same thing happened to Abu 'l-Muzaffar `Abd al-Rahman Ibn Ahmad Ibn Mahmud, our good friend: I quoted to him some verses of mine which he leapt upon with the greatest joy and carried off with him, to be his guiding star ever after.
       When I was living in the old city at Cordova I one day met Abu `Abd Allah Muhammad Ibn Kulaib of Kairouan, a man with an exceedingly long tongue, well sharpened to enquire on every manner of subject. The topic of Love and its various aspects was under discussion, and he put the following question to me " If a person with whom I am in love is averse to meeting me, and avoids me whenever I try to make an approach, what should I do? " I replied, " My opinion is that you should endeavor to bring relief to your own soul by meeting the beloved, even if the beloved is averse to meeting you." He retorted, " I do not agree; I prefer that the beloved should have his will and desire, rather than I mine. I would endure and endure, even if it meant death for me." " I would only have fallen in love ", I countered, " for my personal satisfaction and aesthetic pleasure. I should therefore follow my own analogy, guide myself by my personal principles, and pursue my habitual path, seeking quite deliberately my own enjoyment." " That is a cruel logic ", he exclaimed. " Far worse than death is that for the sake of which you desire death, and far dearer than life is that for the sake of which you would gladly lay down your life." " But ", I said, " you would be laying down your life not by choice but under compulsion. If it were possible for you not to lay down your life, you would not have done so. To give up meeting the beloved voluntarily would certainly be most reprehensible, since you would thereby do violence to yourself and bring your own soul to its doom." Thereupon he cried out, "You are a born dialectician, and dialectics have no particular relevance to Love. "In that case", I said, " the lover will certainly be unfortunate." "And what misfortune is there he ended, " that is greater than Love?"




OF OPPOSITION


SOMETIMES the lover follows his own lust, and lets himself go completely. He is cured of his sickness at the hands of the beloved, and is resolved to have his pleasure of the other at all costs, whether the beloved be angry or consent. If the lover is assisted in this by circumstance, if his heart remains steadfast and the fates favour him, he will drain the cup of his joy to the last drop; his sorrows will depart, his cares will be at an end: he will see the fulfillment of his hopes, and attain all *his desire. I have myself seen lovers who comported themselves after this fashion: the following verses of mine describe the situation.



When I have had my will
And slaked my soul's desire
Of some sweet fawn, who still
Consumed my heart with fire;

I reek not if she be
Reluctant to consent,
Nor care if she agree
But all malevolent.

Where'er the water may
Be found, I'll seize the same
And sprinkle with its spray
My tamarisk aflame.





OR THE REPROACHER


LOVE has its various misfortunes: of these the firs is the Reproacher.
       Of reproachers there are divers kinds. The original sort is a friend, between whom and yourself the burden of cautiousness has been let drop: his reproach is better than many abettings. It consists of incitements and prohibitions; therein and thereby the soul is wonderfully stimulated and remarkably strengthened; its properties are at once purposeful and efficacious, and healing to those sore wounded by passionate desire. Especially is this the case if the friend is gentle in his speech, and skilled at matching his words to his intentions; if he is aware of the times when the negative should be emphasized, and the occasions on which it is better to concentrate on positive injunctions; and if he is apprised of the hours wherein both approaches ought to be combined; all according to the degree of tractability or obdurateness, response or rebellion which he observes in the lover.
       The second type of reproacher is the thoroughgoing scolder, who never lets up reprimanding the lover. That is a tough business, and a heavy burden to bear.
       I myself once had a like experience, very similar to what we are here discussing though not strictly in the same type of situation. Our mutual friend Abu '1-Sari 'Ammar Ibn Ziyad reproached me frequently about a certain course I was pursuing, and seconded the efforts of others who had reprimanded me on the selfsame score; yet I had always thought that he would take my side whatever I did, whether I was acting rightly or wrongly, because of the firm friendship and true brotherhood uniting us.
       I have seen a lover so violent in his emotions, and so overwhelmingly infatuated, that he loved to be reproached more than anything in the world, in order that he might show his reproacher how stubbornly he could rebel against his scoldings. He took a positive delight in opposing him, in provoking him to resistance and doubled reproof, and then in triumphing over him; his joy was like that of a king who puts his enemies to flight, or a skilled debater who triumphs over his opponent. Sometimes this motive inspires a lover to provoke the reproacher to reprimand him; he will do things, which oblige the censor to begin his faultfinding. I have some verses on this topic.



To hear myself reproached and blamed
Of all things this I love most fair,
For then perchance her name is named
Whose mention bids me not despair.

I quaff reproach, as though a cup
I drain with purest wine replete,
And after, having drunk it up,
Devour my mistress' name for sweet.





OF THE HELPFUL BROTHER


ONE of the things devoutly to be desired in Love is that Almighty God shall bestow upon a man a sincere friend, one moreover who is agreeable in speech, of amply abundant means, adroit in laying hold of an affair and shrewd in coming through it, masterly in setting forth an argument, sharp of tongue, of splendid magnanimity, widely learned, little apt to contradict, mighty in succour, strong to endure, patient in the face of impudence, broadly complaisant, a grand confederate, evenly matched, of praiseworthy character, innocent of all injustice, determined to be of help, loathing estrangement, noble in all his undertakings, averse to secret wickedness, profound in his conceptions, understanding his friend's desires, of virtuous habits, high-born, absolutely discreet, abounding in good works, truly trustworthy, incapable of treachery, of a generous spirit, of penetrating sensibility, accurate in intuition, wholly dependable, a perfect shield, renowned for his fidelity, of manifest constancy, steady in temper, ready with good counsel, sure in his affection, easy to lead on, having a lively faith, truthful in all that he utters, of a gay heart, strictly chaste, wide in prowess, endowed with fortitude, accustomed to sincerity, a stranger to revulsion, a haven of rest in times of trouble, ready to share the privacy of his friend's poverty and to partake of all its most intimate secrets.
       In such a friend the lover may truly find his greatest repose. But where is such a man to be found? If you are able to lay your hands upon him, grapple him to you as a miser hugs his gold, and grasp him tightly as a niggard grips his silver. Guard him with all that you possess, sparing neither your inheritance nor your hard-earned wealth; for having him, your joy will be complete, your sorrows will be dispersed, the long hours will go by swiftly, and all your affairs will pass agreeably. With such a comrade no man will lack for goodly help and fair counsel. Therefore do kings take unto themselves ministers and courtiers that they may lighten for them somewhat of their heavy burden, and the crushing load they carry on their shoulders; that they may derive riches from their counsels, and reinforcement from their competency. Otherwise it is not within the power of human nature to withstand all the shocks that assail it, except a man seek succour of a kindred spirit, one resembling him in kind.
        Some lovers there are who, missing this quality in their friends, and having little confidence in them because of their experience of mankind-for the one to whom the lover's secret is entrusted will generally act in one of two ways: either he will mock his opinion, or he will publish his secret therefore prefer solitude to society, and go apart from their fellows into desolate places, communing with the air and conversing with the earth; in which conduct they discover relief, as the sick man in his sighing, and the sorrowful man in his sobbing. For when cares crowd thickly into the; heart, the heart can no more contain them; and if it gives not vent to them with the tongue, and finds not relief in lamentation, the sufferer perishes of grief and dies of sorrow.
       I have never seen anything to equal the helpfulness of women in this respect. They are far more forward than men in keeping love's secret, in counseling each other to be discreet, and in co-operating to conceal it whenever they happen to know of any such affair. I have never in my life known a woman to reveal the secret of a loving couple, without that she was hated, loathed and unanimously condemned by all her sisters. Old women excel young girls in this particular the latter sometimes do disclose what they know out of jealousy (though that happens indeed rarely), whereas the former have despaired of further romances, and are therefore now anxious solely for the welfare of others.
       I know of a wealthy woman who possessed many slave-girls and servants. It was rumoured that one of her maids was in love with a young gentleman of the family, and that he reciprocated her sentiments; it was further reported that they were behaving disgracefully. A friend remarked to the mistress, " Your maid so-and-so knows all about the affair, and is intimate with every detail. The mistress thereupon laid hold of the maid-and she was very cruel in punishing her servants-and let her sample such a variety of blows and pummeling's as even the toughest man could not have endured, hoping that the girl would disclose to her something of the matter that had been mentioned to her; but she betrayed nothing whatsoever.
       I also know of a great lady, able to recite the Koran from end to end, pious, and devoted to good works. She happened to obtain possession of a letter written by a boy to his ladylove; the boy was the property of a different household. The grand lady let the young man know that she was aware of the romance he sought to deny everything, but that was impossible. She then said to him, " What ails you? Who has ever been immune from love? Don't worry about this; by Allah, I will never apprise anyone of your secret.' If I could only buy her for you out of my property, even if it took all that I possess, I would gladly place her at your disposal, somewhere that you could come to her without anyone being the wiser."
        You will sometimes see a virtuous, elderly lady, having given up all hope of men, whose fondest occupation and she has the greatest confidence that this will prove acceptable to God) is to contrive to marry off an orphan girl; she will lend her clothes and her jewels to an impoverished bride.
        As for the reason why this instinct is so deeply rooted in women, I see no other explanation than that they have nothing else to fill their minds, except loving union and what brings it about, flirting and how it is done, intimacy and the various ways of achieving it. This is their sole occupation, and they were created for nothing else. Men on the other hand are divided in their interests; some seek to amass a fortune, some aspire to the company of kings, some pursue knowledge, some look after their families, some venture on arduous journeys, some hunt, some ply divers crafts, some go forth to the wars, some confront armed rebellions, some brave fearful perils, some cultivate the soil. All these different occupations diminish leisure, and divert men from the paths of idleness. I have read in the biographies of the kings of the negroes, that those monarchs assign their womenfolk to the care of a trusty henchman, who allots to each her task of wool spinning, so that their whole time is fully employed. For they say that when a woman remains without any occupation, she hankers after men and yearns for the marriagebed.
       I have myself observed women, and got to know their secrets to an extent almost unparalleled; for I was reared in their bosoms, and brought up among them, not knowing any other society. I never sat with men until I was already a youth, and my beard had begun to sprout. Women taught me the Koran, they recited to me much poetry, they trained me in calligraphy; my only care and mental exercise, since first I began to understand anything, even from the days of earliest childhood, has been to study the affairs of females, to investigate their histories, and to acquire all the knowledge I could about them. I forget nothing of what I have seen them do. This all springs from a profound jealousy innate in me, and a deep instinctive suspicion of women's ways. I have thus discovered not a little of their habits and motives. All this shall be set forth at length in the appropriate chapters, God willing.




---

OF THE SPY


ANOTHER of the misfortunes of Love is the Spy: he is truly an inward fever, a persistent delirium, a haunting obsession. Spies are of various kinds.
       The first type of spy is the bore who squats himself down without malice prepense in a spot where a man is apt to meet with his beloved, and where the two intend to disclose something of their secret and to reveal their passion, amiably conversing alone. Such a kind of spy will occasion the lover more disquiet than a more serious type: even though he may take himself off quickly enough, all the same he is an obstacle preventing the realization of desire, and frustrating the most ample hopes.
        One day I saw a pair of lovers in a place where they supposed themselves to be alone; they addressed themselves to their tender protests, and made ready to exploit their sweet solitude. But the spot which they had chosen for their interview was not a private sanctuary, and it was not long before the tiresome intruder appeared on the scene. Observing me, he at once turned aside and sat down next to me, remaining with me a long time. If you could only have seen the young lover, and the mixture of evident despair and anger on his face, you would have witnessed a truly wonderful spectacle. I have commemorated the scene in some verses, of which the following is an extract.



He sits, the while the hours go by,
A boring presence at the best,
And drools on matters wherein I
Have not the slightest interest.

Ridwa, and Yadhbul, and Shamam,
Samman, and mighty Lebanon,
The mount of Hazn, and of Lukam
He far outweighs them, every one.

       Then there is the spy who has discovered an inkling of what the loving pair are about, and has some suspicion of what is going on; he desires to ferret out the whole truth of the case, and therefore hangs about and squats for hours on end, watching their movements, eyeing their expressions, counting their very breaths. Such a man is more pestilential than the mange. I know of a young fellow who had every intention of manhandling a spy of this sort. These verses of mine illustrate the type.



He comes, not every other while
But constantly, with purpose vile
What greater headache can there be
Than such unwelcome company?

He perseveres to such excess
In leis absurd attentiveness,
That we are known throughout the town
As Messrs Adjective and Noun!

       Next there is the spy who watches over the beloved. There is no other way of dealing with him, but to conciliate him; if he can be won over, then that is the very acme of delight. This is the spy commonly mentioned by the poets in their verses.
       I have observed a man who was so adroit in his efforts to conciliate a spy, that in the end the spy spied on his behalf; he feigned inattention when inattention was called for, he defended him from all danger, and in every way exerted himself in his interests. This too I have put into verse.



Many a time and oft a spy
Was posted o'er the lady I
Aspired to win, by every art
Resolved to keep us two apart.

But presently my gentle way
So mastered him beneath my sway
That soon my worst presentiments
Were changed to careless confidence.

He was a sword unsheathed and bare,
Ready to slay me then and there;
But now he has become my friend,
And to his kindness ne'er an end.

       Here is a stanza from another poem on the same subject.



He was an arrow poised for death,
But now he is my life and breath;
He was rank poison in my throat,
But now my only antidote.

       I know of a man who set a spy to watch over a person about whom he was anxious, and had every confidence in the spy's loyalty; as things turned out he proved his greatest bane and the source of all his calamity.
       If there proves to be no strategem whereby the spy may be overcome, no way in which he can be con ciliated, then the only hope that remains is to be able now and again to signal surreptitiously with the eyes or the eyebrows and to make subtle allusions in speaking: that is enjoyment of a kind, and secures for the passionate lover some temporary satisfaction. I have a poem on this theme, which begins as follows.



There is a spy, who watches o'er
My darling mistress evermore;
To his employer he is true,
And faithful to his compact, too.

       Later in the same poem these two stanzas occur.



He cuts my every path that leads
To satisfying my heart's needs,
And so a work accomplishes
Else wrought by dire calamities.

It is as though a demon lives
Within his heart, that all perceives,
And in his either eye one dwells
Who every least adventure tells.

       The following stanza also belongs to the same set of verses.



Two watchful spies appointed be
To overlook all men but me
God, sitting on His heavenly throne,
Assigns a third to me alone.

       The most disgusting kind of spy is the man who has been tried in love long ago, and suffered its misfortunes over many years, and then, after having known its manifestations very fully, has now detached himself from it: he is therefore desirous in the extreme to protect the person over whom he is watching from the calamities of love. God be praised, what a splendid spy he makes, and what mischief stands poised to fall upon lovers through his instrumentality! These verses of mine suit that topic.



A spy that too long knew
The mischief love can do
He drank of passion deep,
And was denied his sleep;

Encountered in desire
Sharp pains, and torment dire
Love well nigh proved his doom
And laid him in the tomb.

All tricks he knew in truth
Of love-afflicted youth,
Scorned not to try each ruse,
Each wink and word to use.

Then, after all his pains,
Oblivion attains,
Calls passion to its face
A shame and a disgrace.

And now, o'er her whom I
Adore he's set to spy,
His charge, to keep apart
From her my lovesick heart.

Ah, what calamitous
Afflictions light on us,
And what misfortunes fell
Have come with us to dwell!

       One of the most curious examples of spying I ever recall is the following. I know two lovers who are both in love with the same person, and conduct themselves in identical fashion; each of them, as I have observed, spies upon the other. On this subject I have also composed a short poem.



Two lovers madly smitten,
And by the same love bitten;
Each turns against the other,
Each wrestles with his brother.

The dog beside the manger
Comports himself no stranger
Too sick to eat, too greedy
To entertain the needy.





OF THE SLANDERER


ANOTHER of the misfortunes of Love is the Slanderer he is of two kinds. The first sort of slanderer desires simply to part the loving couple. He is the less mischievous of the two; but for all that he is a deadly poison, a bitter colocynth, an imminent doom and an impending calamity. Sometimes his embroideries are ineffective. Generally the slanderer addresses himself to the beloved; the lover, poor fellow-" the choking throat can't sing a note ", and " whom rage destroys knows little joys "he is far too occupied with his own troubles to listen to what the slanderer has to say. Slanderers are well aware of this, and therefore direct their efforts only towards those whose minds are free of other cares, and who are therefore ready to pounce with the fury of a mighty *potentate, prepared to find fault at the least provocation.
       Slanderers have various methods of tale bearing. For instance, they will inform the beloved that the lover is not concealing the secret. That is a difficult situation to deal with, and slow to remedy unless it so happens by coincidence that the beloved resists the lover's advances-a circumstance which in any case makes aversion inevitable. There is no relief for the beloved when such rumours are about, unless the fates take a hand by acquainting her of something of the lover's secret feelings, and then only if the beloved is intelligent and has a modicum of discretion; she will in that case defer judgment on the lover. When the beloved discovers, after behaving with due aloofness and reserve, that the slanderer's story' was a lie, and that the lover has in fact not divulged the secret at all, she of course realises that the tale was a fabrication from beginning to end, and all her dark doubts vanish.
        I once saw this very drama enacted between a pair of lovers. The beloved was very watchful, and excessively discreet; but many slanderous tales were carried about, and in the end the marks of these were evident in the beloved's countenance. He spoke of " a love that never was in truth "; he became a prey to conjectures and, ugly thoughts, and was so dumbfounded and distraught that, he could no longer bottle up his feelings; finally he disclosed what had been reported to him. If you could have been present at the scene when the lover offered his excuses, you would have realized that passion is indeed a tyrant who must be obeyed, an edifice most strongly bound together, a lance exceeding sharp and penetrating. His apologies were a pretty mixture of groveling, confession, denial, penitence, and unconditional surrender. So after a certain amount of pother all was well once more between the happy pair.
        Sometimes the slanderer alleges that the love which the lover is protesting is not true, and that his real purpose is to relieve himself and gratify his sensual impulses. This is a kind of slander which, while serious enough when whispered abroad, is nevertheless easier to deal with than the preceding variety. The state of the lover is quite different from that of the mere pleasure-seeker; the evidences of emotion are wholly at variance in the two cases. This topic has however been discussed amply enough in the chapter on Compliance.
       Sometimes the slanderer reports that the lover is divided in his affections: this is a consuming fire, and an ache pervading all the members. When the purveyor of such a story happens to be dealing with a youthful lover who is handsome, graceful, desirable, inclined to sensual pleasures, and of a worldly disposition, while the beloved is a lady of illustrious position and high rank, the likeliest thing imaginable is that she will endeavour to destroy her suitor, and to be the instrument of his death. How many a fair young lover has been struck down on this account, or been given poison to drink, or had his belly ripped up, all for a like cause! Such was the end of Marwan Ibn Ahmad Ibn Hudair, the father of Ahmad the ascetic and of Musa and `Abd al-Rahman, better known as the sons of Lubna: he met his doom at the hands of his slave-girl Qatr al-Nada. This was my motive in writing a cautionary poem for a comrade of mine, from which I will quote.



Will a man, except he's blind,
Put his trust in womankind?
What a stupid he must be
So to court catastrophe!

Ah, how many fools have come
To the murky pool of doom,
Thought it clean, and wholesome too,
And sucked up the deadly brew!

       The second sort of slanderer labours to part the lovers in order that he may enjoy unique possession of the beloved, and have her for himself. This is the most difficult, deadly and decisive kind of all, because of the strenuous efforts the slanderer will make in view of the personal advantage he looks to gain.
       There is yet a third class of slanderer: the man who traduces lover and beloved alike, and so reveals the secrets of both. Such a type may be disregarded, if the lover is co-operative. I have put this matter into a poem.



I marvel at the slanderer
Who seeks to worm our secret out:
He only has our news to bear,
And nothing else to blab about.

Why should he worry at my gloom,
Or trouble if I faint and fret?
Myself the pomegranate consume
The children's teeth on edge are set!

        Here I find myself obliged to set down some observations closely analogous to the subject now under discussion, even though they may be slightly off the point. I would like to say a few words of explanation about tale bearing and backbiting. In talking, one thing always leads on to another, as we envisaged at the beginning of this essay.
        There are no people on earth worse than slanderers and backbiters. Backbiting is a characteristic proving' the tree to be rotten, and the branch diseased; it shows that the nature itself is corrupt, and that the upbringing is also depraved. The born backbiter must needs lie; for backbiting is one of the branches, one of the authentic species of lying. Every backbiter is a liar.
       I have never loved a liar. Though I am ready to be indulgent, and to be friendly with every man whatever his fault, even if it be a grave fault, committing his case to the tender mercy of his Creator and liking him for his good points, I cannot stomach anyone whom I know to be in the habit of lying: that for me wipes out all his virtues, destroys his merits, and discounts any worth there may be in him. I look for no good in such a man whatsoever. Of every other sin a man may repent every other vice can be concealed and abandoned; but as for telling a lie, there is no turning back from that, and that can never be hidden, wherever it may be. I have not seen in all my life, neither have I heard from any man, a case of a liar who eschewed lying and did not return to the habit again. I have never taken the initiative in breaking off relations with an acquaintance, except when I have detected him in a lie; in such a case it is I who take the first step, and go out of my way to avoid and to forsake him. Lying is a mark which I have never seen on any man, without his being suspected of having some dark fissure in his soul, and diagnosed as suffering from some frightful spiritual deformity. I pray that God may never abandon us, nor deny us the protection of His grace!
       A wise man of old has said, "Make friends with whom you will, but avoid three sorts of men-the fool, who desiring' to help you only harms you; the weary, because in the hour when you rely upon him most, on account of the long and firm friendship between you, in that very hour he lets you down; and the liar, since the more you believe in him the more surely he will do you a dirty trick when you least expect it."
       The Prophet of Allah is reported to have said, " To keep one's covenant is a part of faith"; and again," No man is a believer in the complete sense of the word, so long as he had not given up lying even in jest." I received these two Traditions from Abu `Umar Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Muhammad Ibn `Ali Ibn Rifa'a, who had them from `Ali Ibn `Abd al-`Aziz, from Abu 'Ubaid al-Qasim Ibn Sallam, from his teachers. The second of them has the ultimate authority of `Umar Ibn al-Khattab, and of his son `Abd Allah (God be well pleased with them both).
       Allah says, "O ye who believe, why say ye that which ye do not? Hateful it is to God, that ye should say that which ye do not " (Koran LXI 3).
        The Prophet of Allah was once asked, " May a believer be a miser? "He replied, "Yes." "And may a believer be a coward?" "Yes." "And may a believer be a liar?" "No." I received this Tradition from Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Sa'id, who had it from 'Ubaid Allah Ibn Yahya, from his father, from Malik Ibn Anas, from Safwan Ibn Sulaim. By the same chain of authorities I am informed that the Prophet of Allah also said, "There is no good in lying ": this dictum was likewise issued in answer to a question. Another Tradition, which I have on the same chain up to Malik, reporting in this case from Ibn Masud, quotes the Prophet of Allah as saying, "A man will go on lying, and making one black spot after another on his heart, until his heart is wholly black, and his name will be inscribed in God's book as one of the liars." This chain, depending upon Ibn Masud, quotes the Prophet of Allah further as saying, " Practise truthfulness; for truthfulness leads on to piety, and piety leads on to Paradise. And beware of lying; for lying leads on to sinfulness, and sinfulness leads on to Hell."
       It is said that a man came to the Prophet of Allah and said to him, "O Prophet of Allah, I have three besetting sins-drink, fornication, and lying. Command me which of these I should give up." The Prophet of Allah said, " Give up lying." The man departed from him, and then desired to commit fornication; but he thought a while and then said to himself, " I will come to the Prophet of Allah, and he will say to me, `Hast thou fornicated?' And if I admit it, he will punish me as the law requires; but if I deny it, I shall break my pledge. I will therefore give up this sin." Thereafter he was tempted in the same way to drink, and reasoned after the same manner. Finally he returned to the Prophet of Allah and said, "0 Prophet of Allah, I have given up all three sins." Lying is thus seen to be the root of every abomination, and to comprise all evil; it attracts the hatred of Almighty God.
        We have Abu Bakr al-Siddiq's authority for the statement that the Prophet of Allah said, " That man is without faith, in whom faith cannot be placed." Ilm Masudd is the ultimate source of the Prophet of Allah's saying, " The believer is liable to all innate dispositions, except treachery and lying." The Prophet of Allah further declared, " Three qualities there are which, if they dwell with a man, that man is a hypocrite: to promise and not to fulfill, to lie when speaking, and to betray when trust is placed in him."
        What is unbelief, if it is not lying against Almighty God? Truth belongs to God, and God loves truth; by truth the heavens and the earth stand fast.
        I have never seen any man more shameful than a liar. Empires do not perish, kingdoms are not destroyed, blood is not shed unjustly, honour is not violated, except through backbiting and lying. It is backbiting, which exacerbates hatred and deadly rancour. The lot of the back-biter is nothing but hatred and shame and humiliation; he deserves to be looked down upon by the person to whom he carries his filth-and all the more by others-as one looks down upon a cur.
        Almighty God says, " Woe unto every slanderous defamer! " (Koran CIV I). Again Allah says, " O ye who believe, if there cometh unto you a sinful man bearing tidings, do ye make the matter clear " (Koran XLIX 6). Here God calls the talebearer a sinful man. Allah also says, "Obey thou not the contemptible, back-biting perjurer, who goeth about with slander, and is a hinderer of good, being a transgressor, a criminal, a low-born churl withal " (Koran LXVIII 10-13)
        The Prophet of Allah said, " No calumniator shall enter Paradise." He also said, " Beware of the three babblers! " By this last saying he meant the talebearer, the man who receives tales, and the man who issues them.
       Al-Ahnaf said, " The trustworthy man does not carry reports about, and the double-faced man deserves to be held in no regard by God." Such is the burden of vileness and depravity with which he is loaded.
        A comrade once carried a lying report about me to Abu Ishaq Ibrahim Ibn `Isa al-Thaqafi, the well-known poet (God have mercy on his soul!), just as a joke. But the poet, being very imaginative, believed the story, which enraged him. I should add that both the talebearer and the poet were good friends of mine; the former was not really a backbiter at all, but he was a great jester and loved practical jokes. I therefore sent to Abu Ishaq, who was much troubled by the report, an epistle in verse, which included the following lines.



Take not as substitute for truth
A story thou hast heard men tell,
When thou canst not determine well
By what thou knowest where is Booth.

So might a man in too great haste,
Beholding a mirage, pour out
The precious drops he totes about,
And perish in the howling waste.

       I also addressed a poem to my friend the talebearer, containing these stanzas.



Treat not in jest of earnest things,
Like some psychologist, who brings
Corruption to the very soul
He tends, that else is sane and whole.

The man whose sharpest weapon is
The hawking of mendacities
Is like the bustard, whose defence
Is broadly based on excrements.

       I once had a friend, but so many lies were carried to him about me that at last the campaign had its effect on him; the marks were apparent in his expression and his glance. Now it is my nature to act with great deliberation, to watch with patience, and to be as conciliatory as is humanly possible. I found in quiet submission a way to restore our friendship, and then sent him a poem, from which I will quote just one stanza.



In marksmanship I have a way
Which, had it seen the light of day;
Wahriz could scarce have claimed to be
The champion of archery.

       'Ubaid Allah Ibn Yahya al-Jaziri, who transmits by heart his uncle's famous elegant essays, was a natural liar. The habit has so dominated him and overmastered his reason, that in the end it has become as much his constant companion as hope is to the human breast. He will reinforce his lying tales with the most solemn oaths, which he is ready to shout from the housetops. So he has become more false than a mirage in the desert, being a complete addict to lies, which he seems to love with a passionate devotion; so much so that he will go on telling his stories to people even though he knows quite well that they do not believe him; that little detail does not put him off in the slightest, he still carries on with his falsehoods.
       This is the man to whom I addressed the following verses.



All thou didst strive to keep concealed
Stands now uncovered and revealed
Report, and what myself could see,
Have proven thy malignity.

So circumstance is often shown
By other circumstance alone,
And tribunals take pregnancy
As witness to adultery.

       Here is an extract from another short poem I composed in his honour.



He tells more falsehoods, all in all,
Than mirror, mirror on the wall:
He strikes more swiftly friends apart
Than Indian sabres split the heart.

I think that Fate and sundering Time
Are his disciples in the crime
All practise to one common end
Of separating friend from friend.

       I honored him with a third effusion, a full-length ballad from which I will here quote no more than five stanzas.



He is more lying than a waste
Of good opinion worst misplaced,
More hateful than a load of debt
And poverty oppressing yet.

The Lord's Commandments on his ear
Fall with less chance that he may hear,
And are unlikelier to impress
Than protests the compassionless.

In him unite, to grace his fame,
All ignominy and all shame,
Which leave no room for any worse
That men may vilify and curse.

He is more odious than reproof
To one who feigns to be aloof
From censure, and he strikes the bone
More chill than Salim's frozen stone.

More loathed is he, than to be rent
From the beloved, and banishment,
And spying eyes, to mind perplexed,
And heart athirst, and spirit vexed.

      But he who rouses a heedless brother, or counsels a friend, or protects a fellow Moslem, or lays information concerning a malefactor, or re orts about an enemy, and in doing so does not lie, and is not proved a liar, and intends not to rouse rancour or ill-will, such a man cannot be called a tale-bearer. Have the weak ever perished, or the feeble-minded ever come to ruin for any other reason than that they were unable to distinguish' well between the true counselor and the back-biter? For these attributes are very close to each other on the surface, but inwardly lie far apart: the one is a disease, the other a cure. To the sagacious man the distinction between the two will not be hidden.
       The authentic talebearer is one whose purveying of tales is not approved by the canons of religion, whose purpose is to part friends and provoke strife between comrades, to stir up trouble, to create commotion, to embellish and adorn a tale. If a man fears to embark upon the course of good counsel, lest he fall into the ways of back-biting, and has insufficient confidence in his own perspicacity and the accuracy of his personal judgment when involved in worldly affairs and in commerce with his fellows, then let him take his religion as a guide, and as a lamp to lighten his path, following after it wherever it may lead him on, and halting whenever it bids him halt. The light of his faith will be a sure guarantee that he will see the road ahead, a valid assurance that he will reach his goal, a certain pledge of success and salvation. The Divine Lawgiver, and He Who sent down His Messenger to mankind, He Who dispenseth all commandments and all forbiddings-surely He knows better the path of truth, and is more fully apprised of the happy issue and of deliverance at the end, than any mortal man who boasteth to look into his own soul, and delveth into his mind's conjectures according to his own imperfect reasoning.

---

OF UNION


ONE of the significant aspects of Love is Union. This is a lofty fortune, an exalted-rank, a sublime degree, a lucky star; nay more, it is life renewed, pleasure supreme, joy everlasting, and a grand mercy from Allah.
       Were it not that this world below is a transitory abode of trial and trouble, and Paradise a home where virtue receives its reward, secure from all annoyances, I would have said that union with the beloved is that pure happiness which is without alloy, and gladness unsullied by sorrow, the perfect realization of hopes and the complete fulfillment of one's dreams.
       I have tested all manner of pleasures, and known every variety of joy; and I have found that neither intimacy with princes, nor wealth acquired, nor finding after lacking, nor returning after long absence, nor security after fear and repose in a safe refuge none of these things so powerfully affects the soul as union with the beloved, especially if it come after long denial and continual banishment. For then the flame of passion waxes exceeding hot, and the furnace of yearning blazes up, and the fire of eager hope rages ever more fiercely. The fresh springing of herbs after the rains, the glitter of flowers when the night clouds have rolled away in the hushed hour between dawn and sunrise, the plashing of waters as they run through the stalks of golden blossoms, the exquisite beauty of white castles encompassed by verdant meadows not lovelier is any of these than union with the well-beloved, whose character is virtuous, and laudable her disposition, whose attributes are evenly matched in perfect beauty. Truly that is a miracle of wonder surpassing the tongues of the eloquent, and far beyond the range of the most cunning speech to describe: the mind reels before it, and the intellect stands abashed.
       I have tried to express this in a poem.



Men sometimes come and question me
How many years my age may be,
Seeing my temples silver now
And flecks of snow upon my brow.

This is the answer that I give
"When I count up the life I live
Applying all my reason's power,
I make the total just one hour."

"And how", my questioner replies
In accents of amazed surprise,
"Mak'st thou this sum, which seems to me
Beyond all credibility?"

"One day", I answer," she I love
All other earthly things above
Lay in my arms, and like a thought
Her lips with mine I swiftly sought.

"And though the years before I die
Stretch out interminably, I
Shall only count my life in truth
As that brief hour of happy youth."
       Assignations and trysts are among the pleasurable phases of union. Realization of a long-awaited promise plucks at the heart's strings in a most exquisite way.
       There are two aspects of this situation. The first is the promise that the lover shall visit the beloved. I have a short poem on this topic, from which I will quote two stanzas.



I whispered with the moon all night
The while she tarried, and it seemed
That in the radiance of its light
Some glimmer of her beauty gleamed.

And I was faithful to my troth,
And love was joined, and life was gay;
Sweet union laughed upon us both,
And dark estrangement slunk away.


       The second aspect of this situation is when the lover is awaiting the promise that he may visit his beloved. Indeed, the preludes to union and the first stages of its fulfillment stir the depths of the heart in a manner quite unlike any other experience.
       I know a man who was sore smitten with desire for a maiden inhabiting a residence close neighboring his own. He could come to her whenever he wished without let or hindrance; but no way was open to him to do more than gaze upon her and converse with her, for hours on end, by night if he liked or by day. At last the fates conspired to secure him some response, and made it possible for him to realize a measure of happiness, and that after he had quite despaired because of the weary time he had been waiting. I remember well how crazy and wellnigh delirious he was with delight; his speech was barely coherent, so overcome was he by joy. I commemorated the scene in the following poem.



Had I wooed half as fervently
God's pardon, as that lovely maid,
My Lord would have forgiven me
However sore I disobeyed.

Prayed I with equal earnestness
The desert lion to assuage
His wrath, as her my suit to bless,
No man need dread his baffled rage.

Long she denied my heart's desire,
Then ah! So ardent kisses pressed
Upon my lips, that all the fire
Of love rekindled in my breast.

So might some traveller athirst
Discovering waters after dearth
Drink, till the great potations burst
His lungs, then lifeless sink to earth.

       I also wrote a second poem on the same subject, beginning in this fashion.



Love fluttered and was gone
Like breath within my bone:
I pricked my eyes to view
Like horse to the hulloo.

I had a mistress fair:
She fled me everywhere,
Yet sometimes stealthily
She gave her lips to me.

I laid my lips on those,
And thought to find repose,
But felt within my breast
New pain and more unrest.

My heart did withered lie
Like herbage parched and dry
Whereon some casual hand
Will toss a flaming brand.

       Later in this effusion the following stanza occurs.



Ha, thou has had thy day,
Proud jewel of Cathay!
My ruby I acclaim,
My Andalusian flame.

       I know of a young slave-girl who was ardently passionate for a certain youth, the son of a noble household, but he was ignorant of her sentiments. Great was her sorrow, and long her despair, so that she pined and wasted away for the love of him. He in all the pride of youthful indifference was quite unconscious of her suffering, which she was prevented from revealing to him by maidenly modesty; for she was a virgin unspotted, and moreover respected him too highly to surprise him with a declaration which for all she knew he might not find to his liking. As time went on, however, and the girl felt more and more certain of the state of her heart, she at last complained of her plight to a sagacious woman who enjoyed her confidence, for she was her old nurse. The latter said to her, " Hint at your feelings to him in verse." The girl did as she was advised, and that time after time; but the youth paid no attention whatsoever. It was not that he lacked intelligence and wit; quite the contrary; but he had no suspicion of her intention, that his imagination should be alert to look for hidden meanings in her words. Finally the girl's endurance was at an end; her emotions were insupportable. One night she w seated with him Me-a-tete; and God knows that he was most chaste and self-disciplined, very far indeed from committing any impropriety. Finding that she could no longer control her feelings, when she stood up to leave him she suddenly turned and kissed him on the mouth, then, without uttering a single word, coquettishly swaying she withdrew. I have tried to picture the scene in a poem.



As she withdrew, the lissom maid,
This way and that she gently swayed
As a narcissus 'neath the trees
Swings on its stem before the breeze.

Deep in his heart the lover hears
The pendants hanging from her ears
Ring out a tender melody
"I love thee dearly: lov'st thou me?"

I pictured in her poise and grace
A dove that goes with perfect pace;
Not over slow he seems to move,
Nor undue hasty, to reprove.

       The young man was stupefied, confused, quite overcome; his heart was deeply stirred; his spirit was overwhelmed by conflicting emotions. Hardly was she out of his sight when he found himself caught in the toils of destruction; his breast was all afire; he sighed and sighed. A multitude of fears assailed him; he was a prey to every apprehension; sleep deserted him, and all through the long night he tossed and turned unable to close his eyes. Such was the beginning of a love between them, which continued many moons, until the cruel hand of separation broke the cords of their perfect union. There you may say was a very Devil's trick, an incitement to passion no man could have withstood, unless he were under the protection of Allah the All-Powerful.
       Some say that union too long enjoyed is fatal to love. That is a vile doctrine, advanced only by those who quickly tire of a sweet romance. On the contrary, the longer the union lasts the firmer the attachment becomes. Speaking for myself, I have never drunk deep of the waters of amorous union without my thirst raging all the more fiercely: such is the predicament of one who seeks to cure himself by applying as remedy the very sickness from which he is suffering the respite is immediate, but soon gone. I have reached, in mastery of those I have loved, the furthest attainable goals, beyond which no man may aim to achieve, and yet I have ever found myself desirous for more. I have enjoyed such exquisite pleasure a long while, and never experienced weariness nor been overtaken by lassitude.
       One day I was seated in close company with a certain person I loved, and wherever I turned my thoughts, speculating on the many varieties of union, I found none that fell not short of my desire; all failed to satisfy my passion; not any accorded me fulfillment of even the least of my dreams. The nearer I approached my goal, the further my goal eluded me: the flintstone of yearning passion kindled the fire of anguish within my breast. I immortalized that interview in the following stanzas.



Come, bring a knife and cleave apart
This solitude within my heart,
Then lay my love within the tear,
And stitch it up with tender care.

And with the morn I pray she shall
Look for no other place to dwell,
But fondly keep this little room
Her own, until the Day of Doom.

Here let her live, so long as I
Draw breath, and when I come to die
My heart for comfort may she crave
In the dark silence of the grave.

       There is no situation in all the world that can compare with the happy state in which a pair o lovers find themselves, when they have none to spy upon them, when they are secure from slanderers and safe from separation, when they have no desire to turn away one from the other, and are far indeed from growing weary, when they are spared the attentions of reprovers, when their natures are perfectly attuned and they love each other with equal ardour, when Allah has bestowed on them abundant subsistence, complete tranquillity, and a season of peace, when their union is lawful, and blessed by Allah's approval, and when their association endures long and unbroken even to the day of death, which day none can thrust away nor escape. But that is a grace none has ever fully enjoyed, a need of the soul not granted to all who seek it. Were it not for the fact that this state is ever accompanied by the dread of sudden destined calamities, ordained in the hidden pandects of Allah, such as parting unpremeditated, or death ravishing the one or the other while yet in the flower of youth-were it not for these and like circumstances I would have said that union such as I have described is a state remote from all misfortune, secure against the intrusion of any catastrophe.
       I have known men who have enjoyed all the aforementioned advantages in full, save that they had the single misfortune to find that the object of their affection was of a froward disposition, and coquettish in the consciousness that she was adored. Their life together was therefore never truly happy; not a day dawned without some dispute flaring up between them. Moreover both partners (as I have observed) suffered from the same defect of character, because each was confident of the other's love: and so they continued, until separation drew nigh to them and they were parted by death, that is the invariable rule of this transient world. I have expressed this matter in verse.



How can I thus unjustly blame
The mischief separation wreaks?
My loved one's ways are all the same
She ever separation seeks.

It would have been sufficient woe
Passion inflicted on my like
How shall I bear this double blow
Passion and separation strike?

       It is related that Ziyad Ibn Abi Sufyan said one day to his courtiers, " What man enjoys the most blissful life? " " The Prince of the Faithful ", they replied. " But what of the trouble he suffers at the hands of the uraish? " " Then thou ", the courtiers suggested. " But what ", said Ziyad, " of the troubles I suffer at the hands of the Kharijis and at the outposts of the empire?" They said, "Then who is that man, 0 Prince? " He answered, " A good Moslem, married to a good Moslem wife, with sufficient means to provide for the two of them, satisfied with her and she with him, not knowing me, and I not knowing him."
       Is there any lovely thing provoking the admiration of all creatures, that gladdens the heart, captivates the senses, charms the soul, dominates the passion, ravishes the reason, and snatches away the mind, comparable with the anxiety of the lover over the beloved? I have witnessed many situations of this sort; and indeed it is a wonderful spectacle, evoking the most tender compassion, especially if the romance be clandestine. If you could see the beloved subtly alluding when she is questioned as to the cause of her being angry with the lover, and his perplexity as he tries to extricate himself from his mishap by offering excuses, and how she willfully misinterprets him, and he contrives to invent some meaning in her words which he can offer to the bystanders-if you could be present at such a scene, you would truly behold a marvel, and a secret delight all other pleasures surpassing. I personally have never witnessed anything that so powerfully stirs the heart, so deeply plunges into its very life, and so subtly penetrates its vital spots.
       Lovers in union have such plausible excuses to offer that baffle the sharpest intellects and defeat the most powerful minds. I have seen this on a number of occasions, and composed this poem to illustrate the point.



If one really tries
Truth to mix with lies,
With the fool the two
Pass for one, and true.

Yet between the twain
Is distinction plain,
And the man of sense
Notes their difference.

Silver fused with gold
Readily is sold
"Pure, without alloy"
To the foolish boy.

But if you prefer,
Try the jeweller
He will tell for sure
Counterfeit from pure.

       I know a boy and a girl who were extremely fond of each other. When intruders were present, they would recline together with one of those large cushions between them against which important personages are invited to rest their backs on the divan. Their heads would meet behind the cushion, and each would be kissing the other without being seen. To all appearances they would be stretched out in this way simply because they were weary. Their equally reciprocated love assumed vast proportions, so that the youth sometimes comported himself with arrogance towards the girl. On this topic I have the following stanzas.



Time's tale is full
Of miracle,
Surprising each
To ear and speech

Mounts that prefer
The boot and spur,
And givers who
Their askers woo.

The captive glowers,
The captor cowers
The slain assails,
The slayer pales.

But ne'er till now
I heard of how
Fond hope may thrill
To yearner's will.

Methinks there is
One rule in this
Objects obey
What agents say!

       I have been told by a woman in whom I have every confidence that she once saw a youth and a maiden, each excessively passionate for the other, who were come together joyously in a certain spot. The youth had in his hand a knife, with which he was cutting some fruit; he pressed with it too hard, and inflicted a light wound on his thumb, which began to bleed. Now the girl was wearing a silk jacket of gold tissue, very costly; she with a quick turn of her hand tore off a strip of the precious material, and bound up the boy's thumb with it. For a lover to act like this is a small matter, compared with his proper obligations; it is a bounden duty, a law requiring his obedience. And indeed how should it be otherwise, seeing that he has devoted his life and bestowed his soul as an offering to the beloved, and how can he refuse anything after yielding these?
       I once knew the daughter of Zakariya' Ibn Yahya al-Taminu, better known as Ibn Bartal; she was the niece of the Chief Justice of Cordova, Muhammad Ibn Yahya, whose brother, the vizier-general, was killed by Ghalib together with two other commanders in the celebrated Battle of the Border (the names of these commanders were Marwan Ibn Ahmad Ibn Shahid, and Yusuf Ibn Sa'id al-'Akki). Now this lady was married to Yahya Ibn Muhammad, whose grandfather was the vizier Yahya Ibn Ishaq; her husband was surprised by death while the couple were still in the bloom of their joy and the flower of their happiness. She was so overcome by grief, that on the night he died she slept with him under a single blanket; so she took her last fond'; farewell of him, and of the union which had brought her so much gladness. Her sorrow did not depart from her thereafter, even up to the day of her death.
       Union surreptitiously snatched, hoodwinking the spies, in which precautions are taken against intruders, such as smothered laughter, admonitory coughing, gesturing with the hands, pressing against one another's sides, touching hands and feet-all this affects the soul most deliciously. I have these verses on the matter.



Secret union yields a pleasure
Far beyond the common measure
From a steady match extracted,
Union openly enacted.

Mingled with its joy delightful
Is a caution truly frightful,
Such as his whose march embraces
Solid rock and sandy places.

       I was told by a comrade, a most trustworthy man who comes from one of the best families, that he was smitten when a boy with a violent passion for a slave-girl attached to a house belonging to his people. He was strictly barred from coming to her, and was at the same time quite crazy for her. " One day ", he told me, "we went on an excursion to one of our estates in the plain to the west of Cordova; one of my uncles was accompanying us. We sauntered through the orchards until we were far away from human habitation, and stretched at our ease by the banks of streams. Suddenly the sky clouded over, and rain began to fall. We had not sufficient coverings with us to protect the whole party; and so my uncle ordered a servant to bring a wrap, threw it over me, and then told the girl to cover herself up with me. Picture me, as you will, enjoying full possession under the very eyes of the multitude, and they entirely unaware! Blissful reunion that was virtually a privacy, happy party that was indistinguishable from a tete-a-fete! By Allah, I have never forgotten that day." I can still see him as he told me the story, laughing in every limb and positively quivering with merriment, despite the long interval, which had passed since the adventure took place. I wrote this stanza to sum up the escapade.



The meadows laughed for joy,
The clouds wept many a tear,
As when a lovesick boy
Beholds his darling near.

       A novel instance of union is well illustrated by a story I was told by one of my friends. He had a passion for a certain girl living in a nearby apartment; between his apartment and hers there was a vantage point from which the one could look out on the other. She used to stand and wait for him in that place, there being some little distance between them, and greet him with her hand wrapped in her blouse. He asked her one-day why she did this, and she replied, " Possibly an inkling may be gained of what we are about, and then some other person may wait for you here instead of me and wave to you; and you might return the greeting, and so our friend's suspicions would be confirmed. So let this be the token between us; if you see a bare hand signalling a greeting in your direction, be sure that it is not my hand, and do not reply."
       Sometimes union is found to be so pleasurable, and the lovers' hearts are in such perfect concord, that they act quite recklessly, paying no heed to any who may Reprove them, taking no care to conceal their attachment from any guardian, and troubling not at all if the talebearer be at work. Indeed in such circumstances a reproach act as a positive incitement.
       I will conclude this chapter by quoting a few verses, which I have composed on the subject of union.



How often I have fluttered round
Love's flame,
And what all moths discover, found
The same!

Again:
The sweet incitements of desire
Would unto Union go,
As nightbound wayfarers aspire
Towards the campfire's glow.

Again:
Oft union with my love assuaged
Love's flames that in my bowels raged,
As dying men by drought accursed
In living waters slake their thirst.

Again:
Fix not thy glance, nor gaze agape
For ever on one lovely shape,
For Beauty is unlimited
Through all the world her boundaries spread.

       Finally I quote an extract from a longer poem.



O is there any who will pay
Blood-wit for him that Love doth slay,
Or their redeeming ransom bring
Whom passion is imprisoning.

Or has my destiny in store
That I may come to her once more,
And live again the day we spent
Beside the stream in merriment?

All day those waters sweet at will
I swam, and yet I thirsted still:
O passing strange, my limbs to drench
Yet not my raging thirst to quench!

Dear mistress, I am wasted so
By Love's consuming pains, that lo,
My sick-bed visitors descry
No sign at all where I may lie.

How then, where others failed indeed
To see a way, did Love succeed
This anguished sufferer to find
Invisible to all mankind?

My doctor, who would cure my ails,
Grows weary of the task, and fails,
While even those who envied me
Feel pity for my malady.


---

---

OF BREAKING OFF


AMONG the misfortunes of Love there is also to be counted Breaking Off. This is of various sorts. The first variety is that breaking off which common caution requires when a spy is present: this is indeed more delicious than any union, and were it not for the fact that the outward meaning of the expression, and the rules of nomenclature, oblige me to introduce it in the present chapter I would have put it off to elsewhere, feeling it to be too sublime to be inscribed here.
       In the circumstances now under discussion you will see the beloved drawing away from the lover, addressing her observations to another person, and employing the most refined allusions, lest her purpose be already suspected and her intentions gravely doubted. You will also see the lover acting in the same way, except that he is more under the influence of his natural instincts, more drawn on by his passion despite himself; and so he appears even while drawing away to be advancing, speaking though ostensibly silent, his eyes turned in one direction and his heart in another.
       The shrewd and intelligent man discovers the inward meaning of the lovers' talk through the exercise of his imaginative faculty, and is therefore aware that the secret intention of their conversation is quite different from its apparent purport, advertisement being not at all the same thing as sober fact. This then makes a Most exciting spectacle, a scene at once stirring and inspiring, arousing the deepest emotions and evoking all the instincts of chivalry.
       Here I should like to quote some verses of mine, which touch on these things a little, even though the actual topics with which they deal are sometimes beside the present point; but I have already bargained with you over this kind of irrelevancy.



Abu 'l-`Abbas insults his name,
But of his nature does not wot:
So might the fish the ostrich blame
For having thirst, which he has not.

Again:
How oft have I obliged a friend,
Not over willing to that end
Nor yet reluctant so to do,
But having other aims in view.

       Here is an extract from a long poem of mine, which comprises a variety of wise aphorisms and rules of natural behaviour.



I keep the joy within my heart
For those I count my friends apart,
And bare my fangs to smile on those
I reckon my especial foes.

The colocynth's disgusting juice
Is taken for its healing use,
And honey pure, although endued
With sweeter properties, eschewed.

So in like case, when need dictates
The very thing my spirit hates
I make it do, and turn my lust
From what I would to what I must.

The jewels hidden in the deeps,
And all the pearls that ocean keeps
In its dark dungeon, none may gain
Except he dive, and dive again.

I strive to drag my soul away
From where its natural instincts lay,
When I am sure another route
Would sooner lead to my pursuit.

So Allah abrogated laws
That served our forefathers, because
His newer revelation brought
Men nearer to the good He sought.

I suit my manners to the crowd
And do the things by them allowed,
While keeping still intact and whole
The pristine virtue of my soul.

So water changes colour to
Accord it with the vessel's hue,
Although its element for sure
Is wonderfully white and pure.

       The following stanza also comes from the same composition.



They fit together, hand in glove,
My faculties, and those I love
By these and those alike live I,
Because of both I fear to die.

       Later in the ballad these verses occur.



I am not one whom cheerfulness
And affability impress,
And neither cold aloofness aught
Determines what is in my thought.

Within my soul I purpose then
To keep my distance from such men,
But outwardly I smile, and bow,
And cry, "Thrice welcome to you now!"

I have observed the fire of war,
That spreads destruction wide and far,
When first its tinder bursts aflame
Seems nothing but a jest, a game.

The speckled serpent looks to be
A beautiful embroidery,
But underneath the woven thread
Dire poison lurks, to strike men dead.

The scimitar's refulgent blade
Is most attractively arrayed,
Yet, flourished by a cunning arm,
Its steel inflicteth mortal harm.

And so I count humility
Renown pre-eminent to be,
When it procureth for a man
Complete fulfillment of his, plan.

The proudest warrior, when he must,
Will rub his forehead in the dust,
That on the morrow he may rise
High-honoured in the sultan's eyes.

Submission leading on to fame
I reckon this a nobler aim
Than too quick glory to attain
With mean abasement in its train.

To oft the overladen board
Has won starvation as reward,
And self-denial sometimes brings
Abundance of delicious things.

No spirit ever tasted fame
That thought humility a shame,
Nor that sweet savour of repose
Which only he who labours knows.

To win to waters far away
When thirsting through the livelong day
Is more delightful and more sweet
Than sitting lazily replete.

      Later still I proceed thus.



All things created, when well viewed,
Some portion manifest of good;
So if the best should be denied,
With what is well be satisfied.

Yet drink not of the muddy stream
Save in extremity extreme,
And when the whole round world contains
No other reservoir but drains.

And never let those lips of thine,
Though parched, approach the brackish brine;
Salt chokes the throat; far seemlier then
Is thirst endured to honest men.

      These two stanzas from the same poem are quotable.



Take of her favours what may be
With ease enjoyed, contenting thee
Thereat, nor striving to attain
What only violence can-gain.

She is not bound to thee by bill
Of sale, to serve thee at thy will,
Nor, if thou win her, shall she prove
Possessed of a fond parent's love.

      Here are another two stanzas.



Despair not ever to arrive
Where far-fetched cunning may contrive
To bring thee: much before thee lies
To win the hard and distant prize.

Trust not the darkness of the night,
For dawn shall soon be breaking bright;
And be not dazzled by the sun
Its orb goes down on everyone.

      Finally I will cite three more stanzas from this same masterpiece.



So persevere with steady force,
For waters flowing on their course
By sheer persistency alone
Wear down at last the granite stone.

Strive on, strive ever; slacken not,
And reckon little all the lot
Thou hast accomplished; drizzle rates
No deluge, yet it penetrates.

The man who trains himself to sup
On poison, finds it fills him up,
And in the end it does him good
As much as any well-tried food.

      Then there is the breaking off which is provoked by coquettishness; it is more delicious than many a union. Consequently it never occurs except when both lovers have complete confidence in one another, and each is firmly convinced of the other's sincere loyalty. It is then that the beloved feigns to shun the lover, in order to prove the lover's patience, and that the sun may not be uninterruptedly shining on their romance. At such a time the lover despairs, if he is the victim of a grand passion, not so much on account of what has already happened, but because he fears that matters may develop and assume graver proportions, the break between himself and his beloved leading on to other ruptures; or he may also be afraid of that other great catastrophe, the beloved's growing weary of the attachment. I myself experienced in my youth a breaking off of this kind, in my relations with a very intimate friend. The rupture soon healed, but then it returned. When this happened frequently, I extemporised a poem as a sort of joke, inserting after each couplet of my original composition a couplet taken from the beginning stanzas of the Suspended Ode of Tarafa Ibn al-'Abd, which I had studied with commentary at the feet of Abu Sa'id al-Fata al Ja`fari, transmitting from Abu Bakr al-Muqri', from Abu Jafar al-Nahhas (God. have mercy on their souls!), in the Cathedral Mosque of Cordova.



I called to mind the love I bore
For her, my heart's adored of yore,
That seems like Khaula's traces now
Wind-swept on Thahmad's rocky brow.

My memory of that firm bond
She pledged with me (and I so fond)
Still lasts as clear as the blue band
Tattooed upon an Arab's hand.

And there I paused, not knowing true
If she would come to me anew,
Yet not despairing, and I wept
Until the morn, nor ever slept.

Then long my kinsfolk chided me
And made reproach abundantly;
"Nay, perish not of grief", they cried,"
But be with courage fortified."

The divers moods and rages of
That fickle lady whom I love
Are like the wrecks of schooners spread
Along Dad's rocky torrent-bed.

Those alternations of repulse
And union, which my heart convulse,
Are as a ship some helmsman veers
To catch the wind, then forward steers.

First she was pleased a little while,
Then turned away in anger vile;
So children playing in the sands
Divide the parcels with their hands.

Her lips were smiling graciously,
But in her heart she raged at me
A double necklace, fashioned with
Gay pearls, and sombre chrysolith.

      Next comes the breaking off which is occasioned by reproach on account of some fault committed by the lover. This situation involves a certain hardship; but the happiness engendered by a restoration of relations, and the joy, which the beloved's renewed approval evokes, counterbalances everything that has passed. The beloved's approval, following upon her anger, affords a delight unequalled by any other pleasure, and moves the spirit to an ecstasy of gladness far exceeding anything that mundane circumstances can occasion. Has any spectator ever witnessed, or any eye beheld, or has it entered into, the thoughts of man to conceive a more delicious and exciting situation than this? The spies have departed; all hateful influences are far away; the slanderers have vanished from the scene. The lover and the beloved are met together again; they have been parted for a time because of some fault committed by the lover, and that breaking off which ensued has lasted a little while; but now there is nothing to prevent them from enjoying a long talk. The lover begins by apologizing humbly, submitting with all diffidence his clear proofs and arguments-either boldly, or with self abasement, professing a shame over what he has done. Now he declares his innocence; now he asks for pardon and begs to be forgiven, confessing to all the faults of which he is accused even though he be entirely faultless. Meanwhile the beloved all the time fixes her eyes on the ground, occasionally stealing a furtive glance at the lover, or sometimes steadily regarding him for a long moment. At last, seeing him smile, she smiles surreptitiously; and that is the sign that she approves and is satisfied. So the atmosphere of the interview brightens up; the clouds of misunderstanding roll away; his excuses are accepted, his argument is admitted. The faults reported by the talebearers are expunged; the last traces of anger disappear. Now her answers are all " Yes ", and " Your fault would be forgiven, even if you really did act so; how much the more, seeing that you are guiltless." They conclude the whole proceedings with union more firmly joined than ever; reproaches are done with; everything is happiness again; and on this charming note they disperse. Such a scene defies description; the tongue is too halting adequately to do justice to the topic.
      I have trodden the carpets of caliphs, and attended the courts of kings, and yet never have I seen reverential awe equal to that which the lover manifests to his beloved. I have observed conquerors triumphing over vanquished princes, viziers exulting in their authority, statesmen rejoicing in their power, and in all this I have beheld nothing to exceed the happiness and hilarity of the lover when he is sure that the beloved's heart is in his keeping, and is confident that she is drawn towards him and loves him truly. I have been present when subjects are excusing themselves before their sovereign, and witnessed how men charged with grave offences comport themselves in the presence of arrogant tyrants, but I have not seen anything more abject than the distracted lover confronting the enraged beloved, transported with anger and mastered by uncompromising fury.
      I have myself experienced both situations. In the first I was; harder than steel, more trenchant than sword, unresponsive to abject humility, unconceding to self-abasement. In the second I was more yielding than a garment, and softer than cotton cloth, making haste to submit myself to the last degree of humiliation if it should profit me, eager to seize every opportunity of prostrating myself if that should be of avail, caressing with my tongue, plunging into every manner of deep and subtle fancy in my exposition, contriving all the tricks of eloquence, in short attempting every means of winning the beloved's favour again.
      False accusation is one of the familiar features of breaking off, and this may occur both at the beginning and at the end of a love affair. In the former case it is a sign of true affection, whereas in the latter it indicates that the passion has cooled off, and is the gateway to forgetting.
      In this connexion I recall that one day I was passing by the cemetery of Bab `Amir in Cordova, with a crowd of students and Traditionists; we were on our way to the class of Shaikh, Abu 'l-Qasim `Abd al-Rahman Ibn Abi Yazid al-Misri my revered teacher, in Rusafa, and with us was Abu Bakr `Abd al-Rahman Ibn Sulaiman al-Balawi of Ceuta, a most talented poet. He was reciting some verses of his own composition, describing a certain known person given to making false accusations. This was what he was saying.



He hastens down his primrose way,
Regardless what ahead may lie;
He hurries swiftly to unfray
Love's cords that took so long to tie.

A weary labour it will be
To patch affection's cloak anew,
If, fast as I am patching, he
Makes speed to rip the cloth in two.

      The recitation of the first of these two stanzas coincided with the arrival on the scene of Abu `Ali al-Husain Ibn `Ali al-Fasi (God have mercy upon him!), who was also on his way to Ibn Abi Yazid's lecture. Hearing the verses, he smiled in our direction and joined us as he went along, remarking, " Nay, rather to knot Love's cords, God willing, for that would be more becoming! " This Abu 1-Husain said despite his gravity, his virtue, his saintliness, his innocence, his piety, his self-denial and his learning. Thereupon I composed the following lines.



Give up thy purposeful intent
The cords of my fond love to rend,
O cruel tyrant, and relent,
Our union's broken threads to mend.

Thou shalt assuredly return,
Whether thou wishest it or no;
Spite thy unwillingness to learn,
The prudent lawyer tells us so.

      Sometimes breaking off is accompanied by reproaches; and by my life, that is a delicious situation provided it does not go too far. But if it assumes momentous proportions, then the omens are far from happy; it is a most unhealthy symptom, presaging evil to follow. In brief, it is the carrier of separation, the forerunner of severance, the consequence of false accusations, the prelude to troublesomeness, the messenger of dismissal, the provoker of hatred, and the vanguard of aversion. It is only to be approved when it comes in a gentle form, and springs out of tender anxiety. I have these verses on the subject.



When thou hast blamed me, it may be
Thou wilt be generous to me,
Forgiving all that thou didst, blame,
And adding blessings on my name.

How often has a day begun
(As we have seen) with shining sun,
Yet, ere the afternoon was o'er,
We heard the dreadful thunders roar.

And then again the weather cleared,
The clouds dispersed, the sun appeared;
And so, by that analogy,
I hope once more to look on thee!

      I was inspired to compose- the above poem by some reproaches of which I was the target, upon just such a spring day as I have described; I wrote them that very time.
      Once I had two friends who were brothers. The went away on a journey, and when they returned was suffering from ophthalmia. They were remiss in visiting me, and so I wrote to them in rhyme, m communication being addressed to the elder. Permit me to quote from this letter.



And I was telling to
Thy brother o'er and o'er
Things whose recitals do
Distress the hearer sore.

But if the clouds outspread
Obscure the sun at noon,
What is there to be said
About the rising moon?

      Then there is the breaking off which is the result of the slanderers' activities. I have already spoken about these gentry earlier in this essay, and the foul infection spread by their poisonous tongues. This may often lead to a final rupture.
      Next I must speak of that breaking off which is caused by weariness. To grow tired of a thing is an inborn human characteristic: a man afflicted by this failing deserves all the more not to receive the sincere and undiluted affection of any friend, and that none should engage himself to him in true brotherhood. For he is not constant in any covenant; he perseveres in no association; the succour he may render to the lover is of but brief duration; neither his love nor his hatred is to be trusted. The best way with such a man is not to attach him to oneself, and rather to flee from his company and his society, for one will never derive any advantage from his friendship. It is for this reason that we have excluded this quality from our analysis of lovers, and put it in the category of the beloved's attributes; for the latter are in general apt to level false accusations, to entertain dark suspicions, o address themselves to rupturing relations. The person who decks himself out with the name of love, and is easily wearied, is no true lover at all: it is right that the very taste of him should be shunned, and that he be banished from the roll of lovers, and never admitted into their society. I never saw any man so completely dominated by this quality as Abu 'Amir Muhammad Ibn 'Amir (God-have mercy upon him'!). If anyone had described to me a fraction of what I knew of him, I would never have believed him. People of such a temperament are the quickest of beings to fall in love, and the least patient with those they love, also with those they detest vice versa. They change as rapidly from adoration as they gallop into it. So never put your trust in anyone who is given to weariness, neither occupy your thoughts with him; entertain no false hopes that he will be faithful to you, and if you are constrained by necessity to love him, know him for what he is, a creature of passing fancies, and adapt yourself to suit his varying moods as you observe him to change from moment to moment, conforming in general with all his fickle whims.
      Abu 'Amir, whose name I have just mentioned, whenever he clapped his eyes on a slave-girl could scarcely restrain his impatience; he was so overcome by anxiety and trepidation that he wellnigh expired, until at last he possessed her, even if a veritable forest of tragacanth bushes stood between him and his object. Yet as soon as he was certain that she was his for the having, love turned to revulsion, intimacy to aversion, agitation to be with her into agitation to be without her, longing to have her into longing to be rid of her. So he would sell her at the most ridiculous price. Such was his wont, so that he squandered in this way many tens of thousands of gold dinars. Yet for all that, God bless him, he was a man of culture, intelligent, sagacious, noble and sweet in his ways; he had a penetrating wit, and was withal a great aristocrat, of highly exalted rank, and enjoyed a position of vast prestige. His handsome features and perfect physique were beyond all definition; the imagination boggles to describe even the least part of his manly beauty, and none could adequately accomplish the task of picturing him as he was. The boulevards of the city were all deserted of promenaders, the whole population being intent to pass the door of his house, which stood in the street running up from the little river, by the gate of my own residence on the eastern side of Cordova, and leading to the avenue adjoining the palace of al-Zahira; his house was in this avenue, quite close to mine. All, as I have said, thronged his door, for no other reason than simply to catch a glimpse of him. Many a slave-girl died of a broken heart on his account; infatuated by his charm, they would deck themselves out in all their finery to attract his fancy; but he betrayed their hopes, so that they became the victims b of wasting passion, and were slain by solitude. I knew one of these girls, whose name was `Afra'; she did not trouble to conceal her love for him, in whatever company she found herself, and the tears never dried on her cheeks. She passed from his household to Abu '1-Barakat al-Khaiyali, the prefect of the royal buildings.
      Abu 'Amir told me much about himself, including the fact that he was weary among other things of his own name! As for his friends, he changed them frequently during his brief lifetime. Like the finch, he never remained constant to the same fashion long; sometimes he would dress in the robes of a king, tunes he got himself up like an assassin
      It behoves any man who has the misfortune to be mixed up with someone of this description, not to expend all his energies in loving him; rather should he set up despair, which he might well entertain regarding the constancy of his companion's affections, as an adversary to do battle against his heart's inclinations. As soon as the first signs of weariness on his part exhibit themselves to him, he must avoid his company for several days, until his fickle friend's mind livens up again and his ennui departs; then he may safely resume relations with him. In that way the friendship may well endure. I have summed up this counsel in a little poem.



Put not thy hopes in him
Whose love grows quickly dim;
The friend who wearies soon,
His love's a worthless boon.

Then have thou nothing of
A so inconstant love
It is a loan to lack
That must be rendered back.

      Then again there is a variety of breaking off where the initiative is taken by the lover. This happens when the lover observes that the beloved has begun to treat him harshly, and is inclining away from him in favour of another fancy; or when some tedious intruder is always sticking to his side. In such a case the lover sees death standing before him; he gulps the choking draughts of despair; to bite the acid pulp of the colocynth would discomfort him less than to; look upon so hateful a spectacle. So he withdraws from his suit, though his heart is breaking. I have rendered this tragic situation very touchingly in verse.



I shunned the one I love,
Yet not because I hate
O wondrous shunning of
The lover passionate!

But that I cannot bear
To gaze (though I love well)
Upon her features fair,
My traitorous gazelle.

Death is a sweeter prize
Then vainly to desire
Her heart that opens lies
To all who may aspire.

The flames within my breast
Their fiery lances dart;
O strange, the vast unrest
Of my enduring heart!

Yet Allah has allowed
The captive, by His laws,
His secret thoughts to shroud
When in the captor's claws.

This merciful decree
Permits, in mortal fear,
Avowed apostasy
To faithful hearts sincere.

      I will relate an instance of breaking off in its most extraordinary and frightful form. I knew a man whose heart was distraught for one who kept far away from him, fleeing before his passionate advances. My poor friend suffered agonies of his unrequited love for a considerable time then fortune vouchsafed him a remarkable opportunity of attaining union, so that he was within; sight of realizing all his fond hopes. In the moment when he was separated by but a hair's-breadth from the goal of his ambition, the beloved broke off relations once more, and withdrew further than even before from his reach. On that subject I composed the following verses.



I had a pressing need
For Fortune to concede,
That seemed as if it were
Remote as Jupiter.

Dame Fortune so far went
Her rigours to relent
As to display my prize
Before my very eyes.

Then she removed anew
My target out of view,
As if my heart's delight
Had never been in sight.

      I invented a second poem on the same theme.



My hope drew near, till I stretched out
My hand, upon, my hope to lay;
But then my object swerved about
And vanished to the Milky Way.

So suddenly I, who was thus
So certain, fell into despair;
My hope was swept to Sirius
That seemed within my grasping there.

All men had envied my good chance,
And now I envied in my turn;
Desire had cast on me its glance,
Yet I was only left to yearn.

So Fate delights eternally
To vary good with ill surprise
None puts his trust in Destiny
Who is ambitious to be wise.

      Finally there is the breaking off which is the consequence of hatred. Here all fictions go astray, all ruses come to an end; it is the great and final catastrophe. This is the disaster which leaves the reason utterly bewildered. He who is smitten by this calamity, let him apply himself to discover what may be his beloved's wishes, and let him endeavour to find out what his darling will approve; he must at all costs avoid whatever he may be aware that the object of his passion abhors. If he conducts himself in this manner, it may be that this will incline her sympathies again towards him, always provided that the beloved knows the value of concord and of striving to attain it. But if she does not know the value of this, then there is no hope of turning her from her hateful attitude; all your good deeds will be crimes in her eyes. If the lover is unable to convert the beloved, then let him resolve upon oblivion; let him examine his soul, and consider the misery and privation it is suffering, and forthwith labour to gratify his desire in whatever manner he can. I have seen- a man in these straits, and wrote a ballad to illustrate his case, beginning as follows.



'Twas my misfortune to adore
One who, if I had chanced to save
Him from sure death that loomed before,
Would cry, "O were I in the grave!"

      Later in the poem these stanzas occur.



'Tis not my fault if, when I drive
My camels to the bubbling spring,
The world's vicissitudes contrive
To vitiate my homecoming.

What just complaint is there to find
Against the sun at noon ablaze,
If feeble eyes are stricken blind
And cannot look upon its rays?

      I also have this trifle.



It is most hateful to avoid
When union has been enjoyed;
But union seems O! divine
After avoidance has been thine.
The one is wealth that visits thee
When thou hast dwelt with poverty,
The other poverty, that on
Great wealth ensues, when it is gone.

      I can quote a longer poem.



They character, I know,
Into two parts doth go,
And Fate through thee doth play
Two separate roles today

Thou art as Nu'man was
In days of old, because
As Arab legend says
He, Nu'man, had two days.

One day was bliss for men,
And all were happy then;
But one was full of hate
And malice desperate.

Thy day of grace and glee
On others dawns, not me;
My day with woe is sent
And bitter banishment.

This troth I love thee by
Does it not qualify
To win, for recompense,
Some slight beneficence?

      Here is a fragment.



O thou in whom, most sweet,
All loveliness doth meet,
Like pearls in order strung
And on a necklace hung:

How comes it, death from thee
Assaults me brutally
By night, when in thy face
Shines forth my star of grace?

      I have a formal ode which begins thus.



Is this sad hour of fond farewell
The Judgment Hour whereof men tell,
This night of parting and of gloom
The vigil of the Day of Doom?

My banishment, is it that woe
Believers for a season know
Who hope to meet their Lord again,
Or infidels' eternal pain?

      Later I proceed as follows.



God ever bless those days gone by,
Those nights we joyed in, thou and I,
Memories that still fragrant are
And fresh as the sweet nenuphar.

The lily's petals are ablaze
With glittering beauty, like our days;
Its center is the night, whose knife
Cuts short our slender thread of life.

We passed our days and nights away
In heedless joy and folly gay,
And so they came, and so they fled,
And we knew not the way they sped.

But presently another time
Succeeded to that age sublime,
Fair promise of fidelity
Belied, alas! by perfidy.

      Further on in the same poem I have these stanzas.



Yet, O my soul, do not despair:
Perchance the times will yet be fair,
And Fortune, who has turned her face
Too long, renew her former grace.

For Allah, the All-Merciful,
Hath given the 0mayyads rule,
And I, like them, may therefore wait
In fortitude for better fate.

      The foregoing verses are extracted from a panegyric which I composed in honour of Abu Bakr Hisham Ibn Muhammad, the brother of the Caliph `Abd al-Rahman al-Murtada, God have mercy on his soul! Allow me to quote further from this masterpiece.



Does not the soul that in us lies
Within its consciousness comprise
Things near and far, although compressed
In the dark dungeon of the breast?

So Time a body is, and he
Time's spirit and vitality,
Comprising in his knowledge all
(Prove this, and see!) that may befall.

      Lastly I will cite these two remarkable stanzas.



The nations all their tribute bring
Which he accepts, their gracious King?
And in accepting proves renewed
Regard, requiring gratitude.

So every river in the realm,
Although its waters overwhelm
Its narrow banks, impetuously
Debouches in the boundless sea


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