The Arabian Nights: Tales of 1,001 Nights: Volume 1

by Penguin; Robert Irwin; Malcolm Lyons; Ursula Lyons

  The envier then said: ‘I have something to tell you and this is why I have made the journey to see you. So get up and come with me.’ The other did this and, taking the envier’s hand, he walked to the farthest end of the mosque. ‘Tell the faqirs to go to their rooms,’ said the envier, ‘for I can only speak to you in private where no one can hear us.’ This the envied did, and the faqirs went to their rooms as they were told. The two then walked on a little until they came to the old well and there the envier pushed his victim into it without anyone knowing. He himself then left the mosque and went on his way, thinking that he had killed his former neighbour.

  The well, however, was inhabited by jinn, who caught the falling man and lowered him gently on to the bedrock. They then asked each other whether any of them knew who he was. Most said no, but one of them said: ‘This is the man who fled from his envier and who settled in this city where he founded this mosque. We have listened with delight to his invocations and to his reading of the Quran. The envier travelled to meet him and by a trick threw him down into our midst. But news of him has reached the king, who is intending to visit him tomorrow on the matter of his daughter.’ ‘What is wrong with his daughter?’ asked one of the jinn. ‘She is possessed by an evil spirit,’ replied the other, ‘for the jinni Marwan ibn Damdam is in love with her. If this man knew how to treat her, he could cure her, for the treatment is the easiest possible.’ ‘What is it?’ asked the other. ‘The black cat that he has with him in the mosque has a white spot as big as a dirham at the end of its tail. If he takes seven of its white hairs and uses them to fumigate the girl, the evil spirit will leave her head and never return and she will be cured there and then.’

  The man was listening to all this, and so it was that the next morning, when dawn broke and the faqirs came, they found the shaikh rising out of the well, and as a result he became a figure of awe to them. Since he had no other medicines, he took seven hairs from the white spot at the end of the black cat’s tail and carried them away with him. The sun had scarcely risen when the king arrived with his escort and his great officers of state. He told his men to wait and went in to visit the shaikh, who welcomed him warmly and said: ‘Shall I tell you why you have come to me?’ ‘Please do,’ replied the king. The man said: ‘You have come to visit me in order to ask me about your daughter.’ ‘That is true, good shaikh,’ the king agreed. ‘Send someone to fetch her,’ said the man, ‘and I hope, if God Almighty wills it, that she will be cured immediately.’ The king gladly sent for his daughter, who was brought tied up and manacled. The man sat her down and spread a curtain over her, after which he produced the seven cat hairs and used them to fumigate her. The evil spirit that was in her head cried out and left. She then recovered her senses, covered her face and said: ‘What is all this? Who has brought me here?’

  The joy that the king felt was not to be surpassed. He kissed his daughter’s eyes and then the hands of the shaikh, after which he turned to his state officials and said: ‘What do you say? What does the man who cured my daughter deserve?’ ‘He should marry her,’ they said. ‘You are right,’ said the king, and he married the man to his daughter, making him his son-in-law. Shortly afterwards, the vizier died and when the king asked who should replace him, the courtiers said: ‘Your son-in-law.’ So he was appointed vizier and when, soon after that, the king himself died and people asked who should be made king, the answer was: ‘The vizier.’ Accordingly he was enthroned and ruled as king.

  One day, as he was riding out, the envier happened to be passing by and saw the man he envied in his imperial state among his emirs, viziers and officers of state. The king’s eye fell on him and, turning to one of his viziers, he said: ‘Bring me that man, but do not alarm him.’ When his envious neighbour was brought to him, he said: ‘Give this man a thousand mithqals of gold from my treasury; load twenty camels for him with trade goods, and send a guard with him to escort him to his land.’ Then he took his leave of the man who envied him, turned away from him and did not punish him for what he had done.

  ‘See then, ‘ifrit, how the envied forgave the envious, who had started by envying him, then injured him, followed him, and eventually threw him into the well, intending to kill him. His victim did not pay him back for these injuries but forgave and pardoned him.’ At this point, lady, I wept most bitterly before him and recited:

  Forgive those who do wrong, for the wise man

  Forgives wrongdoers for their evil deeds.

  If every fault is mine,

  Every forgiveness should be yours.

  Who hopes that his superior will pardon him

  Has to forgive inferiors their faults.

  The ‘ifrit said: ‘I shall not kill you, but neither shall I forgive you. Instead, I shall cast a spell on you.’ Then he plucked me from the ground and flew up into the air with me until I could see the earth looking like a bowl set in the middle of water. He set me down on a mountain and, taking some earth, he muttered over it, cast a spell and scattered it over me, saying: ‘Leave this shape of yours and become an ape.’ Instantly, I became a hundred-year-old ape, and when I saw myself in this ugly form, I wept over my plight, but I had to endure Time’s tyranny, knowing that no one is Time’s master. After climbing down from the mountain top, I found a wide plain across which I travelled for a month before ending at the shore of the salt sea. I stayed there for some time until suddenly I caught sight of a ship out at sea that was making for the shore with a fair breeze. I hid myself behind a rock and waited until it came by, when I jumped down into it. ‘Remove this ill-omened beast,’ cried one of the merchants on board. ‘Let’s kill it,’ said the captain. ‘I’ll do that with this sword,’ said another. I clung to the hem of the captain’s clothes and wept copious tears.

  The captain now felt pity for me and told the merchants: ‘This ape has taken refuge with me and I have granted it to him. He is now under my protection, so let no one trouble or disturb him.’ He then began to treat me with kindness, and as I could understand whatever he said, I did everything that he wanted and acted as his servant on the ship, so that he became fond of me. The ship had a fair wind for fifty days, after which we anchored by a large city, with a vast population. As soon as we had arrived and the ship had anchored, mamluks sent by the local king came on board. They congratulated the merchants on their safe voyage and passed on further congratulations from the king. Then they said: ‘The king has sent you this scroll of paper, on which each one of you is to write one line. The king’s vizier was a calligrapher and as he is now dead, the king has taken the most solemn of oaths that he will only appoint as his successor someone who can write as well as he did.’

  The merchants were then handed a scroll which was ten cubits long and one cubit in breadth. Every last one of them who knew how to write, did so, and then I, in my ape’s form, snatched the scroll from their hands. They were afraid that I was going to tear it and they tried to stop me, but I gestured to them to tell them I could write, and the captain signalled to them to leave me alone. ‘If he makes a mess of it,’ he said, ‘we can drive him away, but if he can write well, I shall take him as a son, for I have never seen a more intelligent ape.’ Then I took the pen, dipped it in the inkwell and wrote in the ruka‘i script:

  Time has recorded the excellence of the generous

  But up till now your excellence has not been written down.

  May God not orphan all mankind of you,

  Who are the mother and father of every excellence.

  Then I wrote in the raihani script:

  He has a pen that serves every land;

  Its benefits are shared by all mankind.

  The Nile cannot rival the loveliness

  That your five fingers extend to every part.

  Then in the thuluth script I wrote:

  The writer perishes but what he writes

  Remains recorded for all time.

  Write only what you will be pleased to see

  When the Day of Resurrection comes.

>   I then wrote in naskh:

  When we were told you were about to leave,

  As Time’s misfortunes had decreed,

  We brought to the mouths of inkwells with the tongues of pens

  What we complained of in the pain of parting.

  Then I wrote in tumar script:

  No one holds the caliphate for ever:

  If you do not agree, where is the first caliph?

  So plant the shoots of virtuous deeds,

  And when you are deposed, no one will depose them.

  Then I wrote in muhaqqaq script:

  Open the inkwell of grandeur and of blessings;

  Make generosity and liberality your ink.

  When you are able, write down what is good;

  This will be taken as your lineage and that of your pen.

  I then handed over the scroll and, after everyone had written a line, it was taken and presented to the king. When he looked at it, mine was the only script of which he approved and he said to his courtiers: ‘Go to the one who wrote this, mount him on a mule and let a band play as you bring him here. Then dress him in splendid clothes and bring him to me.’ When they heard this, they smiled. The king was angry and exclaimed: ‘Damn you, I give you an order and you laugh at me!’ ‘There is a reason for our laughter,’ they said. ‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘You order us to bring you the writer, but the fact is that this was written by an ape and not a man, and he is with the captain of the ship,’ they told him. ‘Is this true?’ he asked. ‘Yes, your majesty,’ they said.

  The king was both amazed and delighted. He said: ‘I want to buy this ape from the captain,’ and he sent a messenger to the ship, with a mule, a suit of clothes and the band. ‘Dress him in these clothes,’ he said, ‘mount him on the mule and bring him here in a procession.’ His men came to the ship, took me from the captain, dressed me and mounted me on the mule. The people were astonished and the city was turned upside down because of me, as the citizens flocked to look at me. When I was brought before the king, I thrice kissed the ground before him, and when he told me to sit, I squatted on my haunches. Those present were astonished at my good manners and the most astonished of all was the king. He then told the people to disperse, which they did, leaving me with him, his eunuch and a young mamluk.

  At the king’s command, a table was set for me on which was everything that frisks or flies or mates in nests, such as sandgrouse, quails, and all other species of birds. The king gestured to me that I should eat with him, so I got up, kissed the ground in front of him and joined him in the meal. Then, when the table cloth was removed, I washed my hands seven times, took the inkwell and the pen, and wrote these lines:

  Turn aside with the chickens in the spring camp of the saucers

  And weep for the loss of fritters and the partridges.

  Mourn the daughters of the sandgrouse,

  Whom I do not cease to lament,

  Together with fried chickens and the stew.

  Alas for the two sorts of fish served on a twisted loaf.

  How splendid and how tasty was the roasted meat,

  With fat that sank into the vinegar in the pots.

  Whenever hunger shakes me, I spend the night

  Applying myself to a pie, as bracelets glint.

  I am reminded of this merry meal when I eat

  On tables strewn with various brocades.

  Endure, my soul; Time is the lord of wonders.

  One day is straitened, but the next may bring relief.

  I then got up and took my seat some way off. The king looked at what I had written and read it with astonishment. ‘How marvellous!’ he exclaimed. ‘An ape with such eloquence and a master of calligraphy! By God, this is a wonder of wonders.’ Then some special wine was brought in a glass, which he drank before passing it to me. I kissed the ground, drank and then wrote:

  They burned me with fire to make me speak,

  But found I could endure misfortune.

  For this reason, hands have lifted me,

  And I kiss the mouths of lovely girls. *

  I added the lines:

  Dawn has called out to the darkness, so pour me wine

  That leaves the intelligent as a fool.

  It is so delicate and pure that I cannot tell

  Whether it is in the glass or the glass is in it.

  When the king read the lines, he sighed and said: ‘Were a man as cultured as this, he would surpass all the people of his age.’ He then brought out a chessboard and asked whether I would play with him. I nodded yes and came forward to set out the pieces. I played two games with him and beat him, to his bewilderment. Then I took the inkwell and the pen and wrote these lines on the chessboard:

  Two armies fight throughout the day,

  The battle growing fiercer every hour,

  But when night’s darkness covers them,

  Both sleep together in one bed.

  On reading this, the king was moved to wonder, delight and astonishment and told a servant: ‘Go to your mistress, Sitt al-Husn, and tell her that I want her to come here to see this wonderful ape.’ The eunuch went off and came back with the lady. When she saw me, she covered her face and said: ‘Father, how can you think it proper to send for me in order to show me to men?’ ‘Sitt al-Husn,’ he said, ‘there is no one here except for this little mamluk, the eunuch who brought you up, and I, your father. So from whom are you veiling your face?’ She said: ‘This ape is a young man, the son of a king, who has been put under a spell by the ‘ifrit Jirjis, of the stock of Iblis, who killed his own wife, the daughter of King Iftamus, the lord of the Ebony Islands. You think that he is an ape, but in fact he is a wise and intelligent man.’

  The king was astonished by his daughter and he looked at me and said: ‘Is what she says about you true?’ I nodded yes and broke into tears. ‘How did you know that he was under a spell?’ the king asked his daughter. ‘When I was young,’ she replied, ‘I had with me a cunning old woman who had a knowledge of magic, a craft she passed on to me. I remembered what she taught me and have become so skilled in magic that I know a hundred and seventy spells, the least of which could leave the stones of your city behind Mount Qaf and turn it into a deep sea, with its people swimming as fish in the middle of it.’ ‘By my life, daughter,’ said the king, ‘please free this young man so that I can make him my vizier, for he has wit and intelligence.’ ‘Willingly,’ she replied, and taking a knife in her hand, she cut out a circle…

  Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the fourteenth night, SHE CONTINUED:

  I have heard, O auspicious king, that THE DERVISH SAID TO THE LADY OF THE HOUSE:

  The princess took in her hand a knife inscribed with Hebrew characters and with this she cut a circle in the middle of the palace. Over this she wrote names, talismans and spells, and she recited words, some intelligible and some unintelligible. After a time, everything grew dark and the ‘ifrit came down on us in his own shape. His arms were like winnowing forks, his legs like the masts of ships and his eyes like firebrands. We shrank from him in fear, and the princess said: ‘There is no welcome for you,’ at which he turned into a lion and said: ‘Traitress, you have broken the covenant and the oath. Did we not swear that neither of us would oppose the other?’ ‘You accursed ‘ifrit,’ she said, ‘am I bound to one like you?’ ‘Take what comes to you,’ said the ‘ifrit, and in his lion shape he opened its mouth and sprang at the girl. She quickly took one of her hairs, shook it in her hand and muttered a spell, so that the hair became a sharp sword. With this she struck a blow at the lion which cut it in two, but its head turned into a scorpion. For her part, the princess turned into a huge snake which attacked the damned ‘ifrit in his scorpion form. There was a fierce fight, and the scorpion turned into an eagle while the snake became a vulture. For some time the vulture pursued the eagle until it turned into a black cat. The princess then became a brindled wolf and for a time the two creatures fought together
in the palace. Then the cat, finding itself beaten, became a large red pomegranate in the middle of the palace fountain. When the wolf came up to it, it rose in the air and fell on the palace floor where it burst, its seeds scattered, each in a different place, until they covered the floor. A shiver ran through the wolf and it became a cock, which started to pick the seeds so as not to leave a single one, but, as was fated, one of them was hidden by the side of the fountain.

  The cock then started to crow and to flap its wings, gesturing to us with its beak. We could not understand what it meant and it crowed so loudly that we thought that the palace had fallen in on us. Then it went all around the floor until it saw the grain concealed beside the fountain. It pounced on this to peck it up, but the grain slipped into the middle of the water in the fountain and became a fish which dived down to the bottom. The cock turned into a bigger fish and went down after it. This second fish vanished from sight for some time and then suddenly we heard a loud cry and a scream, which made us shudder. Then out came the ‘ifrit like a firebrand, with fire coming from his open mouth and fire and smoke from his eyes and nose. He was followed by the princess in the form of a huge burning coal and the two fought for a time until both were covered by thick flames and the palace was choked with smoke. We were terrified and were about to plunge into the water, fearing we might be burned to death. The king recited the formula: ‘There is no might and no power except with God, the Exalted, the Omnipotent. We belong to God and to Him do we return.’ He added: ‘I wish that I had not forced her to do this in order to rescue this ape, placing so huge a burden on her to confront this damned ‘ifrit, who cannot be matched by all the ‘ifrits to be found in the world. I wish that I had never known this ape – may God give him no blessing now or ever. I had wanted to do him a favour for God’s sake and to free him from his spell, but my heart has been weighed down by misfortune.’