I spent the night brooding over the problem and when morning came, I left my house and did the rounds of the orchards, one after the other, without finding any apples in them. Then I met an old gardener and, when I asked him, he told me: ‘There are few or no apples to be found, except in Basra, in the orchard of the Commander of the Faithful, where they are in the charge of his gardener who keeps them for his master.’ I went back home and my love and affection for my wife led me to make myself ready to set out on a journey to Basra. I travelled for fifteen days and nights there and back, bringing my wife three apples which I had bought from the gardener at Basra for one dinar each. I went in and gave them to her, but they gave her no pleasure and she put them aside. Her weakness and fever had grown worse and this went on for ten days, after which she recovered.
I then left my house and went to my shop, where I sat buying and selling. At midday, while I was sitting there, a black slave passed by holding one of those three apples in his hand and playing with it. When I asked him about the apple, pretending that I wanted to get one like it, he laughed and told me that he had got it from his mistress. ‘I had been away,’ he explained, ‘and when I got back, I found her sick. She had three apples with her and she told me that her cuckold of a husband had gone to Basra for them and had bought them for three dinars. It was one of these that I took.’
When I heard what the slave had to say, Commander of the Faithful, the world turned black for me. I got up, closed my shop and returned home, out of my mind with anger. Looking at the apples, I could see only two. ‘Where is the third?’ I asked my wife, and when she said: ‘I don’t know,’ I was certain that the slave had told me the truth, so I picked up a knife, and coming from behind her, without a word I knelt on her breast and slit her throat with the knife. Then I cut off her head and quickly put her in a basket, covering her with a shawl. I wrapped her in a piece of carpet, sewed the whole thing up and put it in a chest, which I locked. I then loaded it on to my mule and threw it with my own hands into the Tigris. In God’s Name, Commander of the Faithful, I implore you to hang me quickly, as I am afraid that my wife will demand restitution from me on the Day of Judgement. For when I had thrown her into the river without anyone knowing what I had done, I went back home and there I found my eldest son in tears, although he did not know what I had done to his mother. When I asked him why he was crying, he told me that he had taken one of his mother’s apples and had gone into the lane to play with his brothers. He said: ‘But a tall black slave snatched it from me and asked me where I had got it. I told him that my father had gone to Basra to bring it for my mother who was sick and that he had bought three apples for three dinars. The slave took the apple and paid no attention to me, even though I told him this a second and a third time, and then he hit me and went off with it. I was afraid that my mother would beat me because of it and so my brothers and I went off out of the city. Evening came and I was still afraid of what she might do to me. For God’s sake, father, don’t say anything to her that may make her ill again.’
When I heard what the boy had to say, I realized that this slave was the one who had made up a lying story to hurt my wife and I was certain that I had killed her unjustly. While I was weeping bitterly, this old man, her father, arrived and, when I told him what had happened, he sat down beside me and wept. We went on weeping until midnight, and for five days until now we have been mourning her and regretting her unjust death. All the blame for this rests on the slave and it is he who is responsible for her death. I implore you, by your ancestors’ honour, to kill me quickly, as there is no life for me now she is dead. So avenge her death on me.
When the caliph heard the young man’s story, he was filled with astonishment and said: ‘By God, I shall hang no one except this damned slave and I shall do a deed which will cure the sick and please the Glorious King.’
Morning now dawned and Shahrazad broke off from what she had been allowed to say. Then, when it was the twentieth night, SHE CONTINUED:
I have heard, O auspicious king, that the caliph swore that he would hang no one but the slave, as what the young man had done was excusable. Then he turned to Ja‘far and said: ‘Fetch me this damned slave who was responsible for all this, and if you fail, you will take his place.’ Ja‘far went away weeping and saying: ‘Twice I have been threatened with death; the pitcher does not always escape unbroken. There is nothing that I can do about this but hope that He who saved me on the first occasion may save me on the second. By God, I shall not leave my house for three days, and the True God will do what He sees fit.’
Accordingly, he stayed inside for three days and on the fourth he brought in the qadis and the notaries and took a tearful farewell of his children. At that moment, a messenger arrived from the caliph, saying: ‘The Commander of the Faithful is furiously angry and has sent for you, saying that before the day is over you will be hanged.’ When Ja‘far heard that, he wept, as did his children, his slaves and his whole household. When he had finished taking leave of the others, he went up to his youngest daughter, whom he loved more than all his other children, to say goodbye to her. He clasped her to his breast, kissed and wept at parting from her. In her pocket he could feel something round and he asked her what it was. ‘An apple, father,’ she told him, ‘inscribed with the name of our lord, the caliph. Our slave Raihan brought it four days ago and would not give it to me until I paid him two dinars.’
When Ja‘far heard about the slave and the apple, he was overjoyed. Putting his hand into his daughter’s pocket, he brought out the apple and recognized it, exclaiming: ‘O God, Whose deliverance is near at hand!’ He then ordered the slave to be brought, and when he had come, Ja‘far asked him where he had got the apple. ‘By God, master,’ he replied, ‘if lies can save a man once, truth can save him twice. I didn’t steal it from your palace, from the imperial palace or from the Commander of the Faithful’s orchard. Five days ago, while I was out walking, I went into a lane in the city where I saw some children playing. One of them had this apple and I snatched it away from him and hit him. He cried and told me that it belonged to his sick mother. “She wanted my father to get her an apple,” he told me, “and my father went to Basra and bought her three of them, for which he paid three dinars. I stole one of the three to play with.” I paid no attention to the child’s tears and took the apple and came here. Then my little mistress paid two gold dinars for it. That is my story.’
When Ja‘far heard this, he was amazed that the mischief involving the death of the girl had been caused by his own slave. He was sorry for his connection with him but delighted at his own escape, reciting these lines:
When a slave brings disaster on you,
Use him as a ransom for your life.
You can get many other slaves,
But you will never find another life.
Grasping the slave by the hand, he brought him to the caliph and told him his story from beginning to end. The caliph was full of astonishment and laughed until he fell over. He ordered that the story should be written down and spread among the people, but Ja‘far said: ‘Do not wonder at this tale for it is not more astonishing than the story of the vizier Nur al-Din ‘Ali, the Egyptian, and Shams al-Din Muhammad, his brother.’ ‘Tell it to me,’ said the caliph, ‘although what can be more wonderful than the story we have just heard?’ ‘I shall not tell it to you,’ said Ja‘far, ‘unless you promise not to execute my slave.’ ‘If it is really more remarkable than what has just happened, I shall grant you his life, but if not, then I shall have him killed.’ JA‘FAR BEGAN:
Know then, Commander of the Faithful, that in the old days there was in Egypt a just and upright sultan who loved the poor and would sit with men of learning. He had an intelligent and experienced vizier, with a knowledge of affairs and of administration. This vizier was a very old man and he had two sons, fair as moons, unequalled in comeliness and beauty. The name of the elder was Shams al-Din Muhammad, while the younger was Nur al-Din ‘Ali. Nur al-Din was more conspicuously
graceful and handsome than his brother, so much so that his fame had spread in other lands, and people came to Egypt to see his beauty.
It then happened that their father died. He was mourned by the sultan, who went to the sons, brought them close to him and gave them robes of honour. ‘Do not be distressed,’ he said, ‘for you will take your father’s place.’ This delighted them and they kissed the ground in front of him. After a month of mourning for their father, they entered into office as joint viziers, sharing between themselves the power that had been in their father’s hands, with one of them accompanying the sultan whenever he went on his travels.
It happened that the sultan was about to leave on a journey in the morning and it was the turn of the elder brother to go with him. On the night before, the two brothers were talking together and the elder said to the younger: ‘Brother, it is my intention that you and I should marry on the same night.’ ‘Do what you want,’ said his brother, ‘for I agree to your suggestion.’ When they had made this agreement, the elder said: ‘If God so decrees, we shall marry two girls and consummate the marriage on one and the same night. Then they will give birth on the same day and, God willing, your wife will produce a boy and mine a girl. We shall then marry them to each other and they will be husband and wife.’ ‘What dowry will you ask from my son for your daughter?’ asked Nur al-Din. ‘I shall take from your son,’ replied Shams al-Din, ‘three thousand dinars, three orchards and three estates. On no other terms will the marriage contract be valid.’
When he heard this, Nur al-Din said: ‘What is this dowry that you want to impose as a condition on my son? Don’t you know that we two are brothers and that both of us, by God’s grace, are joint viziers, equal in rank? You should give your daughter to my son without asking for any dowry at all, and if there must be one, then it should be fixed at something that will merely show people that a payment has been made. You know that the male is better than the female. My son is a male and it is through him and not through your daughter that we shall be remembered.’ ‘What about my daughter, then?’ asked Shams al-Din. ‘It will not be through her that we shall be remembered among the emirs,’ his brother told him, and added: ‘You want to deal with me like the man in the story who approached one of his friends to ask for something. “I swear by the Name of God,” said his friend, “that I shall do what you ask, but tomorrow.” In reply, the other recited:
If favours are put off until next day,
For those who know, that is rejection.’
Shams al-Din said: ‘I see that you are selling me short and making out that your son is better than my daughter. It is clear that you lack intelligence and have no manners. You talk about our shared vizierate, but I only let you share out of pity for you, so that you might help me as an assistant and I might not cause you disappointment. Now, by God, after what you have said, I shall not marry my daughter to your son, even if you were to pay out her weight in gold.’ Nur al-Din was angry when he heard this and said: ‘I’m no longer willing to marry my son to your daughter.’ ‘And I’m not prepared to accept him as a husband for her,’ repeated Shams al-Din, adding: ‘Were I not going off on a journey I would make an example of you, but when I get back, I shall let you see what my honour requires.’
On hearing what his brother had to say, Nur al-Din was beside himself with anger, but he managed to conceal this. The two of them spent the night in separate quarters and in the morning the sultan set out on his journey, going by Giza and making for the Pyramids, accompanied by the vizier Shams al-Din. As for Shams al-Din’s brother, Nur al-Din, after spending the night in a furious rage, he got up and performed the morning prayer. Then he went to his strongroom and, taking out a small pair of saddlebags, he filled them with gold. Remembering his brother’s contemptuous remarks, he started to recite these lines:
Go, and you will replace the one you leave behind;
Work hard, for in this lies life’s pleasure.
The stay-at-home is humble, arriving at no goal
Except distress, so leave your land and go.
I see that water left to stand goes bad;
If it flows, it is sweet, but if not, it is not.
Were the full moon not to wane,
The watcher would not always follow it.
Lions that do not leave their lair will find no prey;
Arrows not shot from bows can strike no target.
Gold dust when in the mine is worth no more than earth,
And aloes wood in its own land is merely used for fires.
When taken from the mine, gold is a precious object of demand,
While elsewhere in the world it is outranked by aloes wood.
When Nur al-Din had finished these lines, he told one of his servants to prepare the official mule with its quilted saddle. This beast, coloured like a starling, had a high, dome-like back; its saddle was of gold and its stirrups of Indian steel; its trappings were like those of the Chosroes; and it looked like a bride unveiled. Nur al-Din ordered that a silk carpet and a prayer rug should be put on it, with the saddlebags being placed under the rug. He then told his servants and slaves that he was going on a pleasure trip outside the city. ‘I shall go towards Qalyub,’ he said, ‘and spend three nights away. None of you are to follow me, for I am feeling depressed.’
He quickly mounted the mule, taking with him only a few provisions, and he then left Cairo, making for open country. By noon he had reached Bilbais, where he dismounted, rested and allowed the mule to rest too. He took and ate some of his provisions, and in Bilbais he bought more food for himself and fodder for his mule. He then set out into the country, and when night fell, he had come to a place called al-Sa‘diya. Here he spent the night, getting out some food, placing the saddlebags beneath his head and spreading out the carpet. He slept there in the desert, still consumed with anger, and after his night’s sleep, he rode off in the morning, urging on his mule until he came to Aleppo. There he stayed for three days in one of the khans, looking around the place at his leisure until both he and the mule were rested. Then he decided to move on and, mounting his mule, he rode out of the city without knowing where he was heading. His journey continued until, without knowing where he was, he reached Basra. He stopped at a khan, unloaded the saddlebags from the mule and spread out the prayer mat. He then handed over the mule with all its gear to the gatekeeper of the khan, asking him to exercise it, which he did.
It happened that the vizier of Basra was sitting at the window of his palace. He looked at the mule with its costly trappings and thought that it might be a ceremonial beast, the mount of viziers or kings. Perplexed by this, he told one of his servants to bring him the gatekeeper of the city. The servant did as he was told, and the gatekeeper came to him and kissed the ground. The vizier, who was a very old man, asked him who the mule’s owner might be and what he was like. ‘Master,’ said the gatekeeper, ‘the owner of this mule is a very young man of the merchant class, impressive and dignified, with elegant manners, the son of a merchant.’ On hearing this, the vizier got up and after riding to the khan, he approached Nur al-Din who, seeing him coming, rose to meet him. He greeted the vizier who, in turn, welcomed him, dismounted from his horse, and embraced him, making him sit beside him. ‘My son,’ he said, ‘where have you come from and what do you want?’ ‘Master,’ replied Nur al-Din, ‘I have come from Cairo. I was the son of a vizier there, but my father moved from this world to the mercy of Almighty God.’ He then told his story from beginning to end, adding: ‘I have made up my mind that I shall never return until I have passed through every city and every land.’ ‘My son,’ said the vizier when he heard this, ‘do not obey the promptings of pride or you will destroy yourself. The lands are desolate and I am afraid lest Time bring misfortunes on you.’
He then had Nur al-Din’s saddlebags placed on the mule and, taking the carpet and the prayer mat, he brought him to his house where he lodged him in elegant quarters and showed him honour, kindness and much affection. ‘My boy,’ he said to him, �
��I am an old man and I have no son, but God has provided me with a daughter who is your match in beauty and whose hand I have refused to many suitors. I have conceived love for you in my heart and so I ask whether you would be willing to take her to serve you, while you become her husband. If you accept, I shall bring you to the sultan of Basra and tell him that you are the son of my brother, and I shall get him to appoint you as his vizier in my place. I shall then stay at home, for I am an old man.’
When Nur al-Din heard what he had to say, he bowed his head and said: ‘To hear is to obey.’ The vizier was delighted and he told his servants to set out food and to decorate the main reception hall where the weddings of the emirs were held. He collected his friends and invited the great officials of state together with the merchants of Basra. When they came, he told them: ‘I had a brother, the vizier of Egypt. God provided him with two sons, while, as you know, He gave me a daughter. My brother had enjoined me to marry her to one of his sons. I agreed to this, and when the appropriate time for marriage came, he sent me one of his sons – this young man who is here with us. Now that he has arrived, I want to draw up the marriage contract between him and my daughter that the marriage may be consummated here, for he has a greater right to her hand than a stranger. After that, if he wants he can stay here, or if he prefers to leave, I shall send him and his wife off to his father.’
Everyone there approved of the plan and, looking at Nur al-Din, they admired what they saw. The vizier then brought in the qadis and the notaries, who drew up the contract. Incense was scattered, sugared drinks served and rosewater sprinkled, after which the guests left. The vizier then told his servants to take Nur al-Din to the baths. He gave him a special robe of his own and sent him towels, bowls and censers, together with everything else that he might need. When he left the baths wearing the robes, he was like the moon when it is full on the fourteenth night. He mounted his mule and rode on until he reached the vizier’s palace, where he dismounted. Entering the vizier’s presence, he kissed his hand and was welcomed…
The Arabian Nights: Tales of 1,001 Nights: Volume 1 Page 19