5
They set a table down before the boon companions’ eyne, For eating, borne on wroughten feet of gold and silver fine;
The Garden of Eternity[1] it seemed, the which unites All that the soul can weary for of costly meat and wine.
Quoth she, ‘Thou soughtest to drink of our drink; so up and at our meat and drink!’ He could hardly credit his ears and set down forthright at the table; whereupon she bade her nurse[2] give him a cup, that he might drink. Now her slave-girls were called, one Huboub, another Khutoub and the third Sukoub, and she who gave him the cup was Huboub. Presently, the breeze blew [on the lady] and the scarf[3] fell from her head and discovered a fillet of glittering gold, set with pearls and jewels and jacinths; and on her breast was a necklace of all manner gems and precious stones, to which hung a sparrow of red gold, with feet of red coral and bill of white silver and [body] full of aloes and ambergris and odoriferous musk. Then he looked at the breast of her shift and saw thereon the following verse wroughten in red gold:
The fragrance of musk, that breathes from the breasts of the fair, The zephyr borrows, to sweeten the morning air.
Mesrour marvelled at this with an exceeding wonder and was confounded at her charms and amazement got hold upon him. Then said she to him, ‘Begone from us and go about thy business, lest the neighbours hear of us and even us with the lewd.’ ‘By Allah, O my lady,’ replied he, ‘suffer me to enjoy the sight of thy beauty and grace.’ With this she was wroth with him and leaving him, walked in the garden, followed by her maids [Khutoub and Sukoub], whilst Huboub abode by the curtain with
