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I said unto the rose, ‘What ails thy thorns to be So swift to wound and hurt all those that touch thy charms?’
It answered, ‘All the flowers my soldiers are, in sooth, And I their Sultan am and these my thorns my arms.’
And he gave an eighth a bunch and he recited the following:
God watch o’er a rose that’s grown yellow and bright, Resplendent, pure gold as it were to the sight,
And guard the fair boughs that have borne it, to boot, With the mock yellow suns of its flowerage bedight!
Then he gave a bunch to a ninth and he recited these verses:
The yellow roses stir to gladness uncontrolled The heart of every slave of passion, young or old.
A shrub that, strange to say, is water given to drink Of silver and for fruit, bears vegetable gold!
Then he gave a bunch of roses to the tenth and last and he recited the following verses:
Seest not the hosts of the rose, in raiment red And yellow that glitter from out their blossoming-stead?
I liken the yellow rose, with its thorn therein, To an emerald lance, through a golden target sped.
Then the gardener brought the wine-service and setting it before them, on a tray of porcelain sprayed with red gold, recited the following verses:
Dawn heraldeth the light; so pour me out, I pray, Of wine, such wine as makes the faintest-hearted gay.
So pure and bright it is, that whether wine in cup Or cup in wine be held, i’ faith, ’tis hard to say.
Then he filled and drank and the cup went round, till it came to Noureddin’s turn, whereupon the gardener filled the cup and handed it to him; but he said, ‘I know not this thing nor have I ever drunken thereof, for therein
