酷兔英语

章节正文

Allah, he is a pretty fellow!" and at the cry Badr al-Din awoke and

found himself lying at a city gate with a crowd gathered around him.
At this he greatly marveled and asked: "Where am I, O good folk, and

what causeth you thus to gather round me, and what have I had to do
with you?" and they answered: "We found thee lying here asleep

during the call to dawn prayer, and this is all we know of the matter.
But where diddest thou lie last night?" "By Allah, O good people,"

replied he, "I lay last night in Cairo." Said somebody, "Thou hast
surely been eating hashish," and another, "He is a fool," and a third,

"He is a citrouille," and a fourth asked him: "Art thou out of thy
mind? Thou sleepest in Cairo and thou wakest in the morning at the

gate of Damascus city!" Cried he: "By Allah, my good people, one and
all, I lie not to you. Indeed I lay yesternight in the land of Egypt

and yesternoon I was at Bassorah." Quoth one, "Well! well!" and
quoth another, "Ho! ho!" and a third, "So! so!" and a fourth cried,

"This youth is mad, is possessed of the Jinni!" So they clapped
hands at him and said to one another: "Alas, the pity of it for his

youthl By Allah, a madman! And madness is no respecter of persons."
Then said they to him: "Collect thy wits and return to thy reason!

How couldest thou be in Bassorah yesterday and in Cairo yesternight
and withal awake in Damascus this morning?" But he persisted,

"Indeed I was a bridegroom in Cairo last night." "Belike thou hast
been dreaming," rejoined they, "and sawest all this in thy sleep."

So Hasan took thought for a while and said to them: "By Allah, this is
no dream, nor visionlike doth it seem! I certainly was in Cairo, where

they displayed the bride before me, in presence of a third person, the
hunchback groom, who was sitting hard by. By Allah, O my brother, this

be no dream, and if it were a dream, where is the bag of gold I bore
with me, and where are my turban and my robe, and my trousers?"

Then he rose and entered the city, threading its highways and byways
and bazaar streets, and the people pressed upon him and jeered at him,

crying out "Madman! Madman!" till he, beside himself with rage, took
refuge in a cook's shop. Now that cook had been a trifle too

clever- that is, a rogue and thief- but Allah had made him repent and
turn from his evil ways and open a cookshop, and all the people of

Damascus stood in fear of his boldness and his mischief. So when the
crowd saw the youth enter his shop, they dispersed, being afraid of

him, and went their ways. The cook looked at Badr al-Din and, noting
his beauty and loveliness, fell in love with him forthright and

said: "Whence comest thou, O youth? Tell me at once thy tale, for thou
art become dearer to me than my soul." So Hasan recounted to him all

that had befallen him from beginning to end (but in repetition there
is no fruition) and the cook said: "O my lord Badr al-Din, doubtless

thou knowest that this case is wondrous and this story marvelous.
Therefore, O my son, hide what hath betide thee, till Allah dispel

what ills be thine, and tarry with me here the meanwhile, for I have
no child and I will adopt thee." Badr al-Din replied, "Be it as thou

wilt, O my uncle!" Whereupon the cook went to the bazaar and bought
him a fine suit of clothes and made him don it, then fared with him to

the kazi, and formally declared that he was his son. So Badr al-Din
Hasan became known in Damascus city as the cook's son, and he sat with

him in the shop to take the silver, and on this wise he sojourned
there for a time.

Thus far concerning him, but as regards his cousin, the Lady of
Beauty, when morning dawned she awoke and missed Badr al-Din Hasan

from her side; but she thought that he had gone to the privy and she
sat expecting him for an hour or so, when behold, entered her father

Shams al-Din Mohammed, Wazir of Egypt. Now he was disconsolate by
reason of what had befallen him through the Sultan, who had

entreated him harshly and had married his daughter by force to the
lowest of his menials and he too a lump of a groom hunchbacked withal,

and he said to himself, "I will slay this daughter of mine if her
own free she had yielded her person to this accursed carle." So he

came to the door of the bride's private chamber, and said, "Ho! Sitt
al-Husn." She answered him: "Here am I! Here am I! O my lord," and

came out unsteady of pit after the pains and pleasures of the night.
And she kissed his hand, her face showing redoubled brightness and

beauty for having lain in the arms of that gazelle, her cousin.
When her father, the Wazir, saw her in such case, he asked her, "O

thou accursed, art thou rejoicing because of this horse groom?" And
Sitt al-Husn smiled sweetly and answered: "By Allah, don't ridicule

me. Enough of what passed yesterday when folk laughed at me, and
evened me with that groom fellow who is not worthy to bring my

husband's shoes or slippers- nay, who is not worth the paring of my
husband's nails! By the Lord, never in my life have I nighted a

night so sweet as yesternight, so don't mock by reminding me of the
Gobbo." When her parent heard her words he was filled with fury, and

his eyes glared and stared, so that little of them showed save the
whites and he cried: "Fie upon thee! What words are these? 'Twas the

hunchbacked horse groom who passed the night with thee!" "Allah upon
thee," replied the Lady of Beauty, "do not worry me about the

Gobbo- Allah damn his father- and leave jesting with me, for this
groom was only hired for ten dinars and a porringer of meat and he

took his wage and went his way. As for me, I entered the bridal
chamber, where I found my true bridegroom sitting, after the singer

women had displayed me to him- the same who had crossed their hands
with red gold till every pauper that was present waxed wealthy. And

I passed the night on the breast of my bonny man, a most lively
darling, with his black eyes and joined eyebrows."

When her parent heard these words, the light before his face
became night, and he cried out at her, saying: "O thou whore! What

is this thou tellest me? Where be thy wits?" "O my father," she
rejoined, "thou breakest my heart. Enough for thee that thou hast been

so hard upon me! Indeed my husband who took my virginity is but just
now gone to the draught-house, and I feel that I have conceived by

him." The Wazir rose in much marvel and entered the privy, where he
found the hunchbacked horse groom with his head in the hole and his

heels in the air. At this sight he was confounded and said, "This is
none other than he, the rascal hunchback!" So he called to him, "Ho,

Hunchback!" The Gobbo grunted out, "Taghum! Taghum!" thinking it was
the Ifrit spoke to him, so the Wazir shouted at him and said, "Speak

out, or I'll strike off thy pate with this sword." Then quoth the
hunchback, "By Allah, O Sheikh of the Ifrits, ever since thou

settest me in this place I have not lifted my head, so Allah upon
thee, take pity and entreat me kindly!"

When the Wazir heard this he asked: "What is this thou sayest? I'm
the bride's father and no Ifrit." "Enough for thee that thou hast

well-nigh done me die," answered Quasimodo. "Now go thy ways before he
come upon thee who hath served me thus. Could ye not marry me to any

save the ladylove of buffaloes and the beloved of Ifrits? Allah
curse her, and curse him who married me to her and was the cause of

this my case." Then said the Wazir to him, "Up and out of this place!"
"Am I mad," cried the groom, "that I should go with thee without leave

of the Ifrit whose last words to me were: 'When the sun rises, arise
and go thy gait.' So hath the sun risen, or no? For I dare not budge

from this place till then." Asked the Wazir, "Who brought thee
hither?" And he answered, "I came here yesternight for a call of

nature and to do what none can do for me, when lo! a mouse came out of
the water, and squeaked at me and swelled and waxed gross till it

was big as a buffalo, and spoke to me words that entered my ears. Then
he left me here and went away. Allah curse the bride and him who

married me to her!"
The Wazir walked up to him and lifted his head out of the cesspool

hole, and he fared forth running for dear life and hardly crediting
that the sun had risen, and repaired to the Sultan, to whom he told

all that had befallen him with the Ifrit. But the Wazir returned to
the bride's private chamber, sore troubled in spirit about her, and

said to her, "O my daughter, explain this strange matter to me!" Quoth
she: "'Tis simply this. The bridegroom to whom they displayed me

yestereve lay with me all night, and took my virginity, and I am
with child by him. He is my husband, and if thou believe me not, there

are his turban twisted as it was, lying on the settle and his dagger
and his trousers beneath the bed with a something, I wot not what,

wrapped up in them."
When her father heard this, he entered the private chamber and found

the turban which had been left there by Badr al-Din Hasan, his
brother's son, and he took it in hand and turned it over, saying,

"This is the turban worn by Wazirs, save that it is of Mosul stuff."
So he opened it and, finding what seemed to be an amulet sewn up in

the fez, he unsewed the lining and took it out. Then he lifted up
the trousers, wherein was the purse of the thousand gold pieces and

opening that also, found in it a written paper. This he read, and it
was the sale receipt of the Jew in the name of Badr al-Din Hasan son

of Nur al-Din All, the Egyptian, and the thousand dinars were also
there.

No sooner had Shams al-Din read this than he cried out with a loud
cry and fell to the ground fainting, and as soon as he revived and

understood the gist of the matter he marveled and said: "There is no
god but the God, whose All-might is over all things! Knowest thou, O

my daughter, who it was that became the husband of thy virginity?"
"No," answered she, and he said: "Verily he is the son of my

brother, thy cousin, and this thousand dinars is thy dowry. Praise
be to Allah! And would I wot how this matter came about!" Then

opened he the amulet which was sewn up and found therein a paper in
the handwriting of his deceased brother, Nur al-Din the Egyptian,

father of Badr al-Din Hasan. And when he saw the handwriting, he
kissed it again and again, and he wept and wailed over his dead

brother. Then he read the scroll and found in it recorded the dates of
his brother's marriage with the daughter of the Wazir of Bassorah, and

of his going in to her, and her conception, and the birth of Badr
al-Din Hasan, and all his brother's history and doings up to his dying

day.
So he marveled much and shook with joy and, comparing the dates with

his own marriage and going in unto his wife and the birth of his
daughter, Sitt al-Husn, he found that they perfectly agreed. So he

took the document and, repairing with it to the Sultan, acquainted him
with what had passed, from first to last, whereat the King marveled

and commanded the case to be at once recorded. The Wazir abode that
day expecting to see his brother's son, but he came not, and he waited

a second day, a third day, and so on to the seventh day without any
tidings of him. So he said, "By Allah, I will do a deed such as none

hath ever done before me!" And he took reed pen and ink and drew
upon a sheet of paper the plan of the whole house, showing whereabouts

was the private chamber with the curtain in such a place and the
furniture in such another and so on with all that was in the room.

Then he folded up the sketch and, causing all the furniture to be
collected, he took Badr al-Din's garments and the turban and fez and

robe and purse, and carried the whole to his house and locked them up,
against the coming of his nephew, Badr al-Din Hasan, the son of his

lost brother, with an iron padlock on which he set his seal.
As for the Wazir's daughter, when her tale of months was

fulfilled, she bare a son like the full moon, the image of his
father in beauty and loveliness and fair proportions and perfect

grace. They cut his navel string and kohled his eyelids to
strengthen his eyes, and gave him over to the nurses and nursery

governesses, naming him Ajib, the Wonderful. His day was as a month
and his month was as a year, and when seven years had passed over him,

his grandfather sent him to school, enjoining the master to teach
him Koran-reading, and to educate him well. He remained at the

school four years, till he began to bully his schoolfellows and
abuse them and bash them and thrash them and say: "Who among you is

like me? I am the son of the Wazir of Egypt!
At last the boys came in a body to complain to the monitor of what

hard usage they were wont to have from Ajib, and he said to them: "I
will tell you somewhat you may do to him so that he shall leave off

coming to the school, and it is this. When he enters tomorrow, sit
ye down about him and say some one of you to some other: 'By Allah,

none shall play with us at this game except he tell us the names of
his mamma and papa, for he who knows not the names of his mother and

his father is a bastard, a son of adultery, and he shall not play with
us."' When morning dawned, the boys came to school, Ajib being one



文章标签:翻译  译文  翻译文  

章节正文