酷兔英语

章节正文
文章总共2页
accursed who cozeneth the servants of Allah Almighty!" Then, looking



at the lad, he exclaimed: "O my son, verily yon tricksy Jew hath

cheated thee and laughed at thee, this platter being pure silver and



virginal. I have weighed it and found it worth seventy dinars, and, if

thou please to take its value,-take it." Thereupon the Sheikh



counted out to him seventy gold pieces, which he accepted, and

presently thanked him for his kindness in exposing the Jew's



rascality.

And after this, whenever the price of a platter was expended, he



would bring another, and on such wise he and his mother were soon in

better circumstances. Yet they ceased not to live after their olden



fashion as middle-class folk, without spending on diet overmuch or

squandering money. But Aladdin had now thrown off the ungraciousness



of his boyhood. He shunned the society of scapegraces and he began

to frequent good men and true, repairing daily to the market street of



the merchants and there companying with the great and small of them,

asking about matters of merchandise and learning the price of



investments and so forth. He likewisefrequented the bazaars of the

goldsmiths and the jewelers, where he would sit and divert himself



by inspecting their precious stones and by noting how jewels were sold

and bought therein. Accordingly, he presently became ware that the



tree truits wherewith he had filled his pockets what time he entered

the enchanged treasury were neither glass nor crystal, but gems rich



and rare, and he understood that he had acquired immensewealth such

as the kings never can possess. He then considered all the precious



stones which were in the jewelers' quarter, but found that their

biggest was not worth his smallest.



On this wise he ceased not every day repairing to the bazaar and

making himself familiar with the folk and winning their loving will,



and inquiring anent selling and buying, giving and taking, the dear

and the cheap, until one day of the days when, after rising at dawn



and donning his dress he went forth, as was his wont, to the jewelers'

bazaar and as he passed along it he heard the crier crying as follows:



"By command of our magnificent master, the King of the Time and the

Lord of the Age and the Tide, let all the folk lock up their shops and



stores and retire within their houses, for that the Lady Badr

al-Budur, daughter of the Sultan, designeth to visit the hammam. And



whoso gainsayeth the order shall be punished with death penalty, and

be his blood upon his own neck!" But when Aladdin heard the



proclamation, he longed to look upon the King's daughter and said in

his mind, "Indeed all the lieges talk of her beauty and loveliness,



and the end of my desires is to see her." Then Aladdin fell to

contriving some means whereby he might look upon the Princess Badr



al-Budur, and at last judged best to take his station behind the

hammam door, whence he might see her face as she entered. Accordingly,



without stay or delay he repaired to the baths before she was expected

and stood a-rear of the entrance, a place whereat none of the folk



happened to be looking.

Now when the Sultan's daughter had gone the rounds of the city and



its main streets and had solaced herself by sight-seeing, she

finally reached the hammam, and whilst entering she raised her veil



and Aladdin saw her favor, he said: "In very truth her fashion

magnifieth her Almighty Fashioner, and glory be to Him Who created her



and adorned her with this beauty and loveliness." His strength was

struck down from the moment he saw her and his thoughts were



distraught. His gaze was dazed, the love of her gat hold of the

whole of his heart, and when he returned home to his mother, he was as



one in ecstasy. His parent addressed him, but he neither replied nor

denied, and, when she set before him the morning meal he continued



in like case, so quoth she: "O my son, what is't may have befallen

thee? Say me, doth aught ail thee? Let me know what ill hath betided



thee, for, unlike thy custom, thou speakest not when I bespeak

thee." Thereupon Aladdin (who used to think that all women resembled



his mother and who, albeit he had heard of the charms of Badr

al-Budur, daughter of the Sultan, yet knew not what "beauty" and



"loveliness" might signify) turned to his parent and exclaimed, "Let

me be!" However, she persisted in praying him to come forward and eat,



so he did her bidding, but hardly touched food. After which he lay

at full length on his bed all the night through in cogitation deep



until morning morrowed.

The same was his condition during the next day, when his mother



was perplexed for the case of her son and unable to learn what had

happened to him. So, thinking that belike he might be ailing, she drew






文章总共2页
文章标签:翻译  译文  翻译文  

章节正文