r and through to a passage and a vault
hung with black, wherein were two corpses, one in a tomb and one
unburied, and we slew them there, clasping each other, O King of the
age!'

Mashalleed gazed upon the head of Bhanavar and sighed, for death had made
the head again fair with a wondrous beauty, a loveliness never before
seen on earth.

THE BETROTHAL

Now, when Shibli Bagarag had ceased speaking, the Vizier smiled gravely,
and shook his beard with satisfaction, and said to the Eclipser of
Reason, 'What opinest thou of this nephew of the barber, O Noorna bin
Noorka?'

She answered, "O Feshnavat, my father, truly I am content with the
bargain of my betrothal. He, Wullahy, is a fair youth of flowing speech.'
Then she said, 'Ask thou him what he opineth of me, his betrothed?"

So the Vizier put that interrogation to Shibli Bagarag, and the youth was
in perplexity; thinking, 'Is it possible to be joyful in the embrace of
one that hath brought thwackings upon us, serious blows?' Thinking, 'Yet
hath she, when the mood cometh, kindly looks; and I marked her eye
dwelling on me admiringly!' And he thought, 'Mayhap she that groweth
younger and counteth nature backwards, hath a history that would affect
me; or, it may be, my kisses--wah! I like not to give them, and it is
said,

"Love is wither'd by the withered lip";

and that,

"On bones become too prominent he'll trip."

Yet put the case, that my kisses--I shower them not, Allah the All-seeing
is my witness! and they be given daintily as 'twere to the leaf of a
nettle, or over-hot pilau. Yet haply kisses repeated might restore her to
a bloom, and it is certain youth is somehow stolen from her, if the
Vizier Feshnavat went before her, and his blood be her blood; and he is
powerful, she wise. I'll decide to act the part of a rejoicer, and
express of her opinions honeyed to the soul of that sex.'

Now, while he was thus debating he hung his head, and the Vizier awaited
his response, knitting his brows angrily at the delay, and at the last he
cried, 'What! no answer? how 's this? Shall thy like dare hold debate
when questioned of my like? And is my daughter Noorna bin Noorka,
thinkest thou, a slave-girl in the market,--thou haggling at her price, O
thou nephew of the barber?'

So Shibli Bagarag exclaimed, 'O exalted one, bestower of the bride!
surely I debated with myself but for appropriate terms; and I delayed to
select the metre of the verse fittin