even as one that is adoring the
shrine; and it was on the sands of the desert she was lying. It chanced
that the Chieftain of a desert tribe passed at midday by the spot, and
seeing the figure of a damsel unshaded' by any shade of tree or herb or
tent-covering, and prostrate on the sands, he reined his steed and leaned
forward to her, and called to her. Then as she answered nothing he
dismounted, and thrust his arm softly beneath her and lifted her gently;
and her swoon had the whiteness of death, so that he thought her dead
verily, and the marvel of her great loveliness in death smote the heart
on his ribs as with a blow, and the powers of life went from him a moment
as he looked on her and the long dark wet lashes that clung to her
colourless face, as at night in groves where the betrothed ones wander,
the slender leaves of the acacia spread darkly over the full moon. And he
cried, ''Tis a loveliness that maketh the soul yearn to the cold bosom of
death, so lovely, exceeding all that liveth, is she!'

After he had contemplated her longwhile, he snatched his sight from her,
and swung her swiftly on the back of his mare, and leaned her on one arm,
and sped westward over the sands of the desert, halting not till he was
in the hum of many tents, and the sun of that day hung a red half-circle
across the sand. He alighted before the tent of his mother, and sent
women in to her. When his mother came forth to the greetings of her son,
he said no word, but pointed to the damsel where he had leaned her at the
threshold of her tent. His mother kissed him on the forehead, and turned
her shoulder to peer upon the damsel. But when she had close view of
Bhanavar, she spat, and scattered her hair, and stamped, and cried aloud,
'Away with her! this slut of darkness! there's poison on her very skirts,
and evil in the look of her.'

Then said he, 'O Rukrooth, my mother! art thou lost to charity and the
uses of kindliness and the laws of hospitality, that thou talkest this of
the damsel, a stranger? Take her now in, and if she be past help, as I
fear; be it thy care to give her decent burial; and if she live, O my
mother, tend her for the love of thy son, and for the love of him be
gentle with her.'

While he spake, Rukrooth his mother knelt over the damsel, as a cat that
sniffeth the suspected dish; and she flashed her eyes back on him,
exclaiming scornfully, 'So art thou befooled, and the poison is already
in thee! But I will not ha