risking herself
longer with me, and after ten thousands and thousands protestations of
mutual love, we parted, perhaps to meet no more.

CHAPTER XXXI

His reflections on the loss of Zeenab--He is suddenly called upon to
exert his skill as a doctor.

As soon as she was gone I sat down on the same spot where we had been
standing, and gave myself up to thought. 'So,' said I to myself, 'so,
this is being two kernels in one almond? Well, if such be the world,
then what I have been taken up with for these two last months is only a
dream. I thought myself a Majnoun, and she a Leilah, and as long as
the sun and moon endured we should go on loving, and getting thin, and
burning like charcoal, and making _kabob_[60] of our hearts. But 'tis
clear that my beard has been laughed at. The Shah came, looked, said two
words, and all was over. Hajji was forgotten in an instant, and Zeenab
took upon herself the airs of royalty.'

I passed a feverish night, and rose early in the morning, full of new
projects. In order to reflect more at my ease, I determined to take a
walk without the city walls, but just as I had stepped from the house,
I met Zeenab mounted on a horse, finely caparisoned, conducted by one of
the royal eunuchs, and escorted by servants making way for her to pass.
I expected, that at the sight of me she would have lifted up the flap
of her veil; but no, she did not even move from her perpendicular on the
saddle, and I walked on, more determined than ever to drive her from
my recollection. But somehow or other, instead of taking my path to the
gate of the city, I followed her, and was led on imperceptibly towards
the king's palace.

Entering the great square, which is situated immediately before the
principal gate, I found it filled with cavalry, passing muster, or the
_soum_, as it is called, before the Shah in person, who was seated in
the upper room over the porch. I lost Zeenab and her conductor in the
crowd, who were permitted to pass, whilst I was kept back by the guards.
The current of my thoughts was soon arrested by the scene carrying
on before me. The troops now under examination consisted of a body of
cavalry under the command of Namerd Khan, the chief executioner, who was
present, dressed in cloth of gold, with the enamelled ornament on his
head glittering in the sun, and mounted upon a superb charger. The
review was quite new to me; and as I gazed upon the horses and the
horsemen, the spears and the