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THE TARJUilAX AL-ASHWAQ (ll) 49

II
. 1. On tlie day of parting they did not saddle the full-grown
reddish-white camels until they had mounted the
psacocks upon them,
2. Peacocks with murderous glances and sovereign power:
thou wouldst fancy that each of them was a Bilqis on
her throne of pearls.
3. When she walks on the glass pavement^ thou seest a sun
on a celestial sphere in the bosom of Idris.
4. When she kills with her glances, her speech restores to
life, as tho’ she, in giving life thereby', were Jesus.
5. The smooth surface of her legs is (like) the Tora in
brightness, and I follow it and tread in its footsteps
as tho’ I were Moses.
0. She is a bishopess, one of the daughters of Rome, un­
adorned : thou seest in her a radiant Goodness.-
7. Wild is she, none can make her his friend; she has
gotten in her solitary chamber a mausoleum for
remembrance.
8. She has baffled everyone who is learned in our religion,
every student of the Psalms of David, every Jewish
doctor, and every Christian priest.
9. If with a gesture she demands .the Gospel, thou wouldst
deem us to be priests and patriarchs and deacons.
10. The day when they departed on the road, I prepared
for war the armies of mj'^ patience, host after liost.
11. When my soul reached the throat (i.e. when I was at
12. And she yielded—may God preserve us from her evil,
the point of death), I besought that Beauty and that
Grace to grant me relief,

and may the victorious king repel Iblis!
13- I exclaimed, when her she-camel set out to depart,
‘ O driver of the reddish-white camels, do not drive
them away with her ! ’

Kor. xxvii, 44.
The author explains tliat is equivalent to