One Thousand and One Nights

by Richard Burton

At length he heard that the Christian army had again taken the field; that the day was fixed for a great and final effort; and that a plain at an inconsiderable distance from his shop was appointed for the scene of action. Sir Isumbras rose before day, buckled on his armour, and mounting a horse which had hitherto been employed in carrying coals, proceeded to the field and took a careful view of the disposition of both armies. When the trumpets gave the signal to charge, he dismounted, fell on his knees, and after a short but fervent prayer to Heaven, again sprang into his saddle and rode into the thickest ranks of the enemy. His uncouth war-horse and awkward armour had scarcely less effect than his wonderful address and courage in attracting the attention of both parties; and when after three desperate charges, his sorry steed was slain under him, one of the Christian chiefs make a powerful effort for his rescue, bore him to a neighbouring eminence, and presented to him a more suitable coat of armour, and a horse more worthy of the heroic rider.

  When he was armed on that stead,

  It is seen where his horse yede,584

  And shall be evermore.

  As sparkle glides off the glede,585

  In that stour he made many bleed,

  And wrought hem wonder sore.

  He rode up into the mountain,

  The soudan soon hath he slain,

  And many that with him were.

  All that day lasted the fight;

  Sir Isumbras, that noble knight,

  Wan the battle there.

  Knights and squires have him sought,

  And before the king him brought;

  Full sore wounded was he.

  They asked what was his name;

  He said, “Sire, a smith’s man;

  What will ye do with me?”

  The Christian king said, than,

  “I trow never smith’s man

  In war was half so wight.”

  “I bid586 you, give me meat and drink

  And what that I will after think,

  Till I have kevered587 my might.”

  The king a great oath sware,

  As soon as he whole were,

  That he would dub him knight.

  In a nunnery they him leaved,

  To heal the wound in his heved,588

  That he took in that fight.

  The nuns of him were full fain,

  For he had the soudan slain,

  And many heathen hounds;

  For his sorrow they gan sore rue;

  Every day they salved him new,

  And stoppčd well his wounds.

  We may fairly presume, without derogating from the merit of the holy sisters or from the virtue of their salves and bandages, that the knight’s recovery was no less accelerated by the pleasure of having chastised the insolent possessor of his wife and the author of his contumelious beating. In a few days his health was restored; and having provided himself with a “scrip and pike” and the other accoutrements of a palmer, he took his leave of the nuns, directed his steps once more to the “Greekish Sea,” and, embarking on board of a vessel which he found ready to sail, speedily arrived at the port of Acre.

  During seven years, which were employed in visiting every part of the Holy Land, the penitent Sir Isumbras led a life of continued labour and mortification: fed during the day by the precarious contributions of the charitable, and sleeping at night in the open air, without any addition to the scanty covering which his pilgrim’s weeds, after seven years service, were able to afford. At length his patience and contrition were rewarded. After a day spent in fruitless applications for a little food,

  Beside the burgh of Jerusalem

  He set him down by a well-stream,

  Sore wepand589 for his sin.

  And as he sat, about midnight,

  There came an angel fair and bright,

  And brought him bread and wine;

  He said, “Palmer, well thou be!

  The King of Heaven greeteth well thee;

  Forgiven is sin thine.”

  Sir Isumbras accepted with pious gratitude the donation of food, by which his strength was instantly restored, and again set out on his travels; but he was still a widower, still deprived of his children, and as poor as ever; nor had his heavenly monitor afforded him any hint for his future guidance. He wandered therefore through the country, without any settled purpose, till he arrived at a “rich burgh,” built round a “fair castle,” the possessor of which, he was told, was a charitable queen, who daily distributed a florin of gold to every poor man who approached her gates, and even condescended to provide food and lodging within her palace for such as were distinguished by superior misery. Sir Isumbras presented himself with the rest; and his emaciated form and squalid garments procured him instant admittance.

  The rich queen in hall was set;

  Knights her served, at hand and feet,

  In rich robes of pall:

  In the floor a cloth was laid;

  “The poor palmer,” the steward said,

  “Shall sit above you all.”

  Meat and drink forth they brought;

  He sat still, and ate right nought,

  But looked about the hall.

  So mickle he saw of game and glee

  (Swiche mirthis he was wont to see)

  The tears he let down fall.

  Conduct so unusual attracted the attention of the whole company, and even of the queen, who, ordering “a chair with a cushion” to be placed near the palmer, took her seat in it, entered into conversation with him on the subject of his long and painful pilgrimage, and was much edified by the moral lessons which he interspersed in his narrative. But no importunity could induce him to taste food: he was sick at heart, and required the aid of solitary meditation to overcome the painful recollections which continually assailed him The queen was more and more astonished, but at length left him to his reflections, after declaring that, “for her lord’s soul, or for his love, if he were still alive,” she was determined to retain the holy palmer in her palace, and to assign him a convenient apartment, together with a servant to attend him.

  An interval of fifteen years, passed in the laborious occupations of blacksmith and pilgrim, may be supposed to have produced a very considerable alteration in the appearance of Sir Isumbras; and even his voice, subdued by disease and penance, may have failed to discover the gallant knight under the disguise which he had so long assumed. But that his wife (for such she was) should have been equally altered by the sole operation of time; that the air and gestures and action of a person once so dear and so familiar to him should have awakened no trace of recollection in the mind of a husband, though in the midst of scenes which painfully recalled the memory of his former splendour, is more extraordinary. Be this as it may, the knight and the queen, though lodged under the same roof and passing much of their time together, continued to bewail the miseries of their protracted widowhood. Sir Isumbras, however, speedily recovered, in the plentiful court of the rich queen, his health and strength, and with these the desire of returning to his former exercises. A tournament was proclaimed; and the lists, which were formed immediately under the windows of the castle, were quickly occupied by a number of Saracen knights, all of whom Sir Isumbras successively overthrew. So dreadful was the stroke of his spear, that many were killed at the first encounter; some escaped with a few broken bones; others were thrown headlong into the castle ditch; but the greater number consulted their safety by a timely flight; while the queen contemplated with pleasure and astonishment the unparalleled exploits of her favourite palmer.

  Then fell it, upon a day,

  The Knight went him for to play,

  As it was ere his kind;

  A fowl’s nest he found on high;

  A red cloth therein he seygh590

  Wavand591 in the wind.

  To the nest he gan win;592

  His own mantle he found therein;

  The gold there gan he find.

  The painful recollection awakened by this discovery weighed heavily on
the soul of Sir Isumbras. He bore the fatal treasure to his chamber, concealed it under his bed, and spent the remainder of the day in tears and lamentations. The images of his lost wife and children now began to haunt him continually; and his altered demeanour attracted the attention and excited the curiosity of the whole court, and even of the queen, who could only learn from the palmer’s attendant that his melancholy seemed to originate in the discovery of something in a bird’s nest. With this strange report she was compelled to be satisfied, till Sir Isumbras, with the hope of dissipating his grief, began to resume his usual exercises in the field; but no sooner had he quitted his chamber than the “squires” by her command broke open the door, discovered the treasure, and hastened with it to the royal apartment. The sight of the gold and the scarlet mantle immediately explained to the queen the whole mystery of the palmer’s behaviour. She burst into tears; kissed with fervent devotion the memorial of her lost husband; fell into a swoon; and on her recovery told the story to her attendants, and enjoined them to go in quest of the palmer, and to bring him at once before her. A short explanation removed her few remaining doubts; she threw herself into the arms of her husband, and the reunion of this long separated couple was immediately followed by the coronation of Sir Isumbras and by a protracted series of festivities.

  The Saracen subjects of the Christian sovereign continued, with unshaken loyalty, to partake of the plentiful entertainments provided for all ranks of people on this solemn occasion; but no sooner had the pious Sir Isumbras signified to them the necessity of their immediate conversion, than his whole “parliament” adopted the resolution of deposing and committing to the flames their newly-acquired sovereign, as soon as they should have obtained the concurrence of the neighbouring princes. Two of these readily joined their forces for the accomplishment of this salutary purpose, and invading the territories of Sir Isumbras with an army of thirty thousand men, sent him, according to usual custom, a solemn defiance. Sir Isumbras boldly answered the defiance, issued the necessary orders, called for his arms, sprang upon his horse, and prepared to march out against the enemy; when he discovered that his subjects had, to a man, abandoned him, and that he must encounter singly the whole host of the invaders.

  Sir Isumbras was bold and keen,

  And took his leave at the queen,

  And sighed wonder sore:

  He said, “Madam, have good day!

  Sickerly, as you I say,

  For now and evermore!”

  “Help me, sir, that I were dight

  In arms, as it were a knight;

  I will with you fare:

  Gif God would us grace send,

  That we may together end,

  Then done were all my care.”

  Soon was the lady dight

  In arms, as it were a knight;

  He gave her spear and shield:

  Again593 thirty thousand Saracens and mo.594

  There came no more but they two,

  When they met in field.

  Never, probably, did a contest take place between such disproportioned forces. Sir Isumbras was rather encumbered than assisted by the presence of his beautiful but feeble helpmate; and the faithful couple were upon the point of being crushed by the charge of the enemy, when three unknown knights suddenly made their appearance, and as suddenly turned the fortune of the day. The first of these was mounted on a lion, the second on a leopard, and the third on a unicorn. The Saracen cavalry, at the first sight of these unexpected antagonists, dispersed in all directions. But flight and resistance were equally hopeless: three and twenty thousand unbelievers were soon laid lifeless on the plain by the talons of the lion and leopard and by the resistless horn of the unicorn, or by the swords of their young and intrepid riders; and the small remnant of the Saracen army who escaped from the general carnage quickly spread, through every corner of the Mohammedan world, the news of this signal and truly miraculous victory.

  Sir Isumbras, who does not seem to have possessed the talent for unravelling mysteries, had never suspected that his three wonderful auxiliaries were his own children, whom Providence had sent to his assistance at the moment of his greatest distress; but he was not the less thankful when informed of the happy termination of all his calamities. The royal family were received in the city with every demonstration of joy by his penitent subjects; whose loyalty had been completely revived by the recent miracle. Magnificent entertainments were provided; after which Sir Isumbras, having easily overrun the territories of his two pagan neighbours, who had been slain in the last battle, proceeded to conquer a third kingdom for his youngest son; and the four monarchs, uniting their efforts for the propagation of the true faith, enjoyed the happiness of witnessing the baptism of all the inhabitants of their respective dominions.

  They lived and died in good intent;

  Unto heaven their souls went,

  When that they dead were.

  Jesu Christ, heaven’s king,

  Give us, aye, his blessing,

  And shield us from care!

  On comparing these several versions it will be seen that, while they differ one from another m some of the details, yet the fundamental outline is identical, with the single exception of the Tibetan story, which, in common with Tibetan tales generally, has departed very considerably from the original. A king, or knight, is suddenly deprived of all his possessions, and with his wife and two children becomes a wanderer on the face of the earth; his wife is forcibly taken from him; he afterwards loses his two sons; he is once more raised to affluence; his sons, having been adopted and educated by a charitable person, enter his service; their mother recognises them through overhearing their conversation; finally husband and wife and children are happily re-united. Such is the general outline of the story, though modifications have been made in the details of the different versions — probably through its being transmitted orally in some instances. Thus in the Arabian story, the king is ruined apparently in consequence of no fault of his own; in the Panjábí version, he relinquishes his wealth to a fakír as a pious action; in the Kashmírí and in the romance of Sir Isumbras, the hero loses his wealth as a punishment for his overweening pride; in the legend of St. Eustache, as in the story of Job, the calamities which overtake the Christian convert are designed by Heaven as a trial of his patience and fortitude; while even in the corrupted Tibetan story the ruin of the monarch is reflected in the destruction of the parents of the heroine by a hurricane. In both the Kashmírí and the Panjábí versions, the father is swallowed by a fish (or an alligator) in re-crossing the river to fetch his second child; in the Tibetan story the wife loses her husband, who is killed by a snake, and having taken one of her children over the river, she is returning for the other when, looking back, she discovers her babe in the jaws of a wolf: both her children perish: in the European versions they are carried off by wild beasts and rescued by strangers — the romance of Sir Isumbras is singular in representing the number of children to be three. Only in the Arabian story do we find the father carrying his wife and children in safety across the stream, and the latter afterwards lost in the forest. The Kashmírí and “Gesta” versions correspond exactly in representing the shipman as seizing the lady because her husband could not pay the passage-money: in the Arabian she is entrapped in the ship, owned by a Magian, on the pretext that there is on board a woman in labour; in Sir Isumbras she is forcibly “bought” by the Soudan. She is locked up in a chest by the Magian; sent to rule his country by the Soudan; respectfully treated by the merchant in the Kashmírí story, and, apparently, also by Kandan in the Panjábí legend; in the story of St. Eustache her persecutor dies and she is living in humble circumstances when discovered by her husband. — I think there is internal evidence, apart from the existence of the Tibetan version, to lead to the conclusion that the story is of Buddhist extraction, and if such be the fact, it furnishes a further example of the indebtedness of Christian hagiology to Buddhist tales and legends.

  AL-MALIK AL-ZAHIR AND THE SIXTEEN CAP
TAINS OF POLICE. — Vol. XII. .

  We must, I think, regard this group of tales as being genuine narratives of the exploits of Egyptian sharpers. From the days of Herodotus to the present time, Egypt has bred the most expert thieves in the world. The policemen don’t generally exhibit much ability for coping with the sharpers whose tricks they so well recount; but indeed our home-grown “bobbies” are not particularly quick-witted.

  THE THIEF’S TALE. — Vol. XII. .

  A parallel to the woman’s trick of shaving off the beards and blackening the faces of the robbers is found in the well-known legend, as told by Herodotus (Euterpe, 121), of the robbery of the treasure-house of Rhampsinitus king of Egypt, where the clever thief, having made the soldiers dead drunk, shaves off the right side of their beards and then decamps with his brother’s headless body.

  THE NINTH CONSTABLE’S STORY. — Vol. XII. .

  The narrow escape of the singing-girl hidden under a pile of halfah grass may be compared with an adventure of a fugitive Mexican prince whose history, as related by Prescott, is as full of romantic daring and hair’s-breadth ‘scapes as that of Scanderbeg or the “Young Chevalier.” This prince had just time to turn the crest of a hill as his enemies were climbing it on the other side, when he fell in with a girl who was reaping chian, a Mexican plant, the seed of which is much used in the drinks of the country. He persuaded her to cover him with the stalks she had been cutting. When his pursuers came up and inquired if she had seen the fugitive, the girl coolly answered that she had, and pointed out a path as the one he had taken.

  THE FIFTEENTH CONSTABLE’S STORY. — Vol. XII. .

  The concluding part of this story differs very materially from that of the Greek legend of Ibycus (fl. B.C. 540), which is thus related in a small MS. collection of Arabian and Persian anecdotes in my possession, done into English from the French:

  It is written in the history of the first kings that in the reign of a Grecian king there lived a philosopher named Ibycus, who surpassed in sagacity all other sages of Greece. Ibycus was once sent by the king to a neighbouring court. On the way he was attacked by robbers who, suspecting him to have much money, formed the design of killing him. “Your object in taking my life,” said Ibycus, “is to obtain my money; I give it up to you, but allow me to live.” The robbers paid no attention to his words, and persisted in their purpose. The wretched Ibycus, in his despair, looked about him to see if any one was coming to his assistance, but no person was in sight. At that very moment a flock of cranes flew overhead. “O cranes!” cried Ibycus, “know that I have been seized in this desert by these wicked men, and I die from their blows. Avenge me, and demand from them my blood.” At these words the robbers burst into laughter: “To take away life from those who have lost their reason,” they observed, “is to add nothing to their hurt.” So saying, they killed Ibycus and divided his money. On receipt of the news that Ibycus had been murdered, the inhabitants of the town were exasperated and felt great sorrow. They caused strict inquiries to be made for the murderers, but they could not be found. After some time the Greeks were celebrating a feast. The inhabitants of the adjoining districts came in crowds to the temples. The murderers of Ibycus also came, and everywhere showed themselves. Meanwhile a flock of cranes appeared in the air and hovered above the people, uttering cries so loud and prolonged that the prayers and ceremonies were interrupted. One of the robbers looked with a smile at his comrades, saying, by way of joke, “These cranes come without doubt to avenge the blood of Ibycus.” Some one of the town, who was near them, heard these words, repeated them to his neighbour, and they together reported them to the king. The robbers were taken, strictly cross-examined, confessed their crime, and suffered for it a just punishment. In this way the cranes inflicted vengeance on the murderers of Ibycus. But we ought to see in this incident a matter which is concealed in it: This philosopher, although apparently addressing his words to the cranes, was really imploring help from their Creator; he hoped, in asking their aid, that He would not suffer his blood to flow unavenged. So God accomplished his hopes, and willed that cranes should be the cause that his death was avenged in order that the sages of the world should learn from it the power and wisdom of the Creator.