XXXI. The Maqáma of the Spindle
XXXI. THE MAQAMA OF THE SPINDLE
‘ÍSÁ IBN HISHÁM related to us and said: I entered Baṣra when I was wide of fame and abundant of reputation, and there came to me two young men. One of them said: 'May God strengthen the Shaikh! this youth entered our house and seized a kitten 4 with vertigo in its head, with the sacred cord 5 and a whirling sphere around its middle. Gentle of voice, if it cries; quick to return, if it flees; long of skirt, if it pulls; slender of
waist, weak of chest, 1 of the size of a plump sheep. Staying in the town, yet not abandoning travel. If it be given a thing, it returns it. If it be tasked with a journey, it goes energetically, and, if it is made to draw the rope, it lengthens it. There it is, bone and wood. It contains property, immoveable and moveable, a past and a future. 2 Said the young man: 'Yes, may God strengthen the Shaikh! for he forcibly took from me:--
'Pointed is his spearhead, 3 sharp are his teeth,
His progeny are his helpers, dissolving union is his business.
He assails his master, clinging to his moustache;
Inserting his fangs into old and young.
Agreeable, of goodly shape, slim, abstemious.
A shooter, with shafts abundant, around the beard and the moustache.'
So I said to the first: 'Give him back the comb in order that he may return to thee the spindle.'
Footnotes
- 128:4
… A kitten: The commentator does not consider that … arabicized from the Persian … partridge, makes good sense and says that the text is corrupt. He suggests that the correct word is … from the Persian … a furred animal and, as the context shows, a kitten. I think his view is correct. If we accept as the arabicized form of … the slight error in pointing is the kind of one a copyist might easily make.
- 128:5
- 129:1
- 129:2
- 129:3