’Ramazan I ne’er fasted in life-time; nay * I ate flesh in public
     at undurn day;[FN#105]
Nor chide I the fair, save in way of love, * Nor seek Meccah’s
     plain[FN#106] in salvation-way: 
Nor stand I praying like rest who cry * ’Hie
     salvationwards’[FN#107] at the dawn’s first ray. 
But I drink her cooled[FN#108] by fresh Northern breeze * And my
     head at dawn to her prone I lay.’[FN#109]

“By Allah, he treadeth no carpet of mine! who is at the door, other than he?” Said Adi, “Jarir ibn al-Khatafah”; and Omar cried, “’Tis he who saith,

’But for ill-spying glances had our eyes espied * Eyne of the
     antelope and ringlets of the Reems.[FN#110]
A huntress of the eyes[FN#111] by night-tide came and I * Cried,
     ‘Turn in peace, no time for visit this, meseems!’

“An it must be and no help, admit Jarir.”  So Adi went forth and admitted Jarir, who entered, saying.

“Yea, he who sent Mohammed unto man, * A just successor for
     Imam[FN#112] assigned. 
His ruth and justice all mankind embrace, * To daunt the bad and
     stablish well-designed. 
Verily now I look to present good, * For man hath ever-transient
     weal in mind.”

Quoth Omar, “O Jarir, keep the fear of Allah before thine eyes and say naught save the sooth.”  And Jarir recited these couplets,

“How many widows loose the hair in far Yamamah-land[FN#113] * How
     many an orphan there abides feeble of voice and eye,
Since faredst thou who wast to them instead of father lost * When
     they like nested fledglings were sans power to creep or fly! 
And now we hope, since brake the clouds their word and troth with
     us, * Hope from the Caliph’s grace to gain a rain[FN#114]
     that ne’er shall dry.”

When the Caliph heard this, he said, “By Allah, O Jarir, Omar possesseth but an hundred dirhams.[FN#115] Ho, boy! do thou give them to him.”  Moreover he gifted him with the ornaments of his sword; and Jarir went forth to the other poets, who asked him, “What is behind thee?"[FN#116] and he answered, “A man who giveth to the poor and denieth the poets, and with him I am well-pleased.”

Al-Hajjaj and the three young men[FN#117]

They tell that Al-Hajjaj[FN#118] once bade the Chief of Police go his rounds about Bassorah city by night, and whomsoever he found abroad after supper-tide that he should smite his neck.  So he went round one night of the nights and came upon three youths swaying and staggering from side to side, and on them signs of wine-bibbing.  So the watch laid hold of them and the captain said to them, “Who be you that ye durst transgress the commandment of the Commander of the Faithful[FN#119] and come abroad at this hour?” quoth one of the youths, “I am the son of him to whom all necks[FN#120] abase themselves, alike the