“O Yusuf, master mine, for safety fly; * In sorest danger
     Ibrahim’s son doth lie: 
When from thy side for house and home he sped * Forthright bade
     Al-Mihrjan to bring him nigh,
And ‘mid th’ Assembly highest stead assigned * A seat in public
     with a sleight full sly. 
A writ thou wrotest bore he on his head * Which fell and picked
     it up the King to ’spy: 
’Tis thus discovered he thy state and raged * With wrath and fain
     all guidance would defy. 
Then bade he Ibrahim’s son on face be thrown * And painful
     beating to the bare apply;
With stripes he welted and he tare his sides * Till force waxed
     feeble, strength debility. 
So rise and haste thee to thine own and fetch * Thy power, and
     instant for the tribe-lands hie;
Meanwhile I’ll busy to seduce his men * Who hear me, O thou
     princely born and high;
For of the painful stress he made me bear * The fire of bane I’ve
     sworn him even I.”

Now when Ibn Ibrahim had finished his verse, he said to the gaoler, “Do thou summon for me the son of my brother hight Manna[FN#268] and thou shalt have from me one hundred gold pieces.”  The man did his bidding, and when the youth came the uncle gave him the letter and bespake him as follows:  “O son of my brother, take thou this paper and fare with it to the Castle of Al-Hayfa and swim the stream, and go up to the building and enter therein and commit this missive unto a youth whom thou shalt see sitting beside the Princess.  Then do thou greet him with the salam from me, and inform him of all that I am in and what I have seen and what thou hast witnessed, and for this service I will give thee an hundred gold pieces.”  The nephew took the uncle’s letter and set forth from the first of the night until he drew nigh the Castle.  Such was the case with Ibn Ibrahim and his sending his nephew Manna’ on a mission to the Princess; but as regards King Al-Mihrjan, when the morning morrowed and showed its sheen and shone and the sun arose with rays a-low-land strown, he sent to summon Ibn Ibrahim; and, when they set him between his hands, he adjured him saying, “O thou! by the rights of the God unique in his rule for Unity; by Him who set up the skies without prop and stay and dispread the Earths firmly upon the watery way, unless thou inform me and apprise me rightly and truly I will order thy head to be struck off this very moment.”  So the cup-companion related to the King the whole affair of Princess Al-Hayfa and Prince Yusuf, and all that had passed between the twain; whereupon Al-Mihrjan asked, “And this Yusuf from what land may he be?” “He is son to the Sovran of Sind, King Sahl,” quoth the other, and quoth Al- Mihrjan, “And is he still in the Palace, or hath he gone to his own country?” “He was therein,” replied Ibn Ibrahim, “but I know not whether he be yet there, or he be gone thence.”  Hereupon Al-Mihrjan commanded his host at once to