and drank their sufficiency and lay down to sleep all of them save their lord, who could not close eye for excess of love-longing.  “O Habib, why and wherefore sleepest thou not?” they asked, and he answered, “O comrades mine, how shall slumber come to one yearning for his dearling, and verily I will lie awake nor enjoy aught repose until such time as I espy the lifeblood of my heart, Durrat al-Ghawwas.”  Thereupon they held their peace; and presently they held council one with other saying, “Who amongst us can supply a dose of Bhang that we may cast him asleep and his slaughter may be easy to us?” “I have two Miskals weight[FN#407] of that same,” quoth one of them, and the others took it from him and presently, when occasion served, they put it into a cup of water and presented it to Habib.  He hent that cup in hand and drank off the drugged liquid at a single draught; and presently the Bhang wrought in his vitals and its fumes mounted to his head, mastering his senses and causing his brain to whirl round, whereupon he sank into the depths of unconsciousness.  Then quoth his escort, “As soon as his slumber is soundest and his sleep heaviest we will arise and slay him and bury him on the spot where he now sleepeth:  then will we return to his father and mother, and tell them that of love-stress to his beloved and of excessive longing and pining for her he died.”  And upon this deed of treachery all agreed.  So when dawned the day and showed its sheen and shone clear and serene the knights awoke and seeing their lord drowned[FN#408] in sleep they arose and sat in council, and quoth one of them, “Let us cut his throat from ear to ear;"[FN#409] and quoth another, “Nay, better we dig us a pit the stature of a man and we will cast him amiddlemost thereof and heap upon him earth so that he will die, nor shall any know aught about him.”  Hearing this said one of the retinue, whose name was Rabi’a,[FN#410] “But fear you naught from Almighty Allah and regard ye not the favours wherewith his father fulfilled you, and remember ye not the bread which ye ate in his household and from his family?  Indeed ’twas but a little while since his sire chose you out to escort him that his son might take solace with you instead of himself, and he entrusted unto you his heart’s core, and now ye are pleased to do him die and thereby destroy the life of his parents.  Furthermore, say me doth your judgment decide that such ill-work can possibly abide hidden from his father?  Now I swear by the loyalty[FN#411] of the Arabs there will not remain for us a wight or any who bloweth the fire alight, however mean and slight, who will receive us after such deed.  So do ye at least befriend and protect your households and your clans and your wives and your children whom ye left in the tribal domain.  But now you design utterly to destroy us, one and all, and after death affix to our memories the ill-name of traitors, and cause our women be enslaved and our children enthralled, nor leave