of a murthered man into his enemy’s garden and after the body was found by spies he had sent to discover the slayer, he summoned Attaf and asked him, “Who murthered yon man within thy grounds?” Replied the other, “’Twas I slew him.”  “And why didst slay him?” cried the Governor, “and what harm hath he wrought thee?” But the generous one replied, “O my lord, I have confessed to the slaughter of this man in order that I and only I may be mulcted in his blood-wite lest the neighbours say, ’By reason of Attaf’s garden we have been condemned to pay his fine.’” Quoth Abd al-Malik, “Why should I want to take mulcts from the folk?  Nay; I would command according to the Holy Law and even as Allah hath ordered, ’A life for a life.’” He then turned for testimony to those present and asked them, “What said this man?” and they answered, “He said, ’I slew him.’” “Is the accused in his right mind or Jinn-mad?"[FN#355] pursued the Governor; and they said, “In his senses.”  Then quoth the Governor to the Mufti, “O Efendi, deliver me thine official decision according to that thou heardest from the accused’s mouth;” and the Judge pronounced and indited his sentence upon the criminal according to his confession.  Hereupon the Governor gave order for his slaves to plunder the house and bastinado the owner; then he called for the headsman, but the Notables interfered and cried, “Give him a delay, for thou hast no right to slay him without further evidence; and better send him to gaol.”  Now all Damascus was agitated and excited by this affair, which came upon the folk so suddenly and unforeseen.  And Attaf’s friends[FN#356] and familiars came down upon the Governor and went about spreading abroad that the generous man had not spoken such words save in fear lest his neighbours be molested and be mulcted for a murther which they never committed, and that he was wholly innocent of such crime.  So Abd al-Malik bin Marwan summoned them and said, “An ye plead that the accused is Jinn-mad this were folly, for he is the prince of intelligent men:  I was resolved to let him life until the morrow; but I have been thwarted and this very night I will send and have him strangled.”  Hereupon he returned to prison and ordered the gaoler to do him die before day might break.  But the man waxed wroth with exceeding wrath to hear the doom devised for Attaf and having visited him in prison said to him, “Verily the Governor is determined to slay thee for he was not satisfied with the intercession made for thee by the folk or even with taking the legal blood-wite.”  Hereat Attaf wept and cried, “Allah (be He magnified and glorified!) hath assigned unto every death a cause.  I desired but to do good amongst the garden folk and prevent their being fined; and now this benevolence hath become the reason of my ruin.”  Then, after much ‘say and said,’ the gaoler spoke as follows, “Why talk after such fashion?  I am resolved to set thee free and to ransom thee with my life; and at