He said, ’How, O damsel? what of my cruelty?  Surely, I know nothing of it.’

But she exclaimed, ‘Ah, worse to feign forgetfulness!’

Now, he was bewildered at the words of the damsel, and followed her leading till they entered a dell in the garden canopied with foliage, and beyond it a green rise, and on the rise a throne.  So he looked earnestly, and beheld thereon Queen Rabesqurat, she sobbing, her dark hair pouring in streams from the crown of her head.  Seeing him, she cleared her eyes, and advanced to meet him timidly and with hesitating steps; but he shrank from her, and the Queen shrieked with grief, crying, ’Is there in this cold heart no relenting?’

Then she said to him winningly, and in a low voice, ’O youth, my husband, to whom I am a bride!’

He marvelled, saying, ’This is a game, for indeed I am no husband, neither have I a bride . . . yet have I confused memory of some betrothal . . .’

Thereupon she cried, ‘Said I not so? and I the betrothed.’

Still he exclaimed, ‘I cannot think it!  Wullahy, it were a wonder!’

So she said, ’Consider how a poor youth of excellent proportions came to a flourishing Court before one, a widowed Queen, and she cast eyes of love on him, and gave him rule over her and all that was hers when he had achieved a task, and they were wedded.  Oh, the bliss of it!  Knit together with bond and a writing; and these were the dominions, I the Queen, woe’s me!—­thou the youth!’

Now, he was roiled by the enchantments of the Queen, caught in the snare of her beguilings; and he let her lead him to a seat beside her on the throne, and sat there awhile in the midst of feastings, mazed, thinking, ‘What life have I lived before this, if the matter be as I behold?’ thinking, ’’Tis true I have had visions of a widowed queen, and I a poor youth that came to her court, and espoused her, sitting in the vacant seat beside her, ruling a realm; but it was a dream, a dream,—­yet, wah! here is she, here am I, yonder my dominions!’ Then he thought, ’I will solve it!’ So, on a sudden he said to her beside him, ’O Queen, sovereign of hearts! enlighten me as to a perplexity.’

She answered, ‘The voice of my lord is music in the ear of the bride.’

Then said he, in the tone of one doubting realities, ’O fair Queen, is there truly now such a one as Shagpat in the world?’

She laughed at his speech and the puzzled appearance of his visage, replying, ’Surely there liveth one, Shagpat by name in the world; strange is the history of him, his friends, and enemies; and it would bear recital.’

Then he said, ’And one, the daughter of a Vizier, Vizier to the King in the City of Shagpat?’

Thereat, she shook her head, saying, ‘I know nought of that one.’

Now, Shibli Bagarag was mindful of his thwackings; and in this the wisdom of Noorna, is manifest, that the sting of them yet chased away doubts of illusion regarding their having been, as the poet says,