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PAGE 3

Loving Laili
by [?]

Now Lailí’s father and mother had wept so much for their daughter that they had become quite blind, and her father kept always repeating, “Lailí, Lailí, Lailí.” When Lailí saw their blindness, she prayed to God to restore their sight to them, which he did. As soon as the father and mother saw Lailí, they hugged her and kissed her, and then they had the wedding all over again amid great rejoicings. Prince Majnún and Lailí stayed with Múnsúk Rájá and his wife for three years, and then they returned to King Dantál, and lived happily for some time with him.

They used to go out hunting, and they often went from country to country to eat the air and amuse themselves.

One day Prince Majnún said to Lailí, “Let us go through this jungle.” “No, no,” said Lailí; “if we go through this jungle, some harm will happen to me.” But Prince Majnún laughed, and went into the jungle. And as they were going through it, God thought, “I should like to know how much Prince Majnún loves his wife. Would he be very sorry if she died? And would he marry another wife? I will see.” So he sent one of his angels in the form of a fakír into the jungle; and the angel went up to Lailí, and threw some powder in her face, and instantly she fell to the ground a heap of ashes.

Prince Majnún was in great sorrow and grief when he saw his dear Lailí turn into a little heap of ashes; and he went straight home to his father, and for a long, long time he would not be comforted. After a great many years he grew more cheerful and happy, and began to go again into his father’s beautiful garden with Husain Mahámat. King Dantál wished his son to marry again. “I will only have Lailí for my wife; I will not marry any other woman,” said Prince Majnún. “How can you marry Lailí? Lailí is dead. She will never come back to you,” said the father. “Then I’ll not have any wife at all,” said Prince Majnún.

Meanwhile Lailí was living in the jungle where her husband had left her a little heap of ashes. As soon as Majnún had gone, the fakír had taken her ashes and made them quite clean, and then he had mixed clay and water with the ashes, and made the figure of a woman with them, and so Lailí regained her human form, and God sent life into it. But Lailí had become once more a hideous old woman, with a long, long nose, and teeth like tusks; just such an old woman, excepting her teeth, as she had been when she came out of the Rohú fish; and she lived in the jungle, and neither ate nor drank, and she kept on saying, “Majnún, Majnún; I want Majnún.”

At last the angel who had come as a fakír and thrown the powder at her, said to God, “Of what use is it that this woman should sit in the jungle crying, crying for ever, ‘Majnún, Majnún; I want Majnún,’ and eating and drinking nothing? Let me take her to Prince Majnún.” “Well,” said God, “you may do so; but tell her that she must not speak to Majnún if he is afraid of her when he sees her; and that if he is afraid when he sees her, she will become a little white dog the next day. Then she must go to the palace, and she will only regain her human shape when Prince Majnún loves her, feeds her with his own food, and lets her sleep in his bed.” So the angel came to Lailí again as a fakír and carried her to King Dantál’s garden. “Now,” he said, “it is God’s command that you stay here till Prince Majnún comes to walk in the garden, and then you may show yourself to him. But you must not speak to him, if he is afraid of you; and should he be afraid of you, you will the next day become a little white dog.” He then told her what she must do as a little dog to regain her human form.