When they saw me, they saluted me
with the salaam and asked me of my case and my history, whereupon I
related to them all what had befallen me and what full measure of
misfortune was mine. Marveling at my tale, they took me to the
mansion, where I saw ranged round the hall ten couches each with its
blue bedding and coverlet of blue stuff and a-middlemost stood a
smaller couch furnished like them with blue and nothing else.
As we entered each of the youths took his seat on his own couch
and the old man seated himself upon the smaller one in the middle,
saying to me, "O youth, sit thee down on the floor, and ask not of our
case nor of the loss of our eyes." Presently he rose up and set before
each young man some meat in a charger and drink in a larger mazer,
treating me in like manner, and after that they sat questioning me
concerning my adventures and what had betided me. And I kept telling
them my tale till the night was far spent. Then said the young men: "O
our Sheikh, wilt not thou set before us our ordinary? The time is
come." He replied, "With love and gladness," and rose and, entering
a closet, disappeared, but presently returned bearing on his head
ten trays each covered with a strip of blue stuff.
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