As for
Kanmakan, he had no thought but of riding and tilting with spears
and shooting with arrows, and thus also did his cousin Kuzia
Fekan; for they were wont to go forth at the first of the day and
return at nightfall, when she would go in to her mother and he to
his, to find her sitting weeping by his father's bed. Then he
would tend his father till daybreak, when he would go forth again
with his cousin, according to their wont. Now Zoulmekan's
sufferings were long upon him and he wept and recited these
verses:
My strength is past away, my tale of days is told And I, alas! am
left even as thou dost behold.
In honour's day, the first amongst my folk was I, And in the race
for fame the foremost and most bold.
Would that before my death I might but see my son The empery in
my stead over the people hold
And rush upon his foes and take on them his wreak, At push of
sword and pike, in fury uncontrolled.
Lo, I'm a man fordone, in this world and the next, Except my
spright of God be solaced and consoled!
When he had made an end of repeating these verses he laid his
head on his pillow and his eyes closed and he slept. In his sleep
he saw one who said to him, "Rejoice for thy son shall fill the
lands with justice and have the mastery over them and men shall
obey him." Then he awoke gladdened by this happy omen that he had
seen, and after a few days, death smote him, whereat great grief
fell on the people of Baghdad, and gentle and simple mourned for
him.
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