THE THREE APPLES
THE THREE APPLES T he Khalif Haroun er Reshid summoned his Vizier Jaafer one night and said to him, ‘I have a mind to go down into the city and question the common people of the conduct of the officers charged with its government; and those of whom they complain, we will depose, and those whom they commend, we will advance.’ Quoth Jaafer, ‘I hear and obey.’ So the Khalif and Jaafer and Mesrour went down into the town and walked about the streets and markets till, as they were passing through a certain alley, they came upon an old man walking along at a leisurely pace, with a fishing-net and a basket on his head and a staff in his hand, and heard him repeat the following verses: They tell me I shine, by my wisdom and wit, Midst the rest of my kind, as the moon in the night. “A truce to your idle discourses!” I cry, “What’s knowledge, indeed, unattended by might?” If you offered me, knowledge and wisdom and all, With my inkhorn and papers, in pawn for a mite, To buy one day’s victua...
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