addicted to an ancient game, but Islam tried to stamp this out,
like other joys of life. The players had ten arrows, which they
shot into the air; seven of them bestowed a right to the portion
of a camel, the other three did not. Abu'l-Ala was fond of using
arrows metaphorically. "And if one child," he writes to a
distinguished sheikh, "were to ask another in the dead of night
in a discussion: 'Who is rewarded for staying at home many times
what he would be rewarded for going on either pilgrimage?' and
the second lad answered: 'Mahomet, son of Sa'id,' his arrow would
have fallen near the mark; for your protection of your subjects
(_quatrain_ 86) is a greater duty than either pilgrimage." And
our poet calls to mind some benefits attached to slavery
(_quatrain_ 88): for an offence against morals a slave could
receive fifty blows, whereas the punishment of a freeman was
double. A married person who did not discharge his vows was
liable to be stoned to death, whereas a slave in similar
circumstances was merely struck a certain number of blows. It was
and still is customary, says von Kremer, if anything is broken by
a slave, forthwith to curse Satan, who is supposed to concern
himself in very trifling matters. The sympathy Abu'l-Ala displays
for men of small possessions may be put beside the modicum
(_quatrain_ 92) he wanted for himself. And these necessaries of
Abu'l-Ala, the ascetic, must appeal to us as more sincerely felt
than those of Ibn at-Ta'awizi, who was of opinion that when seven
things are collected together in the drinking-room it is not
reasonable to stay away. The list is as follows: a melon, honey,
roast meat, a young girl, wax lights, a singer, and wine. But Ibn
at-Ta'awizi was a literary person, and in Arabic the names of all
these objects begin with the same letter. Abu'l-Ala was more
inclined to celebrate the wilderness. He has portrayed