Pagina 173 de 1116

the falcon struck it with her pounces and upset the liquid. The

King filled it a second time with the dripping drops, thinking

his hawk was thirsty; but the bird again struck at the cup with

her talons and overturned it. Then the King waxed wroth with the

hawk and filling the cup a third time offered it to his horse:

but the hawk upset it with a flirt of wings. Quoth the King,

"Allah confound thee, thou unluckiest of flying things! thou

keepest me from drinking, and thou deprivest thyself also, and

the horse." So he struck the falcon with his sword and cut off

her wing; but the bird raised her head and said by signs, "Look

at that which hangeth on the tree!" The King lifted up his eyes

accordingly and caught sight of a brood of vipers, whose poison

drops he mistook for water; thereupon he repented him of having

struck off his falcon's wing, and mounting horse, fared on with

the dead gazelle, till he arrived at the camp, his starting

place.