As she persisted in her entreaties, his love for her at last made him give way and promise she should have her wish. At the hazard of his own life, he sallied out of the city by night and got into the conservatories by breaking down the fence. The noise he made in breaking the fence roused the guard, who turned out to catch the thief. They soon caught him and with blows and curses put him in fetters. In the morning he was brought before the king, who promptly ordered him to be impaled alive. Off he was hauled, with his hands tied behind his back, and led out of the city to execution to the sound of the execution-drum, and was impaled alive. Intense were his agonies; and, to add to them, the crows settled on his head and pecked out his eyes with their dagger-like beaks. Yet, heedless of his pain, and thinking only of his wife, the man murmured to himself, "Alas, I shall miss going to the festival with you arrayed in safflower-coloured cloths, with your arms twined round my neck." So saying, he uttered this stanza:--

I count it not as pain that, here impaled,
By crows I'm torn. My heartfelt pain is this,
That my dear wife will not keep holiday
Attired in raiment gay of ruddy dye.

And as he was babbling thus about his wife, he died and was reborn in hell.

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His lesson ended, the Master identified the Birth by saying, "This husband and wife were the husband and wife of those days also, and I was the Spirit of the Air who made their story known."

[j148]