Malayan literature; comprising romantic tales, epic poetry and royal ...

178
MALAYAN LITERATURE
and other precious stones, I bought all they had for your
Majesty, paying 200,000 tahil. Immediately afterward there
arrived some merchants from another country who wanted
to buy these and offered me a profit of 200,000 tahil. If the
King consents I will sell the jewels, and later buy others."
King Harmuz wrote to his minister the following response :
" What are 200,000 tahil ? What are 400,000 tahil, profit in-
cluded? Is that worth talking about and making so much
ado ? If you are going into the operations of commerce who
will look after the government? If you buy and sell, what
will become of the merchants? It is evident that you would
destroy thus our good renown, and that you are the enemy
of the merchants of our kingdom, for your designs would
ruin them. Your sentiments are unworthy a minister." And
for this he removed him from office.
In the Kitab Sifat-el-Houkama it is said :
" There is a great
diversity of inclinations among men. Everyone has his own
propensity. One is borne naturally toward riches, another
toward patience and resignation, another toward study and
good works. And in this world the humors of men are so
varied that they all differ in nature. Among this infinite
variety of dispositions of soul, that which best suits kings and
ministers is greatness of character, for that quality is the ornament
of royalty.
"
One day the minister of the Sultan Haroun-er-Raschid
was returning from the council of state to his house when
he was approached by a beggar who said :
' O Yahya ! misery
brings me to you. I pray you give me something.'
" When Yahya had arrived at his house he made the beggar
sit down at the door, and calling an attendant said to him:
'
Every day give this man 1,000 dinars, and for his food give
him his part in the provisions consumed in your house.'
'*
They say that for a month the beggar came every day
and sat at Yahya's door, and received the sum of 1,000 dinars.
When he had received them at the end of the month, 30,000
dinars, the beggar went away. When informed of his departure,
Yahya said :
'
By the Lord ! if he had not gone away,
and had come to my door for the rest of his life, I should have
given him the same daily ration.' "
In the Kitab Tarykh the following is told: "There was