سندبادنامه 374.27

374.27

17. Tale of the Fastidious Merchant
and honey a dough be prepared each day to apply as a poultice upon it, until it ripened the humors
and gradually dissolved them. For a period of two months I applied that paste and made that plaster;
and when I took it off, I mixed a little flour and fat with it,
baked cakes, and sold them. Now that swelling has subsided, the humors have been purged,
and there is no longer any need for that." When the merchant heard these words, his bile
was stirred, and he said: "May a curse be upon him and upon your master! And may shame be upon me and upon this
inappropriate question! Truly have they said: 'Seeking the ultimate truth is a misery!' Would that I had never seen you
and had never bought cakes from you!" And from the extremity of his loathing and revulsion he wished that all
the organs of his stomach along with his viscera and intestines would come up through his upper opening by way of vomiting and evacuation. Vomiting and diarrhea
fell upon him, and opened his lower and upper vents. For a long time he remained in the pain of that ailment
and the affliction of that torment; and however much he strove to have the image of this event veiled from his mind,
it was [not] possible, and every hour he would say to himself: