so the man turned away. As he was walking off, Ibn Futayra summoned him back and gave him something. Among his poetry, as Ibn al-Saʿi has recorded—and as it has already been quoted elsewhere (1)—are the following lines:

[Ṭawīl metre]
When I tested people, seeking among them
A loyal brother at the onset of hardship,
I reflected on the days of my joy and my grief
And cried out among the living, “Is there any helper?”
I found, in what pained me, none but a gloater,
And, in what pleased me, none but the envious.

Yahya ibn Saʿid, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Basri (2), the Christian (3), author of the Maqāmāt (4),
was an accomplished, eloquent poet and man of letters, with unrivalled mastery of language and verse. Among his lines are:

[Mukhaḍḍaʿ al-Sabīṭ metre]
Her singing glides softly,
Effortless, into every ear;
No portal of hearing has ever repelled it,
Nor does it ask leave to appear. (5)

Lady Zubayda (6), daughter of Imam al-Muqtafi li-Amr Allah (7), sister of al-Mustanjid and aunt of al-Mustaḍīʾ, lived to a great age and dispensed abundant, ongoing charity. Sultan Masʿud married her at one point, fixing a dowry of one hundred thousand dinars; he died before consummating the marriage, and she had been averse to it, so her wish was fulfilled.

The righteous lady Shaykha Fāṭima Khātūn, daughter of Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn (8) al-ʿAmīd, was pious, devout, and ascetic. She lived to the age of one hundred and six. Amīr al-Juyūsh Nāẓir (9) had married her while she was still a virgin, and she remained with him until he died. She never remarried thereafter; instead she devoted herself to the remembrance of Allah—exalted is He—and to worship. May Allah have mercy on her.