2. A number of our people have narrated from Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Khalid from Bakr ibn Salih from Muhammad ibn abu Hamzah from ‘Uthman al-Asbahaniy who has said the following:

“I once gave a Sulsul as a gift to Tsma’il, son of abu ‘Abd Allah , and abu ‘Abd Allah , came in. When he (the Imam) saw it he said, ‘This bird is an unfortunate bird, so you must send it away. It says, ‘I have failed to find you, I have failed to find you.’ You must lose it before it fails to find you.”’