he was
unwilling to leave her behind, and therefore brought her to the court of
Persia. Her mother died while she was yet an infant; she was now in the
sixteenth year of her age, and her name was ALMEIDA. She was beautiful
as the daughters of Paradise, and gentle as the breezes of the spring;
her mind was without stain, and her manners were without art.

She was lodged with her father in a palace that joined to the gardens of
the seraglio; and it happened that a lamp which had one night been left
burning in a lower apartment, by some accident set fire to the net-work
of cotton that surrounded a sopha, and the whole room was soon after in
a flame. ALMORAN, who had been passing the afternoon in riot and
debauchery, had been removed from his banquetting room asleep; but HAMET
was still in his closet, where he had been regulating some papers that
were to be used the next day. The windows of this room opened towards
the inner apartments of the house in which Abdallah resided; and HAMET,
having by accident looked that way, was alarmed by the appearance of an
unusual light, and starting up to see whence it proceeded, he discovered
what had happened.

Having hastily ordered the guard of the night to assist in quenching the
flame, and removing the furniture, he ran himself into the garden. As
soon as he was come up to the house, he was alarmed by the shrieks of a
female voice; and the next moment, ALMEIDA appeared at the window of an
apartment directly over that which was on fire. ALMEIDA he had till now
never seen, nor did he so much as know that Abdallah had a daughter: but
though her person was unknown, he was strongly interested in her danger,
and called out to her to throw herself into his arms. At the sound of
his voice she ran back into the room, such is the force of inviolate
modesty, though the smoke was then rising in curling spires from the
windows: she was, however, soon driven back; and part of the floor at
the same instant giving way, she wrapt her veil round her, and leaped
into the garden. HAMET caught her in his arms; but though he broke her
fall, he sunk down with her weight: he did not, however, quit his
charge, but perceiving she had fainted, he made haste with her into his
apartment, to afford her such assistance as he could procure.

She was covered only with the light and loose robe in which she slept,
and her veil had dropped off by the way. The moment he entered his
closet, the light discovered to him