aying], "You have now heard every
circumstance; reflect within yourself if you can bring the intelligence
[which is required] respecting the young man, then undertake the
journey towards the country of _Nimroz_, and depart soon, or else
refuse [the conditions and the attempt], and return to your home." I
answered, "If God please, I will soon ascertain all the circumstances
[relating to the strange event], and return to the princess with
success; or if my fate be unlucky, then there is no remedy; but the
princess must give me her solemn promise she will not swerve from what
she engages [to perform]. And now an uneasy apprehension arises in
my heart; if the princess will have the benevolence to call me before
her, and allow me to sit down outside the _parda_, and hear with her
own ears the request I have made, and favour me with an answer from
her own lips; then my heart will be at ease, and every thing will be
possible for me." These my requests the female servant related to the
fairy-formed princess. At last, by way of condescension, she ordered
me to be called before her.

The same female returned, and conducted me to the apartment where the
princess was; what [a display of beauty] I saw! Handsome female slaves
and servants, and armed damsels, from _Kilmak, Turkistan, Abyssinia,
Uzbak Tartary and Kashmir_, were drawn up in two lines, dressed in
rich jewels, with their arms folded across, and each standing in her
appropriate station. Shall I call this the court of Indra? or is it
a descent on the part of the fairies? an involuntary sigh of rapture
escaped [from my breast], and my heart began to palpitate; but I
forcibly restrained myself. Regarding them all around, I advanced on;
but my feet became each as heavy as a hundred _mans_. [218] Whenever I
gazed on one of those lovely women, my heart was unwilling to proceed
farther. On one side [of the saloon] a screen was suspended, and a
stool set with precious stones was placed near it, as well as a chair
of sandal-wood; the female servant made me a sign to sit down on the
[jewelled] stool; I sat down upon it, and she seated herself on the
[sandal-wood chair]; she said, "Now, whatever you have to say, speak
it fully and from the heart."

I first extolled the princess's excellent qualities, also her justice
and liberality; I then added, that "ever since I have entered the
limits of this country, I saw at every stage accommodations for
travellers and lofty buildings; and f