I should have thought myself too happy to obtain so great a favour by asking it, not to accept it after so obliging an offer. The princess then conducted me to a bath, the most elegant, convenient, and at the same time sumptuous you can possibly imagine. When I came out, I found instead of my own dress, another very rich one, which I put on, less for its magnificence than to render myself more worthy of her notice. We seated ourselves on a sofa, covered with superb drapery; the cushions of which were of the richest Indian brocade; she then set before me a variety of the most delicate and rare dishes. We eat together, and having passed the remainder of the day very agreeably, she received me at night in her chamber. The next day, in order to devise every method of entertaining me, she produced, at dinner, a flask of very old wine, the finest I ever tasted; and to please me, she drank several glasses with me. I no sooner found my head rather heated with this agreeable liquor, than I said, “Beautiful princess, you have been buried here alive much too long; follow me, and go and enjoy the brightness of the genuine day, of which for so many years you have been deprived. Abandon this false though brilliant light you have here.”--“Let us talk no more, prince,” she answered, smiling, “on this subject. I value not the most beautiful day in the world, if you will pass nine with me here, and give up the tenth to the Genius.”--“Princess,” I replied, “I see very well that it is the dread you have of the Genius, which makes you hold this language. As for myself, I fear him so little, that I am determined to break his talisman in pieces, with the magic spell that is inscribed upon it. Let him then come; I will wait for him; and however brave, however formidable, he may be, I will make him feel the weight of my arm. I have taken an oath to exterminate all the Genii in the world, and he shall be the first.” The princess, who knew the consequence of this conduct, conjured me not to touch the talisman. “It will be the means,” she said, “of destroying both you and myself. I am better acquainted with the nature of Genii than you can be.” The wine I had drank, prevented me from acknowledging the propriety of her reasons, I kicked down the talisman, and broke it in pieces. This was no sooner done than the whole palace shook, as if ready to fall to atoms, accompanied with a most dreadful noise like thunder, and flashes of lightning, which heightened still more the intermediate gloom. This formidable adventure in a moment dissipated the fumes of the wine, and made me own, though too late, the fault I had committed. “Princess,” I exclaimed, “what does all this mean?” Without thinking of her own misfortune, and alarmed only for me, she, in a fright, answered, “Alas, it is all over with you, unless you save yourself by flight.”