a flame, whose sparks might not be quenched, and desire, whose signs might not be hidden. Presently, they came up out of that basin, whilst Hasan marvelled at their beauty and loveliness and the tokens of inner gifts in the elegance of their movements. Then he cast a glance at the chief damsel who stood mother- naked and there was manifest to him what was between her thighs a goodly rounded dome on pillars borne, like a bowl of silver or crystal, which recalled to him the saying of the poet,[FN#55] "When I took up her shift and discovered the terrace-roof of her kaze, I found it as strait as my humour or eke my worldly ways: So I thrust it, incontinent, in, halfway, and she heaved a sigh. 'For what dost thou sigh?' quoth I. 'For the rest of it sure,' she says." Then coming out of the water they all put on their dresses and ornaments, and the chief maiden donned a green dress,[FN#56] wherein she surpassed for loveliness all the fair ones of the world and the lustre of her face outshone the resplendent full moons: she excelled the branches with the grace of her bending gait and confounded the wit with apprehension of disdain; and indeed she was as saith the poet,[FN#57] "A maiden 'twas, the dresser's art had decked with cunning sleight; The sun thou 'd'st say had robbed her cheek and shone with borrowed light. She came to us apparelled fair in under vest of green, Like as the ripe pomegranate hides beneath its leafy screen; And when we asked her what might be the name of what she wore, She answered in a quaint reply that double meaning bore: The desert's heart we penetrate in such apparel dressed, And Pierce-heart therefore is the name by which we call the vest." —And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased saying her permitted say. When it was the Seven Hundred and Eighty-seventh Night,