brothers disguised themselves and returned by night with all
secrecy to the palace, where they passed the dark hours: and at
dawn they seated themselves at the lattice overlooking the
pleasure grounds, when presently the Queen and her handmaids came
out as before, and passing under the windows made for the
fountain. Here they stripped, ten of them being men to ten women,
and the King's wife cried out, "Where art thou, O Saeed?" The
hideous blackamoor dropped from the tree straightway; and,
rushing into her arms without stay or delay, cried out, "I am
Sa'ad al Din Saood!"[FN#11] The lady laughed heartily, and all
fell to satisfying their lusts, and remained so occupied for a
couple of hours, when the white slaves rose up from the
handmaidens' breasts and the blackamoor dismounted from the
Queen's bosom: then they went into the basin and, after
performing the Ghusl, or complete ablution, donned their dresses
and retired as they had done before. When King Shahryar saw this
infamy of his wife and concubines he became as one distraught and
he cried out, "Only in utter solitude can man be safe from the
doings of this vile world! By Allah, life is naught but one great
wrong." Presently he added, "Do not thwart me, O my brother, in
what I propose;" and the other answered, "I will not." So he
said, "Let us up as we are and depart forthright hence, for we
have no concern with Kingship, and let us overwander Allah's
earth, worshipping the Almighty till we find some one to whom the
like calamity hath happened; and if we find none then will death
be more welcome to us than life." So the two brothers issued from
a second private postern of the palace; and they never stinted
wayfaring by day and by night, until they reached a tree a middle
of a meadow hard by a spring of sweet water on the shore of the
salt sea. Both drank of it and sat down to take their rest; and