enjoyable and delectable!" Quoth she, "And where is this compared
with that I would relate to you on the coming night an the Sovran
suffer me to survive?" Now when it was the next night and that
was

The Three Hundred and Sixty-first Night,

Dunyazad said to her, "Allah upon thee, O my sister, an thou be
other than sleepy, finish for us thy tale that we may cut short
the watching of this our latter night!" She replied, "With love
and good will!" It hath reached me, O auspicious King, the
director, the right-guiding, lord of the rede which is benefiting
and of deeds fair-seeming and worthy celebrating, that the Sultan
took with him the Scholar and they fared till they reached the
citadel and entered the Palace, during which time the King was
pondering the matter and wondering at the affair. And when night
came he bade them get ready his daughter that the first visit
might be paid to her by the bridegroom. They did his bidding and
carried the Youth in procession to her and he found the apartment
bespread with carpets and perfumed with essences; the bride,
however, was absent. So he said in his mind, "She will come
presently albeit now she delayeth;" and he ceased not expecting
her till near midnight, whilst the father and the mother said,
"Verily the young man hath married our daughter and now sleepeth
with her." On this wise the Youth kept one reckoning and the
Sultan and his Harem kept another till it was hard upon dawn--all
this and the bridegroom watched in expectation of the bride. Now
when the day brake, the mother came to visit her child expecting
to see her by the side of her mate; but she could not find a
trace of her, nor could she gather any clear tidings of her.