As he said, so it came to pass; for as soon as it came to be known that the corpse was within a day’s journey of the city, the inhabitants almost of all sorts went forth, met it above twenty miles off, and marched before it, till it came to the city gate; where the confident, waiting for that purpose, presented herself before the prince’s mother, and begged her, in the name of the whole city, that she would be pleased to consent that the bodies of the two lovers, who had but one heart whilst they lived, especially during their amour, might be buried in the same tomb now they were dead.  The princess immediately consented; and the corpse of the prince, instead of being deposited in his own burying-place, was laid by Schemselnihar’s side, after it had been carried in procession at the head of an infinite number of people, of all conditions and degrees:  nay, from that very time, all the inhabitants of Bagdad, and even strangers, from such parts of the world as honoured the Mahometan religion, have had a mighty veneration for that tomb, and paid their devotion at it as often as opportunity would give them leave.

This, sir, said Scheherazade, who now perceived the day begin to approach, is what I had to relate to your majesty concerning the amour of the fair Schemselnihar, mistress to the caliph Haroun Alraschid, and the worthy Ali Ebn Becar, prince of Persia.

When Dinarzade observed that her sister the sultaness had done speaking, she thanked her in the most obliging manner for her entertainment in a history so exceedingly agreeable.

If the sultan will be pleased to let me live till to-morrow, said Scheherazade, I will also relate that of prince Camaralzaman [Footnote:  This word, in Arabic, signifies the Moon of the Time, or the Moon of the Age.], which you will find yet more agreeable.  Here she stopped; and the sultan, who could not yet resolve on her death, permitted her to go on next night in the following manner.

The story of the amours of
Camaralzaman, prince of the isles of the
children of Khaledan; and of Badoura,
princess of china.

About twenty days sail on the coast of Persia, there are islands in the main ocean, called the islands of the Children of Khaledan; these islands are divided into four great provinces, which have all of them very flourishing and populous cities, and which make together a most potent kingdom.  It is governed by a king named Schahzaman [Footnote:  That is to say, in Persic, King of the Time, or King of the Age.], who has four lawful wives, all daughters of kings, and sixty concubines.