princess Ayesha kept passing and repassing before his eyes, flashing like a bird of flame upon a background of sunset sky. Unable to secure repose, he ascended to one of his cabinets of cedar, marvelously carved, that in eastern cities are built out from the exterior walls of the houses, in order to profit by the coolness of the breeze that never failed to draw through the street; still sleep visited him not—for sleep is like happiness, it flies from us when we seek it—and to soothe his mind by the spectacle of the serenity of the night, he took his nargile and went out upon the highest terrace of his mansion.
The cool air of night, the splendor of the heavens, more thickly set with golden spangles than a peri's robe, and in which the moon was displaying her silvery face like a sultana, pale with love, bending over the trellis of her kiosk, brought joy and content to Mahmoud-Ben-Ahmed, for he was a poet and could not but be affected by the glorious spectacle that offered itself to his vision.
From that height the city of Cairo lay stretched before his eyes like one of those birds-eye plans in which the giaours trace the outlines of their fortified places. The terraces adorned with luxuriant plants in pots and gay with multi-colored tapestries; the spots where the waters of the Nile shone in the moonlight, for it was then the time of the yearly inundation; the gardens, from whence rose clusters of palms and groves of locust and fig-trees; the blocks of houses intersected by narrow streets; the brazen domes of the mosques; the slender minarets, pierced with carvings until they were like a toy of ivory; the palaces, brilliantly lighted or else lying in deepest obscurity, all
