Page:Arabian Nights Entertainments (1728)-Vol. 4.djvu/68

If you look, added my Father, towards the Iſland that’s form’d by the two greateſt Branches of the Nile; what Variety of Verdure have you there! What Enamel of all ſorts of Flowers! What a prodigious number of Cities, Villages, Canals and a thouſand other agreeable Objects! If you caſt your Eyes on the other ſide, fteering up towards Ethiopia, how many other Subjects of Admiration! I can’t compare the Verdure of ſo many Plains, watered with the different Canals of the Iſland, better than to ſparkling Emeralds ſet in Silver. Is not great Cairo the largeſt, the moſt populous, and the richeſt City in the Univerſe? What a prodigious Number ef magnificent Edifices both publick and private! If you view the Pyramids, you’ll be ſeized with Aſtoniſhment: You’ll turn ſtiff and unmoveable at the ſight of theſe Maſſes of Stone, of an extravagant Thickneſs, which riſe to the Skies; you’ll be obliged to profeſs, that the Pharoahs who employed ſuch Riches, and ſo many Men in building them, muſt have ſurpaſſed all the Monarchs that have appeared ſince, not only in Egypt, but all the World over, in Magnificence and Invention; fo tranſcendent are the Monuments they have left worthy of their Memory: Monuments ſo ancient, that the Learned can’t agree upon the Time of their Erection; and yet ſuch as ſtand to this Day and will laſt while Ages are. I filently paſs over the Maritime Cities of the Kingdom of Egypt, ſuch as Damiera, Roſetum, Alexandria, &c, where the Lord knows how many Nations come for a thouſand ſorts of Grain, Seeds, Cloath, and an infinite Number of other Things calculated for the Conveniency and the Delight of Men. What I ſpeak of, I have ſome occaſion to know; I ſpent ſome Years of my Youth there, which, as long as I live, I ſhall always reckon the moſt agreeable Part of my Life.

Scheherazade was running on at this Rate, when Day-light appear’d and made her mute. But towards the Cloſe of the enſuing Night, ſhe purſued her ’Story in the fol- lowing manner