burton--1001-nights--sample

I cut fuel-wood the whole of my day and came back in the evening
bearing my bundle on my head. I sold it for half a dinar, with part of
which I bought provision and laid by the rest.
In such work I spent a whole year and when this was ended I went
out one day, as was my wont, into the wilderness; and, wandering away
from my companions, I chanced on a thickly grown lowland in which
there was an abundance of wood. So I entered and I found the gnarled
stump of a great tree and loosened the ground about it and shovelled
away the earth. Presently my hatchet rang upon a copper ring; so I
cleared away the soil and behold, the ring was attached to a wooden
trap-door. This I raised and there appeared beneath it a staircase. I
descended the steps to the bottom and came to a door, which I opened
and found myself in a noble hall strong of structure and beautifully
built, where was a damsel like a pearl of great price, whose favour
banished from my heart all grief and cark and care; and whose soft
speech healed the soul in despair and captivated the wise and ware.
Her figure measured five feet in height; her breasts were firm and upright;
her cheek a very garden of delight; her colour lively bright; her
face gleamed like dawn through curly tresses which gloomed like night,
and above the snows of her bosom glittered teeth of a pearly white. As
the poet said of one like her: —
Slim-waisted loveling, jetty hair-encrowned * A wand of willow on a
sandy mound:
And as saith another. —
Four things that meet not, save they here unite * To shed my heartblood
and to rape my sprite:
164