pt? O tomb! hast
thou destroyed that excess of affection which he bare me? Hast
thou closed those eyes that evinced so much love, and were all my
delight? No, no, this I cannot think. Tell me rather, by what
miracle thou becamest the depositary of the rarest treasure the
world ever contained."

I must confess, my lord, I was enraged at these expressions; for,
in truth, this beloved, this adored mortal, was by no means what
you would imagine him to have been. He was a black Indian, one of
the original natives of this country. I was so enraged at the
language addressed to him, that I discovered myself, and
apostrophising the tomb in my turn; I cried, "O tomb! why dost
not thou swallow up that monster so revolting to human nature, or
rather why dost not thou swallow up both the lover and his
mistress?"

I had scarcely uttered these words, when the queen, who sat by
the black, rose up like a fury. "Miscreant!" said she "thou art
the cause of my grief; do not think I am ignorant of this, I have
dissembled too long. It was thy barbarous hand that brought the
objets of my fondness into this lamentable condition; and thou
hast the cruelty to come and insult a despairing lover." "Yes,"
said I, in a rage, "it was I that chastised that monster,
according to his desert; I ought to have treated thee in the same
manner; I now repent that I did not; thou hast too long abused my
goodness." As I spoke these words, I drew out my cimeter, and
lifted up my hand to punish her; but regarding me stedfastly, she
said with a jeering smile, "Moderate thy anger." At the same
time, she pronounced words I did not understand; and afterwards
added, "By virtue of my enchantments, I command thee to become
half marble and half man." Immediately, my lord, I became what
you see, a dead man among the living, and a living man among the
dead.

After the cruel sorceress, unworthy of the name of queen, had
metamorphosed me thus, and brought me into this hall, by another
enchantment she destroyed my capital, which was very flourishing
and populous; she annihilated the houses, the public places and
markets, and reduced the site of the whole to the lake and desert
plain you have seen; the fishes of four colours in the lake are
the four kinds of inhabitants of different religions, which the
city contained. The white are the Moosulmauns; the red, the
Persians, who worship fire; the blue, the Christians and the
yellow, the Jews. The four little hills were the