"
'The king, greatly enraged, said "Daughter, you are mad, and I must
treat you as such." In a word, he had her shut up in a single
apartment of one of his palaces, and allowed her only ten old women
to wait upon her and keep her company, the chief of whom had been
her nurse. And in order that the kings his neighbours, who had sent
embassies to him on this account, might not think any more of her,
he despatched envoys to them severally, to let them know how averse
his daughter was to marriage; and as he did not doubt that she was
really mad, he charged them to make known in every court that if
there were any physician that would undertake to come and cure her,
he should, if he succeeded, marry her for his pains.
'Fair Maimoune,' continued Danhasch, 'all that I have told you is
true; and I have not failed to go every day regularly to
contemplate this incomparable beauty, to whom I would be very sorry
to do the least harm, notwithstanding my natural inclination to
mischief. Come and see her, I conjure you; it would be well worth
your while; I am ready to wait on you as a guide, and you have only
to command me. I doubt not that you would think yourself obliged to
me for the sight of a princess unequalled for beauty.
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