They guard the folk from all calamities, ✿ But with the rising sun apart they fly?”
She answered, “The leaves of a door.” Quoth he, “Tell me of the gates of Gehenna?” Quoth she, “They are seven in number and their names are comprised in these two couplets:—
Jahannam, next Lazá, and third Hatím; ✿ Then count Sa’ír and Sakar eke, five-fold,
Sixth comes Jahím and Háwiyah the seventh; ✿ Here are seven Hells in four lines briefly told.”
Quoth he “To what doth the poet refer when he saith:—
She wears a pair of ringlets long let down ✿ Behind her, as she comes and goes at speed,
And eye that never tastes of sleep nor sheds ✿ A tear, for ne’er a drop it hath at need;
That never all its life wore stitch of clothes; ✿ Yet robes mankind in every mode of weed?”
Quoth she, “A needle.” (¿) “What is the length and what the breadth of the bridge Al-Sirát?”—Its length is three thousand years’ journey, a thousand in descent and a thousand in ascent and a thousand level: it is sharper than a sword and finer than a hair.——And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to say her permitted say.
Now when it was the Four Hundred and Sixtieth Night,