Then they attired Dunyazad in a dress of blue brocade and she became as she were the full moon when it shineth forth. So they displayed her in this, for the first dress, before King Shah Zaman, who rejoiced in her and well-nigh swooned away for love-longing and amorous desire; yea, he was distraught with passion for her, whenas he saw her, because she was as saith of her one of her describers in these couplets[[118]]:-
She comes apparelled in an azure vest ✿ Ultramarine as skies are deckt and dight:
I view’d th’ unparallel’d sight, which showed my eyes ✿ A Summer-moon upon a Winter-night.
Then they returned to Shahrazad and displayed her in the second dress, a suit of surpassing goodliness, and veiled her face with her hair like a chin-veil.[[119]] Moreover, they let down her side-locks and she was even as saith of her one of her describers in these couplets:—
O hail to him whose locks his cheeks o’ershade, ✿ Who slew my life by cruel hard despight:
Said I, “Hast veiled the Morn in Night?” He said, ✿ “Nay I but veil Moon in hue of Night.”
Then they displayed Dunyazad in a second and a third and a fourth dress and she paced forward like the rising sun, and swayed to and fro in the insolence of beauty; and she was even as saith the poet of her in these couplets[[120]]:—
The sun of beauty she to all appears ✿ And, lovely coy she mocks all loveliness:
And when he fronts her favour and her smile ✿ A-morn, the sun of day in clouds must dress.
Then they displayed Shahrazad in the third dress and the fourth and the fifth and she became as she were a Bán-branch snell or a thirsting gazelle, lovely of face and perfect in attributes of grace, even as saith of her one in these couplets[[121]]:—