THE CONCLUSION OF THE ONE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS
Then King Schahriar exclaimed: “O Sheherazade, how splendid is this story! O! how wonderful she is! Thou hast instructed me, O learned and eloquent, and has caused me to see the events which happened to others besides me, and to consider attentively the words of past kings and peoples, and what things happened to them, extraordinary or wonderful or simply worthy of reflection. And, in truth, behold, having listened to you during these thousand and one nights, I am leaving with a soul deeply changed and joyful and imbued with the happiness of living. So glory to Him who has granted you, O blessed daughter of my vizier, so many chosen gifts, and has perfumed your mouth, and put eloquence on your tongue, and, under your brow, intelligence!"
And little Doniazade got up completely from the carpet where she was snuggled, and ran to throw herself into the arms of her sister, and cried: "O Sheherazade, my sister, how sweet and charming and delicious and instructive are the words, and moving and tasty in their freshness! O! How beautiful are your words, my sister!"
And Sheherazade leaned towards her sister, and, embracing her, she whispered in her ear a few words which she alone heard. And the young girl immediately disappeared, like camphor.
And Sheherazade was left alone for a few moments with King Schahriar. And, as he was getting ready, at the limit of contentment, to take his marvelous wife in his arms, the curtains opened and Doniazade reappeared, followed by a nurse who was holding two twins hanging from her breasts, while a third child crawled behind her.
And Sheherazade turned smiling towards King Schahriar, and arranged the three little ones in front of him, after having hugged them to her bosom, and, her eyes wet with tears, she said to him: "O King of time, here are the three children whom , during these three years, granted you the Retributor through me."
And, while King Schahriar, filled with inexpressible joy, and stirred to the bottom of his entrails, embraced his children, Sheherazade continued: "Your eldest son is now two years old, and these two twins soon to be a year old — may Allah remove the evil eye from the three of them!" And she added: “You remember, indeed, O King of time, that I was indisposed for twenty days, between the six hundred and seventy-ninth night and the seven hundredth. However, it was precisely at this moment that I gave birth to these two twins, whose arrival tired me much more than that of their eldest, the previous year. Because I was so little disturbed by my first diapers that I was able, without interruption, to continue the story then in progress."
And, having thus spoken, she was silent.
And King Schahriar, who was at the extreme limit of emotion, looked from mother to children, and from children to mother, and could not manage to utter a single word.
Then the young Doniazade, after having embraced the children for the twentieth time, turned to King Schahriar and said to him: "And now, O King of time, are you going to have my sister Sheherazade killed, the mother of your children, and thus leave orphans of their mother these three little kings whom no woman can love and care for with the heart of a mother?"
And King Schahriar said, between two sobs, to Doniazade: "Shut up, O young girl, and keep quiet." Then, having succeeded in controlling his emotion somewhat, he turned to Sheherazade and said to her: "O Sheherazade, by the Lord of mercy! you were already in my heart before the arrival of our children. For you knew how to win me over by the qualities with which your Creator adorned you; and I loved you in my spirit because I found in you a pure, pious, chaste, gentle woman, free from all deceit, intact in all respects, ingenuous, subtle, eloquent, discreet, smiling and wise. Ah! May Allah bless you, and bless your father and your mother and your race and your origin!"
And he added: “O Sheherazade, this night, which is the thousand and first, from the moment when I saw you for the first time, is for us a night whiter than the face of the day. And, saying this, he rose and kissed her on the head.
And Sheherazade then took the hand of the King, her husband, and raised it to her lips, to her heart and to her forehead, and said: "O King of time, I beg you to call your old vizier, so that his heart take comfort in me and rejoice in this blessed night."