" Then Aladdin fell to
contriving some means whereby he might look upon the Princess Badr
al-Budur, and at last judged best to take his station behind the
hammam door, whence he might see her face as she entered. Accordingly,
without stay or delay he repaired to the baths before she was expected
and stood a-rear of the entrance, a place whereat none of the folk
happened to be looking.
Now when the Sultan's daughter had gone the rounds of the city and
its main streets and had solaced herself by sight-seeing, she
finally reached the hammam, and whilst entering she raised her veil
and Aladdin saw her favor, he said: "In very truth her fashion
magnifieth her Almighty Fashioner, and glory be to Him Who created her
and adorned her with this beauty and loveliness." His strength was
struck down from the moment he saw her and his thoughts were
distraught. His gaze was dazed, the love of her gat hold of the
whole of his heart, and when he returned home to his mother, he was as
one in ecstasy. His parent addressed him, but he neither replied nor
denied, and, when she set before him the morning meal he continued
in like case, so quoth she: "O my son, what is't may have befallen
thee? Say me, doth aught ail thee? Let me know what ill hath betided
thee, for, unlike thy custom, thou speakest not when I bespeak
thee.
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