Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 5.djvu/348

314 the King,’ said the vizier, ‘what a trick this woman played off upon the folk! And I have heard tell also that THE MAN WHO SAW THE NIGHT OF POWER.

A certain man had longed all his life to look upon the Night of Power, and it befell that, one night, he looked up at the sky and saw the angels and Heaven’s gates opened and beheld all things in the act of prostration before their Lord, each in its several room. So he said to his wife, “Harkye, such an one, God hath shown me the Night of Power, and it hath been proclaimed to me, from the invisible world, that three prayers will be granted unto me; so do thou counsel me what I shall ask.” Quoth she, “O man, the perfection of man and his delight is in his yard; so do thou pray God to greaten thy yard and magnify it.” So he lifted up his hands to heaven and said, “O my God, greaten my yard and magnify it.” Hardly