married a fresh wife and had her strangled the following morning before the
grand-vizir, whose duty it was to provide these unhappy brides for the Sultan.
The poor man fulfilled his task with reluctance, but there was no escape, and
every day saw a girl married and a wife dead.
This behaviour caused the greatest horror in the town, where nothing was heard
but cries and lamentations. In one house was a father weeping for the loss of
his daughter, in another perhaps a mother trembling for the fate of her child;
and instead of the blessings that had formerly been heaped on the Sultan's head,
the air was now full of curses.
The grand-vizir himself was the father of two daughters, of whom the elder
was called Scheherazade, and the younger Dinarzade. Dinarzade had no particular
gifts to distinguish her from other girls, but her sister was clever and courageous
in the highest degree. Her father had given her the best masters in philosophy,
medicine, history and the fine arts, and besides all this, her beauty
