Chapter XV: Part 15

[FN#134] Lane (ii. 352) here introduces, between Nights cclxxi. and ccxc., a tale entitled in the Bresl. Edit. (iv. 134) "The Sleeper and the Waker," i.e. the sleeper awakened; and he calls it: The Story of Abu-l-Hasan the Wag. It is interesting and founded upon historical-fact; but it can hardly be introduced here without breaking the sequence of The Nights. I regret this the more as Mr. Alexander J. Cotheal-of New York has most obligingly sent me an addition to the Breslau text (iv. 137) from his MS. But I hope eventually to make use of it.

[FN#135] The first girl calls gold "Titer" (pure, unalloyed metal); the second "Asjad" (gold generally) and the third "Ibrнz" (virgin ore, the Greek {Greek letters}. This is a law of Arab rhetoric never to repeat the word except for a purpose and, as the language can produce 1,200,000 (to 100,000 in English) the copiousness is somewhat painful to readers.

[FN#136] Arab. "Shakes" before noticed.

[FN#137] Arab. "Kussб'б"=the curling cucumber: the vegetable is of the cheapest and the poorer classes eat it as "kitchen" with bread.

[FN#138] Arab. "Haram-hu," a double entendre. Here the Barlawi means his Harem the inviolate part of the house; but afterwards he makes it mean the presence of His Honour.

[FN#139] Toledo? this tale was probably known to Washington Irving. The "Land of Roum " here means simply Frank-land as we are afterwards told that its name was Andalusia the old Vandal-land, a term still applied by Arabs to the whole of the Iberian Peninsula.

[FN#140] Arab. "Amбim" (plur. of Imбmah) the common word for turband which I prefer to write in the old unclipt fashion. We got it through the Port. Turbante and the old French Tolliban from the (now obsolete) Persian term Dolband=a turband or a sash.

[FN#141] Sixth Ommiade Caliph, A.D. 705-716, from "Tбrik" we have

"Gibraltar"=Jabal-al-Tбrik.

[FN#142] Arab. "Yunбn" = Ionia, applied to ancient Greece as

"Roum" is to the Grжco-Roman Empire.

[FN#143] Arab. "Bahramбni ;" prob. alluding to the well-known

legend of the capture of Somanath (Somnauth) from the Hindus by

Mahmud of Ghazni. In the Ajб'ib al-Hind (before quoted) the

Brahmins are called Abrahamah.

[FN#144] i.e. "Peace be with thee!"

[FN#145] i.e. in the palace when the hunt was over. The bluntness and plain-speaking of the Badawi, which caused the revelation of the Koranic chapter "Inner Apartments" (No. xlix.) have always been favourite themes with Arab tale-tellers as a contrast with citizen suavity and servility. Moreover the Badawi, besides saying what he thinks, always tells the truth (unless corrupted by commerce with foreigners); and this is a startling contrast with the townsfolk. To ride out of Damascus and have a chat with the Ruwalб is much like being suddenly transferred from amongst the trickiest of Mediterranean people to the bluff society of the Scandinavian North. And the reason why the Turk will never govern the Arab in peace is that the former is always trying to finesse and to succeed by falsehood, when the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth is wanted.

[FN#146] Koran. xvi. 112.

[FN#147] A common and expressive way of rewarding the tongue which "spoke poetry." The Jewels are often pearls.

[FN#148] Ibrahim Abu Ishбk bin al-Mahdi, a pretender to the Caliphate of well known wit and a famed musician surnamed from his corpulence "Al-Tannнn"=the Dragon or, according to others (Lane ii. 336), "Al-Tin"= the fig. His adventurous history will be found in Ibn Khallikan D'Herbelot and Al-Siyuti.

[FN#149] The Ragha of the Zendavesta, and Rages of the Apocrypha (Tobit, Judith, etc.), the old capital-of Media Proper, and seat of government of Daylam, now a ruin some miles south of Teheran which was built out of its remains. Rayy was founded by Hoshang the primeval-king who first sawed wood, made doors and dug metal. It is called Rayy al-Mahdiyyah because Al-Mahdi held his court there. Harun al-Rashid was also born in it (A.H. 145). It is mentioned by a host of authors and names one of the Makamat of Al-Hariri.

[FN#150] Human blood being especially impure.

[FN#151] Jones, Brown and Robinson.

[FN#152] Arab. "Kumm ," the Moslem sleeve is mostly (like his trousers) of ample dimensions and easily converted into a kind of carpet-bag by depositing small articles in the middle and gathering up the edge in the hand. In this way carried the weight would be less irksome than hanging to the waist. The English of Queen Anne's day had regular sleeve-pockets for memoranda, etc., hence the saying, to have in one's sleeve.

[FN#153] Arab. "Khuff" worn under the "Bбbъg" (a corruption of the Persian pб-push=feet-covers, papooshes, slippers). [Lane M. E. chaps. i.]

[FN#154] Done in hot weather throughout the city, a dry line for camels being left in mid-street to prevent the awkward beasts slipping. The watering of the Cairo streets of late years has been excessive; they are now lines of mud in summer as well as in winter and the effluvia from the droppings of animals have, combined with other causes, seriously deteriorated the once charming climate. The only place in Lower Egypt, which has preserved the atmosphere of 1850, is Suez.

[FN#155] Arab. "Hurбk:" burnt rag, serving as tinder for flint and steel, is a common styptic.

[FN#156] Of this worthy, something has been said and there will be more in a future page.

[FN#157] i.e. the person entitled to exact the blood-wite.

[FN#158] Al-Maamum was a man of sense with all his fanaticism One of his sayings is preserved "Odious is contentiousness in Kings, more odious vexation in judges uncomprehending a case; yet more odious is shallowness of doctors in religions and most odious are avarice in the rich, idleness in youth, jesting in age and cowardice in the soldier."

[FN#159] The second couplet is not in the Mac. Edit. but Lane's

Shaykh has supplied it (ii. 339)

[FN#160] Adam's loins, the "Day of Alast," and the Imam (who stands before the people in prayer) have been explained. The "Seventh Imam" here is Al-Maamun, the seventh Abbaside the Ommiades being, as usual, ignored.

[FN#161] He sinned only for the pleasure of being pardoned, which is poetical-and hardly practical-or probable.

[FN#162] The Katб (sand-grouse) always enters into Arab poetry because it is essentially a desert bird, and here the comparison is good because it lays its eggs in the waste far from water which it must drink morning and evening. Its cry is interpreted "man sakat, salam" (silent and safe), but it does not practice that precept, for it is usually betrayed by its piping " Kata! Kata!" Hence the proverb, "More veracious than the sand-grouse," and "speak not falsely, for the Kata sayeth sooth," is Komayt's saying. It is an emblem of swiftness: when the brigand poet Shanfara boasts, "The ash-coloured Katas can drink only my leavings, after hastening all night to slake their thirst in the morning," it is a hyperbole boasting of his speed. In Sind it is called the "rock pigeon" and it is not unlike a grey partridge when on the wing.

[FN#163] Joseph to his brethren, Koran, xii. 92, when he gives them his "inner garment" to throw over his father's face.

[FN#164] Arab. "Hajjбm"=a cupper who scarifies forehead and legs, a bleeder, a (blood-) sucker. The slang use of the term is to thrash, lick, wallop. (Burckhardt. Prov. 34.)

[FN#165] The Bresl. Edit. (vii. 171-174) entitles this tale, "Story of Shaddбd bin Ad and the City of Iram the Columned ;" but it relates chiefly to the building by the King of the First Adites who, being promised a future Paradise by Prophet Hъd, impiously said that he would lay out one in this world. It also quotes Ka'ab al-Ahbбr as an authority for declaring that the tale is in the "Pentateuch of Moses." Iram was in al-Yaman near Adan (our Aden) a square of ten parasangs (or leagues each= 18,000 feet) every way, the walls were of red (baked) brick 500 cubits high and 20 broad, with four gates of corresponding grandeur. It contained 300,000 Kasr (palaces) each with a thousand pillars of gold-bound jasper, etc. (whence its title). The whole was finished in five hundred years, and, when Shaddad prepared to enter it, the "Cry of Wrath" from the Angel of Death slew him and all his many. It is mentioned in the Koran (chaps. Ixxxix. 6-7) as "Irem adorned with lofty buildings (or pillars)." But Ibn Khaldun declares that commentators have embroidered the passage; Iram being the name of a powerful clan of the ancient Adites and "imбd" being a tent-pole: hence "Iram with the numerous tents or tent-poles." Al-Bayzawi tells the story of Abdullah ibn Kilabah (D'Herbelot's Colabah). At Aden I met an Arab who had seen the mysterious city on the borders of Al-Ahkбf, the waste of deep sands, west of Hadramaut; and probably he had, the mirage or sun-reek taking its place. Compare with this tale "The City of Brass" (Night dlxv.).

[FN#166] The biblical-"Sheba," named from the great-grandson of Joctan, whence the Queen (Bilkis) visited Solomon It was destroyed by the Flood of Mбrib.

[FN#167] The full title of the Holy City is "Madinat al-Nab)" = the City of the Prophet, of old Yasrib (Yathrib) the Iatrippa of the Greeks (Pilgrimage, ii. 119). The reader will remember that there are two "Yasribs:" that of lesser note being near Hujr in the Yamбmah province.

[FN#168] "Ka'ab of the Scribes," a well-known traditionist and religious poet who died (A.H. 32) in the Caliphate of Osman. He was a Jew who islamised; hence his name (Ahbбr, plur. of Hibr, a Jewish scribe, doctor of science, etc. Jarrett's El-Siyuti, p. 123). He must not be confounded with another Ka'ab al-Ahbбr the Poet of the (first) Cloak-poem or "Burdah," a noble Arab who was a distant cousin of Mohammed, and whose tomb at Hums (Emesa) is a place of pious visitation. According to the best authorities (no Christian being allowed to see them) the cloak given to the bard by Mohammed is still preserved together with the Khirkah or Sanjak Sherif ("Holy Coat" or Banner, the national oriflamme) at Stambul in the Upper Seraglio. (Pilgrimage, i. 213.) Many authors repeat this story of Mu'awiyah, the Caliph, and Ka'ab of the Burdah, but it is an evident anachronism, the poet having been dead nine years before the ruler's accession (A.H. 41).

[FN#169] Koran, lxxxix. 6-7.

[FN#170] Arab. "Kahramбn" from Pers., braves, heroes.

[FN#171] The Deity in the East is as whimsical-a despot as any of his "shadows" or "vice regents." In the text Shaddбd is killed for mere jealousy a base passion utterly unworthy of a godhead; but one to which Allah was greatly addicted.

[FN#172] Some traditionist, but whether Sha'abi, Shi'abi or

Shu'abi we cannot decide.

[FN#173] The Hazarmaveth of Genesis (x. 26) in South Eastern Arabia. Its people are the Adramitae (mod. Hazrami) of Ptolemy who places in their land the Arabiж Emporium, as Pliny does his Massola. They border upon the Homeritж or men of Himyar, often mentioned in The Nights. Hazramaut is still practically unknown to us, despite the excursions of many travellers; and the hard nature of the people, the Swiss of Arabia, offers peculiar obstacles to exploration.

[FN#174] i.e. the prophet Hud generally identified (?) with Heber. He was commissioned (Koran, chaps. vii.) to preach Al-Islam to his tribe the Adites who worshipped four goddesses, Sбkiyah (the rain-giver), Rбzikah (food-giver), Hбfizah (the saviouress) and Sбlimah (who healed sickness). As has been seen he failed, so it was useless to send him.

[FN#175] Son of Ibraham al-Mosili, a musician poet and favourite with the Caliphs Harun al-Rashid and Al-Maamun. He made his name immortal-by being the first who reduced Arab harmony to systematic rules, and he wrote a biography of musicians referred to by Al-Hariri in the Sйance of Singar.

[FN#176] This must not be confounded with the "pissing against the wall" of I Kings, xiv. 10, where watering against a wall denotes a man as opposed to a woman.

[FN#177] Arab. "Zambнl" or "Zimbнl," a limp basket made of plaited palm-leaves and generally two handled. It is used for many purposes, from carrying poultry to carrying earth.

[FN#178] Here we have again the Syriac ''Bakhkh -un-Bakhkh-un-''=well done! It is the Pers Бferнn and means "all praise be to him."

[FN#179] Arab. "A Tufayli?" So the Arab. Prov. (ii. 838) "More intrusive than Tufayl" (prob. the P.N. of a notorious sponger). The Badawin call "Wбrish" a man who sits down to meat unbidden and to drink Wбghil; but townsfolk apply the latter to the "Wбrish."

[FN#180] Arab. "Artбl"=rotoli, pounds; and

"A pint is a pound

All the world round;"

except in highly civilised lands where the pint has a curious power of shrinking.

[FN#181] One of Al-Maamun's Wazirs. The Caliph married his daughter whose true name was Bъrбn; but this tale of girl's freak and courtship was invented (?) by Ishak. For the splendour of the wedding and the munificence of the Minister see Lane, ii. 350-352.

[FN#182] I have described this scene, the wretch clinging to the curtain and sighing and crying as if his heart would break (Pilgrimage iii. 216 and 220). The same is done at the place Al-Multazam'"the attached to;" (ibid. 156) and various spots called Al-Mustajбb, "where prayer is granted" (ibid. 162). At Jerusalem the Wailing place of the Jews" shows queer scenes; the worshippers embrace the wall with a peculiar wriggle crying out in Hebrew, "O build Thy House, soon, without delay," etc.

[FN#183] i.e. The wife. The scene in the text was common at Cairo twenty years ago; and no one complained of the stick. See Pilgrimage i., 120.

[FN#184] Arab. "Udm, Udum" (plur. of Idбm) = "relish," olives, cheese, pickled cucumbers, etc.

[FN#185] I have noticed how the left hand is used in the East. In the second couplet we have "Istinjб"=washing the fundament after stool. The lines are highly appropriate for a nightman. Easterns have many foul but most emphatic expressions like those in the text I have heard a mother say to her brat, "I would eat thy merde!" (i.e. how I love thee!).

[FN#186] Arab. "Harrбk," whence probably our "Carack" and

"Carrack" (large ship), in dictionaries derived from Carrus

Marinus.

[FN#187] Arab. "Ghбshiyah"=lit. an йtui, a cover; and often a saddle-cover carried by the groom.

[FN#188] Arab. "Sharбb al-tuffбh" = melapio or cider.

[FN#189] Arab. "Mudawwarah," which generally means a small round cushion, of the Marocco-work well known in England. But one does not strike a cushion for a signal, so we must revert to the original-sense of the word "something round," as a circular plate of wood or metal, a gong, a "bell" like that of the Eastern Christians.

[FN#190] Arab. "Tъfбn" (from the root tauf, going round) a storm, a circular gale, a cyclone the term universally applied in Al-lslam to the "Deluge," the "Flood" of Noah. The word is purely Arabic; with a quaint likeness to the Gr. {Greek letters}, in Pliny typhon, whirlwind, a giant (Typhњus) whence "Typhon" applied to the great Egyptian god "Set." The Arab word extended to China and was given to the hurricanes which the people call "Tee foong," great winds, a second whimsical-resemblance. But Sir John Davis (ii. 383) is hardly correct when he says, "the name typhoon, in itself a corruption of the Chinese term, bears a singular (though we must suppose an accidental) resemblance to the Greek {Greek letters}. "

[FN#191] Plurale majestatis acting superlative; not as Lane supposes (ii. 224) "a number of full moons, not only one." Eastern tongues abound in instances beginning with Genesis (i. 1), "Gods (he) created the heaven," etc. It is still preserved in Badawi language and a wildling greatly to the astonishment of the citizens will address his friend "Yб Rijбl"= O men!

[FN#192] Arab. "Hбsid" = an envier: in the fourth couplet "Azъl" (Azzбl, etc.) = a chider, blamer; elsewhere "Lawwбm" = accuser, censor, slanderer; "Wбshн,"=whisperer, informer; "Rakib"=spying, envious rival; "Ghбbit"=one emulous without envy; and "Shбmit"= a "blue" (fierce) enemy who rejoices over another's calamities. Arabic literature abounds in allusions to this unpleasant category of "damned ill-natured friends;" and Spanish and Portuguese letters, including Brazilian, have thoroughly caught the trick. In the Eastern mind the "blamer" would be aided by the "evil eye."

[FN#193] Another plural for a singular, "O my beloved!"

[FN#194] Arab. "Khayr"=good news, a euphemistic reply even if the tidings be of the worst.

[FN#195] Abbбs (from 'Abs, being austere; and meaning the "grim faced") son of Abd al-Muttalib; uncle to Mohammed and eponym of the Abbaside Khalifahs. A.D. 749=1258.

[FN#196] Katнl = the Irish "kilt."

[FN#197] This hat been explained as a wazirial title of the time.

[FN#198] The phrase is intelligible in all tongues: in Arabic it is opposed to "dark as night," "black as mud" and a host of unsavoury antitheses.

[FN#199] Arab. "Awwбdah," the popular word; not Udнyyah as in Night cclvi. "Ud" liter.= rood and "Al-Ud"=the wood is, I have noted, the origin of our 'lute." The Span. 'laud" is larger and deeper than the guitar, and its seven strings are played upon with a plectrum of buffalo-horn.

[FN#200] Arab. "Tabban lahu!"=loss (or ruin) to him. So "bu'dan lahu"=away with him, abeat in malam rem; and "Suhkan lahu"=Allah and mercy be far from him, no hope for him I

[FN#201] Arab. "Бyah"=Koranic verses, sign, miracle.

[FN#202] The mole on cheek calls to prayers for his preservation; and it is black as Bilal the Abyssinian. Fajran may here mean either "A.-morning" or "departing from grace."

[FN#203] i.e. the young beard (myrtle) can never hope to excel tile beauties of his cheeks (roses).

[FN#204] i.e. Hell and Heaven.

[FN#205] The first couplet is not in the Mac. Edit. (ii. 171)

which gives only a single couplet but it is found in the Bres.

Edit. which entitles this tale "Story of the lying (or false kбzib)

Khalнfah." Lane (ii. 392) of course does not translate it.

[FN#206] In the East cloth of frieze that mates with cloth of gold must expect this treatment. Fath Ali Shah's daughters always made their husbands enter the nuptial-bed by the foot end.

[FN#207] This is always done and for two reasons; the first humanity, that the blow may fall unawares; and, secondly, to prevent the sufferer wincing, which would throw out the headsman.

[FN#208] Arab. "Ma'бni-hб," lit. her meanings, i.e. her inner woman opposed to the formal-seen by every one.

[FN#209] Described in my Pilgrimage (iii. 168, 174 and 175): it is the stone upon which the Patriarch stood when he built the Ka'abah and is said to show the impress of the feet but unfortunately I could not afford five dollars entrance-fee. Caliph Omar placed the station where it now is; before his time it adjoined the Ka'abah. The meaning of the text is, Be thy court a place of pious visitation, etc. At the "Station of Abraham" prayer is especially blessed and expects to be granted. "This is the place where Abraham stood; and whoever entereth therein shall be safe" (Koran ii. 119). For the other fifteen places where petitions are favourably heard by Heaven see ibid. iii. 211-12.

[FN#210] As in the West, so in the East, women answer an unpleasant question by a counter question.

[FN#211] This "Cry of Haro" often occurs throughout The Nights. In real-life it is sure to colece a crowd. especially if an Infidel (non Moslem) be its cause.

[FN#212] In the East a cunning fellow always makes himself the claimant or complainant.

[FN#213] On the Euphrates some 40 miles west of Baghdad The word is written "Anbбr" and pronounced "Ambбr" as usual with the "n" before "b"; the case of the Greek double Gamma.

[FN#214] Syene on the Nile.

[FN#215] The tale is in the richest Rabelaisian humour; and the requisitions of the "Saj'a" (rhymed prose) in places explain the grotesque combinations. It is difficult to divine why Lane omits it: probably he held a hearty laugh not respectable.

[FN#216] A lawyer of the eighth century, one of the chief pupils of the Imam Abu Hanifah, and Kazi of Baghdad under the third, fourth and fifth Abbasides. The tale is told in the quasi- historical-Persian work "Nigбristбn" (The Picture gallery), and is repeated by Richardson, Diss. 7, xiii. None seem to have remarked that the distinguished legist, Abu Yusuf, was on this occasion a law-breaker; the Kazi's duty being to carry out the code not to break it by the tricks of a cunning attorney. In Harun's day, however, some regard was paid to justice, not under his successors, one of whom, Al-Muktadir bi 'llбh (A.H. 295=907), made the damsel Yamika President of the Diwбn al-Mazбlim (Court of the Wronged), a tribunal which took cognizance of tyranny and oppression in high places.

[FN#217] Here the writer evidently forgets that Shahrazad is telling the story to the king, as Boccaccio (ii. 7) forgets that Pamfilo is speaking. Such inconsequences are common in Eastern story-books and a goody-goody sentiment is always heartily received as in an English theatre.

[FN#218] In the Mac. Edit. (ii. 182) "Al-Kushayri." Al-Kasri was

Governor of the two Iraks (I.e. Bassorah and Cufa) in the reign of

Al-Hisham, tenth Ommiade (A.D. 723-741)

[FN#219] Arab. "Thakalata k Ummak!" This is not so much a curse as a playful phrase, like "Confound the fellow." So "Kбtala k Allah" (Allah slay thee) and "Lб abб lak" (thou hast no father or mother). These words are even complimentary on occasions, as a good shot or a fine recitation, meaning that the praised far excels the rest of his tribe.

[FN#220] Koran, iii. 178.

[FN#221] Arab. "Al-Nisбb"=the minimum sum (about half-a crown) for which mutilation of the hand is prescribed by religious law. The punishment was truly barbarous, it chastised a rogue by means which prevented hard honest labour for the rest of his life.

[FN#222] To show her grief.

[FN#223] Abъ Sa'нd Abd al-Malik bin Kurayb, surnamed Al-Asma'i from his grandfather, flor. A.H. 122-306 (=739-830) and wrote amongst a host of compositions the well-known Romance of Antar. See in D'Herbelot the right royal-directions given to him by Harun al-Rashid.

[FN#224] There are many accounts of his death, but it is generally held that he was first beheaded. The story in the text is also variously told and the Persian "Nigбristбn" adds some unpleasant comments upon the House of Abbas. The Persians, for reasons which will be explained in the terminal-Essay, show the greatest sympathy with the Barmecides; and abominate the Abbasides even more than the latter detested the Ommiades.

[FN#225] Not written, as the European reader would suppose.

[FN#226] Arab. "Fъl al-hбrr" = beans like horsebeans soaked and boiled as opposed to the "Fъl Mudammas" (esp. of Egypt)=unshelled beans steamed and boiled all night and eaten with linseed oil as "kitchen" or relish. Lane (M.E., chaps. v.) calls them after the debased Cairene pronunciation, Mudemmes. A legend says that, before the days of Pharaoh (always he of Moses), the Egyptians lived on pistachios which made them a witty, lively race. But the tyrant remarking that the domestic ass, which eats beans, is degenerate from the wild ass, uprooted the pistachio-trees and compelled the lieges to feed on beans which made them a heavy, gross, cowardly people fit only for burdens. Badawis deride "beaneaters" although they do not loathe the pulse like onions. The principal-result of a bean diet is an extraordinary development of flatulence both in stomach and intestines: hence possibly, Pythagoras who had studied ceremonial-purity in Egypt, forbade the use, unless he referred to venery or political-business. I was once sitting in the Greek quarter of Cairo dressed as a Moslem when arose a prodigious hubbub of lads and boys, surrounding, a couple of Fellahs. These men had been working in the fields about a mile east of Cairo and, when returning home, one had said to the other, "If thou wilt carry the hoes I will break wind once for every step we take." He was as good as his word and when they were to part he cried, "And now for thy bakhshish!" which consisted of a volley of fifty, greatly to the delight of the boys.

[FN#227] No porcelain was ever, as far as we can discover, made in Egypt or Syria of the olden day; but, as has been said, there was a regular caravan-intercourse with China At Damascus I dug into the huge rubbish-heaps and found quantities of pottery, but no China. The same has lately been done at Clysma, the artificial-mound near Suez, and the glass and pottery prove it to have been a Roman work which defended the mouth of the old classical-sweet-water canal.

[FN#228] Arab. "Lб baas ba-zбlik," conversational-for "Lб jaram"= there is no harm in it, no objection to it, and, sometimes, "it is a matter of course."

[FN#229] A white emerald is yet unknown; but this adds only to the Oriental-extravagance of the picture. I do not think with Lane (ii. 426) that "abyaz" here can mean "bright." Dr. Steingass suggests a clerical-error for "khazar" (green).

[FN#230] Arab. "Sharбrif" plur. of Shurrбfah=crenelles or battlements; mostly trefoil-shaped; remparts coquets which a six-pounder would crumble.

[FN#231] Pronounce Abul-Muzaffar=Father of the Conqueror.

[FN#232] I have explained the word in my "Zanzibar, City, Island and Coast," vol. i. chaps. v There is still a tribe, the Wadoe, reputed cannibal-on the opposite low East African shore These blacks would hardly be held " sons of Adam." "Zanj " corrupted to "Zinj " (plur Zunъj) is the Persian "Zany" or "Zangi," a black, altered by the Arabs, who ignore the hard g; and, with the suffixion of the Persian -bбr (region, as in Malabar) we have Zang- bar which the Arabs have converted to "Zanjibar," in poetry "Murk al-Zunъj"=Land of the Zang. The term is old; it is the Zingis or Zingisa of Ptolemy and the Zingium of Cosmas Indicopleustes; and it shows the influence of Persian navigation in pre-Islamitic ages. For further details readers will consult "The Lake Regions of Central-Africa" vol. i. chaps. ii

[FN#233] Arab. "Kawбrib" plur. of "Kбrib" prop. a dinghy, a small boat belonging to a ship Here it refers to the canoe (a Carib word) pop. "dug-out" and classically "monoxyle," a boat made of a single tree-trunk hollowed by fire and trimmed with axe and adze. Some of these rude craft which, when manned, remind one of saturnine Caliph Omar's "worms floating on a log of wood," measure 60 feet long and more.

[FN#234] i.e. A descendant of Mohammed in general-and especially through Husayn Ali-son. Here the text notes that the chief of the bazar was of this now innumerable stock, who inherit the title through the mother as well as through the father.

[FN#235] Arab. "Hasab" (=quaneity), the honour a man acquires for himself; opposed to "Nasab" (genealogy) honours inherited from ancestry: the Arabic well expresses my old motto (adopted by Chinese Gordon), "Honour, not Honours."

[FN#236] Note the difference between "Takaddum" ( = standing in presence of, also superiority in excellence) and "Takбdum" (priority in time).

[FN#237] Lane (ii. 427) gives a pleasant Eastern illustration of this saying.

[FN#238] A Koranic fancy; the mountains being the pegs which keep the earth in place. "And he hath thrown before the earth, mountains firmly rooted, lest it should move with you." (Koran, chaps. xvi.) The earth when first created was smooth and thereby liable to a circular motion, like the celestial-orbs; and, when the Angels asked who could stand on so tottering a frame, Allah fixed it the next morning by throwing the mountains in it and pegging them down. A fair prolepsis of the Neptunian theory.

[FN#239] Easy enough for an Englishman to avoid saying "by God," but this common incident in Moslem folk-lore appeals to the peoples who are constantly using the word Allah Wallah, Billah, etc. The Koran expressly says, "Make not Allah the scope (object, lit. arrow-butt) of your oaths" (chaps. ii. 224), yet the command is broken every minute.

[FN#240] This must be the ubiquitous Khizr, the Green Prophet; when Ali appears, as a rule he is on horseback.

[FN#241] The name is apparently imaginary; and a little below we find that it was close to Jinn land. China was very convenient for this purpose: the medieval-Moslems, who settled in considerable numbers at Canton and elsewhere, knew just enough of it to know their own ignorance of the vast empire. Hence the Druzes of the Libanus still hold that part of their nation is in the depths of the Celestial-Empire.

[FN#242] I am unwilling to alter the old title to "City of Copper" as it should be; the pure metal having been technologically used long before the alloy of copper and zinc. But the Maroccan City (Night dlxvi. et seq.) was of brass (not copper). The Hindus of Upper India have an Iram which they call Hari Chand's city (Colonel Tod); and I need hardly mention the Fata Morgana, Island of Saint Borondon; Cape Fly-away; the Flying Dutchman, etc. etc., all the effect of "looming."

[FN#243] This sword which makes men invisible and which takes place of Siegfried's Tarnkappe (invisible cloak) and of "Fortunatus' cap" is common in Moslem folk-lore. The idea probably arose from the venerable practice of inscribing the blades with sentences, verses and magic figures.

[FN#244] Arab. "'Ukбb," in books an eagle (especially black) and P. N. of constellation but in Pop. usage= a vulture. In Egypt it is the Neophron Percnopterus (Jerdon) or N. Gingianus (Latham), the Dijбjat Far'aun or Pharaoh's hen. This bird has been known to kill the Bбshah sparrow-hawk (Jerdon i. 60); yet, curious to say, the reviewers of my "Falconry in the Valley of the Indus" questioned the fact, known to so many travellers, that the falcon is also killed by this "tiger of the air," despite the latter's feeble bill (pp. 35-38). I was faring badly at their hands when the late Mr. Burckhardt Barker came to the rescue. Falconicide is popularly attributed, not only to the vulture, but also to the crestless hawk-eagle (Nisжtus Bonelli) which the Hindus call Morбngб=peacock slayer.

[FN#245] Here I translate "Nahбs"=brass, as the "kumkum" (cucurbite) is made of mixed metal, not of copper.

[FN#246] Mansur al-Nimrн, a poet of the time and a protйgй of

Yahya's son, Al-Fazl.

[FN#247] This was at least four times Mansur's debt.

[FN#248] Intendant of the Palace to Harun al-Rashid. The Bres. Edit. (vii. 254) begins They tell that there arose full enmity between Ja'afar Barmecide and a Sahib of Misr" (Wazir or Governor of Egypt). Lane (ii. 429) quotes to this purpose amongst Arab; historians Fakhr al-Din. (De Sacy's Chrestomathie Arabe i., p. 26, edit. ii.)

[FN#249] Arab. "Armanнyah" which Egyptians call after their mincing fashion "Irminiyeh" hence "Ermine" (Mus Ponticus). Armaniyah was much more extensive than our Armenia, now degraded to a mere province of Turkey, and the term is understood to include the whole of the old Parthian Empire.

[FN#250] Even now each Pasha-governor must keep a "Wakнl" in

Constantinople to intrigue and bribe for him at head-quarters.

[FN#251] The symbol of generosity, of unasked liberality, the "black hand" being that of niggardness.

[FN#252] Arab. Rбh =pure (and old) wine. Arabs, like our classics, usually drank their wine tempered. So Imr al-Keys in his Mu'allakah says, "Bring the well tempered wine that seems to be saffron-tinctured; and, when water-mixed, o'erbrims the cup." (v. 2.)

[FN#253] There is nothing that Orientals relish more than these "goody-goody" preachments; but they read and forget them as readily as Westerns.

[FN#254] Lane (ii. 435) ill-advisedly writes "Sher," as "the word is evidently Persian signifying a Lion." But this is only in the debased Indian dialect, a Persian, especially a Shirazi, pronounces "Shнr." And this is how it is written in the Bresl. Edit., vii. 262. "Shбr" is evidently a fancy name, possibly suggested by the dynastic name of the Ghurjistan or Georgian Princes.

[FN#255] Again old experience, which has learned at a heavy cost how many a goodly apple is rotten at the core.

[FN#256] This couplet has occurred in Night xxi. I give Torrens (p. 206) by way of specimen.

[FN#257] Arab. "Zбka" = merely tasting a thing which may be sweet with a bitter after-flavour

[FN#258] This tetraseich was in Night xxx. with a difference.

[FN#259] The lines have occurred in Night xxx. I quote Torrens, p. 311.

[FN#260] This tetrastich is in Night clxix. I borrow from Lane (ii. 62).

[FN#261] The rude but effective refrigerator of the desert Arab who hangs his water-skin to the branch of a tree and allows it to swing in the wind.

[FN#262] Arab "Khumбsiyah" which Lane (ii. 438) renders "of quinary stature." Usually it means five spans, but here five feet, showing that the girl was young and still growing. The invoice with a slave always notes her height in spans measured from ankle-bone to ear and above seven she loses value as being full grown. Hence Sudбsi (fem. Sudбsiyah) is a slave six spans high, the Shibr or full span (9 inches) not the Fitr or short span from thumb to index. Faut is the interval-between every finger, Ratab between index and medius, and Atab between medius and annularis.

[FN#263] "Moon faced" now sounds sufficiently absurd to us, but it was not always so. Solomon (Cant. vi. 10) does not disdain the image "fair as the moon, clear as the sun," and those who have seen a moon in the sky of Arabia will thoroughly appreciate it. We find it amongst the Hindus, the Persians, the Afghans, the Turks and all the nations of Europe. We have, finally, the grand example of Spenser,

"Her spacious forehead, like the clearest moon, etc."

[FN#264] Blue eyes have a bad name in Arabia as in India: the witch Zarkб of Al-Yamamah was noted for them; and "blue eyed" often means "fierce-eyed," alluding to the Greeks and Daylamites, mortal-enemies to Ishmael. The Arabs say "ruddy of mustachio, blue of eye and black of heart."

[FN#265] Before explained as used with camphor to fill the dead man's mouth.

[FN#266] As has been seen, slapping on the neck is equivalent to our "boxing ears," but much less barbarous and likely to injure the child. The most insulting blow is that with shoe sandal-or slipper because it brings foot in contact with head. Of this I have spoken before.

[FN#267] Arab. "Hibбl" (= ropes) alluding to the A'akбl-fillet which binds the Kъfiyah-kerchief on the Badawi's head. (Pilgrimage, i. 346.)

[FN#268] Arab. "Khiyбl"; afterwards called Kara Gyuz (= "black eyes," from the celebrated Turkish Wazir). The mise-en-scиne was like that of Punch, but of transparent cloth, lamp lit inside and showing silhouettes worked by hand. Nothing could be more Fescenntne than Kara Gyuz, who appeared with a phallus longer than himself and made all the Consuls-General-periodically complain of its abuse, while the dialogue, mostly in Turkish, as even more obscene. Most ingenious were Kara Gyuz's little ways of driving on an Obstinate donkey and of tackling a huge Anatolian pilgrim. He mounted the Neddy's back face to tail, and inserting his left thumb like a clyster, hammered it with his right when the donkey started at speed. For the huge pilgrim he used a ladder. These shows now obsolete, used to enliven the Ezbekiyah Gardens every evening and explain Ovid's Words,

"Delicias videam, Nile jocose, tuas!"

[FN#269] Mohammed (Mishkбt al-Masбbih ii. 360-62) says, "Change the whiteness of your hair but not with anything black." Abu Bakr, who was two years and some months older than the Prophet, used tincture of Henna and Katam. Old Turkish officers justify black dyes because these make them look younger and fiercer. Henna stains white hair orange red; and the Persians apply after it a paste of indigo leaves, the result is successively leek-green, emerald-green, bottle-green and lastly lamp-black. There is a stage in life (the youth of old age) when man uses dyes: presently he finds that the whole face wants dye; that the contrast between juvenile coloured hair and ancient skin is ridiculous and that it is time to wear white.

[FN#270] This prejudice extends all over the East: the Sanskrit saying is "Kvachit kбnб bhaveta sбdhus" now and then a monocular is honest. The left eye is the worst and the popular idea is, I have said, that the damage will come by the injured member

[FN#271] The Arabs say like us, "Short and thick is never quick" and "Long and thin has little in."

[FN#272] Arab. "Ba'azu layбli," some night when his mistress failed him.

[FN#273] The fountain in Paradise before noticed.

[FN#274] Before noticed as the Moslem St. Peter (as far as the keys go).

[FN#275] Arab. "Munkasir" = broken, frail, languishing the only form of the maladive allowed. Here again we have masculine for feminine: the eyelids show love-desire, but, etc.

[FN#276] The river of Paradise.

[FN#277] See Night xii. "The Second Kalandar's Tale " vol. i. 113.

[FN#278] Lane (ii. 472) refers for specimens of calligraphy to Herbin's "Dйveloppements, etc." There are many more than seven styles of writing as I have shown in Night xiii.; vol. i. 129.

[FN#279] Amongst good Moslems this would be a claim upon a man.

[FN#280] These lines have occurred twice already: and first appear in Night xxii. I have borrowed from Mr. Payne (iv. 46).

[FN#281] Arab. "Ya Nasrбni", the address is not intrinsically slighting but it may easily be made so. I have elsewhere noted that when Julian (is said to have) exclaimed "Vicisti Nazarene!" he was probably thinking in Eastern phrase "Nasarta, yб Nasrбni!"

[FN#282] Thirst is the strongest of all pleas to an Eastern, especially to a Persian who never forgets the sufferings of his Imam, Husayn, at Kerbela: he would hardly withhold it from the murderer of his father. There is also a Hadis, "Thou shalt not refuse water to him who thirsteth in the desert."

[FN#283] Arab. "Zimmi" which Lane (ii. 474) aptly translates a "tributary." The Koran (chaps. ix.) orders Unbelievers to Islamize or to "pay tribute by right of subjection" (lit. an yadin=out of hand, an expression much debated). The least tribute is one dinar per annum which goes to the poor-rate. and for this the Kafir enjoys protection and almost all the civil rights of Moslems. As it is a question of "loaves and fishes" there is much to say on the subject; "loaves and fishes" being the main base and foundation of all religious establishments.

[FN#284] This tetrastich has before occurred, so I quote Lane (ii. 444).

[FN#285] In Night xxxv. the same occurs with a difference.

[FN#286] The old rite, I repeat, has lost amongst all but the noblest of Arab tribes the whole of its significance; and the traveller must be careful how he trusts to the phrase "Nahnu mбlihin" we are bound together by the salt.

[FN#287] Arab. "Alбma" = Alб-mб = upon what ? wherefore ?

[FN#288] Arab. "Mauz"; hence the Linnean name Musa (paradisiaca, etc.). The word is explained by Sale (Koran, chaps. xxxvii. 146) as "a small tree or shrub;" and he would identify it with Jonah's gourd.

[FN#289] Lane (ii. 446) "bald wolf or empowered fate," reading (with Mac.) Kazб for Kattan (cat).

[FN#290] i.e. "the Orthodox in the Faith." Rбshid is a proper name, witness that scourge of Syria, Rбshid Pasha. Born in 1830, of the Haji Nazir Agha family, Darrah-Beys of Macedonian Draina, he was educated in Paris where he learned the usual-hatred of Europeans: he entered the Egyptian service in 1851, and, presently exchanging it for the Turkish, became in due time Wali (Governor-General) of Syria which he plundered most shamelessly. Recalled in 1872, he eventually entered the Ministry and on June 15 1876, he was shot down, with other villains like himself, by gallant Captain Hasan, the Circassian (Yarham-hu 'llбh !).

[FN#291] Quoted from a piece of verse, of which more presently.

[FN#292] This tetrastich has occurred before (Night cxciii.). I quote Lane (ii. 449), who quotes Dryden's Spanish Friar,

"There is a pleasure sure in being mad

Which none but madmen know."

[FN#293] Lane (ii. 449) gives a tradition of the Prophet, "Whoso is in love, and acteth chastely, and concealeth (his passion) and dieth, dieth a martyr." Sakar is No. 5 Hell for Magi Guebres, Parsis, etc., it is used in the comic Persian curse, "Fi'n-nбri wa Sakar al-jadd w'al-pidar"=ln Hell and Sakar his grandfather and his father.

[FN#294] Arab. "Sifr": I have warned readers that whistling is considered a kind of devilish speech by the Arabs, especially the Badawin, and that the traveller must avoid it. It savours of idolatry: in the Koran we find (chaps. viii. 35), "Their prayer at the House of God (Ka'abah) is none other than whistling and hand-clapping;" and tradition says that they whistled through their fingers. Besides many of the Jinn have only round holes by way of mouths and their speech is whistling a kind of bird language like sibilant English.

[FN#295] Arab. 'Kнl wa kбl"=lit. "it was said and he said;" a popular phrase for chit chat, tittle-tattle, prattle and prate, etc.

[FN#296] Arab. "Hadis." comparing it with a tradition of the

Prophet.

[FN#297] Arab. "Mikashshah," the thick part of a midrib of a palm-frond soaked for some days in water and beaten out till the fibres separate. It makes an exceedingly hard, although not a lasting broom.

[FN#298] Persian, "the youth, the brave;" Sansk. Yuvбn: and Lat. Juvenis. The Kurd, in tales, is generally a sturdy thief; and in real-life is little better.

[FN#299] Arab. "Yб Shatir ;" lit. O clever one (in a bad sense).

[FN#300] Lane (ii. 453) has it. "that I may dress thy hair'" etc.

This is Bowdlerising with a witness.

[FN#301] The sign of respect when a personage dismounts.

(Pilgrimage i. 77.)

[FN#302] So the Hindus speak of "the defilement of separation" as if it were an impurity.

[FN#303] Lane (i. 605) gives a long and instructive note on these public royal-banquets which were expected from the lieges by Moslem subjects. The hanging-penalty is, perhaps, a tattle exaggerated; but we find the same excess in the priestly Gesta Romanorum.

[FN#304] Had he eaten it he would have become her guest. Amongst the older Badawin it was sufficient to spit upon a man (in entreaty) to claim his protection: so the horse-thieves when caught were placed in a hole in the ground covered over with matting to prevent this happening. Similarly Saladin (Salбh al-Din) the chivalrous would not order a cup of water for the robber, Reynald de Chвtillon, before putting him to death

[FN#305] Arab. "Kishk" properly "Kashk"=wheat-meal-coarsely ground and eaten with milk or broth. It is de rigueur with the Egyptian Copts on the "Friday of Sorrow" (Good Friday): and Lane gives the recipe for making it (M. E. chaps. xxvi.)

[FN#306] In those days distinctive of Moslems.

[FN#307] The euphemism has before been noticed: the Moslem reader would not like to pronounce the words "I am a Nazarene." The same formula occurs a little lower down to save the reciter or reader from saying "Be my wife divorced," etc.

[FN#308] Arab, "Hбjj," a favourite Egyptianism. We are wrong to write Hajji which an Eastern would pronounce Hбj-jн.

[FN#309] This is Cairene "chaff."

[FN#310] Whose shell fits very tight.

[FN#311] His hand was like a raven's because he ate with thumb and two fingers and it came up with the rice about it like a camel's hoof in dirty ground. This refers to the proverb (Burckhardt, 756), "He comes down a crow-claw (small) and comes up a camel-hoof (huge and round)."

[FN#312] Easterns have a superstitious belief in the powers of food: I knew a learned man who never sat down to eat without a ceremonious salam to his meat.

[FN#313] Lane (ii. 464), uses the vile Turkish corruption "Rustum," which, like its fellow "Rustem," would make a Persian shudder.

[FN#314] Arab. "Darrij" i.e. let them slide (Americanicи).

[FN#315] This tetrastich has occurred before: so I quote Mr. Payne (in loco).

[FN#316] Shaykh of Al-Butnah and Jбbiyah, therefore a Syrian of the Hauran near Damascus and grandson to Isъ (Esau). Arab mystics (unlike the vulgar who see only his patience) recognise that inflexible integrity which refuses to utter "words of wind" and which would not, against his conscience, confess to wrong-doing merely to pacify the Lord who was stronger than himself. The Classics taught this noble lesson in the case of Prometheus versus Zeus. Many articles are called after Job e.g. Ra'arб' Ayyub or Ghubayrб (inula Arabica and undulata), a creeper with which he rubbed himself and got well: the Copts do the same on "Job's Wednesday," i.e. that before Whit Sunday O.S. Job's father is a nickname of the camel, etc. etc.

[FN#317] Lane (in loco) renders "I am of their number." But "fн al-siyбk" means popularly "(driven) to the point of death."

[FN#318] Lit. = "pathway, road"; hence the bridge well known as "finer than a hair and sharper than a sword," over which all (except Khadijah and a chosen few) must pass on the Day of Doom; a Persian apparatus bodily annexed by Al-Islam. The old Guebres called it Puli Chinбvar or Chinбvad and the Jews borrowed it from them as they did all their fancies of a future life against which Moses had so gallantly fought. It is said that a bridge over the grisly "brook Kedron" was called Sirбt (the road) and hence the idea, as that of hell-fire from Ge-Hinnom (Gehenna) where children were passed through the fire to Moloch. A doubtful Hadis says, "The Prophet declared Al-Sirбt to be the name of a bridge over hell- fire, dividing Hell from Paradise" (pp. 17, 122, Reynold's trans. of Al-Siyuti's Traditions, etc.). In Koran i. 5, "Sirat" is simply a path, from sarata, he swallowed, even as the way devours (makes a lakam or mouthful of) those who travel it. The word was orig. written with Sнn but changed for easier articulation to Sбd, one of the four Hurъf al-Mutabbakбt, "the flattened," formed by the broadened tongue in contact with the palate. This Sad also by the figure Ishmбm (=conversion) turns slightly to a Zб, the intermediate between Sin and Sad.

[FN#319] The rule in Turkey where catamites rise to the highest rank: C'est un homme de bonne famille (said a Turkish officer in Egypt) il a йtй achetй. Hence "Alfi" (one who costs a thousand) is a well-known cognomen. The Pasha of the Syrian caravan, with which I travelled' had been the slave of a slave and he was not a solitary instance. (Pilgrimage i. 90.)

[FN#320] The device of the banquet is dainty enough for any old Italian novella; all that now comes is pure Egyptian polissonnerie speaking to the gallery and being answered by roars of laughter.

[FN#321] i.e. "art thou ceremonially pure and therefore fit for handling by a great man like myself?"

[FN#322] In past days before Egypt was "frankified" many overlanders used to wash away the traces of travel by a Turkish bath which mostly ended in the appearance of a rump wriggling little lad who offered to shampoo them. Many accepted his offices without dreaming of his usual-use or misuse.

[FN#323] Arab. "Imбm." This is (to a Moslem) a most offensive comparison between prayer and car. cop.

[FN#324] Arab. "Fi zaman-hi," alluding to a peculiarity highly prized by Egyptians; the use of the constrictor vaginж muscles, the sphincter for which Abyssinian women are famous. The "Kabbбzah" ( = holder), as she is called, can sit astraddle upon a man and can provoke the venereal-orgasm, not by wriggling and moving but by tightening and loosing the male member with the muscles of her privities, milking it as it were. Consequently the cassenoisette costs treble the money of other concubines. (Arranga-Ranga, p. 127.)

[FN#325] The little eunuchs had evidently studied the Harem.

[FN#326] Lane (ii. 494) relates from Al-Makrizi, that when Khamбrawayh, Governor of Egypt (ninth century), suffered from insomnia, his physician ordered a pool of quicksilver 50 by 50 cubits, to be laid out in front of his palace, now the Rumaylah square. "At the corners of the pool were silver pegs, to which were attached by silver rings strong bands of silk, and a bed of skins, inflated with air, being thrown upon the pool and secured by the bands remained in a continual-state of agreeable vacillation." We are not told that the Prince was thereby salivated like the late Colonel Sykes when boiling his mercury for thermometric experiments,

[FN#327] The name seems now unknown. "Al-Khahн'a" is somewhat stronger than "Wag," meaning at least a "wicked wit." Properly it is the Span. "perdido," a youth cast off (Khala') by his friends; though not so strong a term as "Harfъsh"=a blackguard.

[FN#328] Arab. "Farsakh"=parasang.

[FN#329] Arab. "Nahбs asfar"=yellow copper, brass as opposed to Nahбs ahmar=copper The reader who cares to study the subject will find much about it in my "Book of The Sword," chaps. iv.

[FN#330] Lane (ii. 479) translates one stanza of this mukhammas (pentastich) and speaks of "five more," which would make six.

[FN#331] A servile name. Delicacy, Elegance.

[FN#332] These verses have occurred twice (Night ix. etc.): so I give Lane's version (ii. 482).

[FN#333] A Badawi tribe to which belonged the generous Ma'an bin

Za'idab, often mentioned The Nights.

[FN#334] Wealthy harems, I have said, are hot-beds of Sapphism and Tribadism. Every woman past her first youth has a girl whom she calls her "Myrtle" (in Damascus). At Agbome, capital-of Dahome, I found that a troop of women was kept for the use of the "Amazons" (Mission to Gelele, ii. 73). Amongst the wild Arabs, who ignore Socratic and Sapphic perversions, the lover is always more jealous of his beloved's girl-friends than of men rivals. In England we content ourselves with saying that women corrupt women more than men do.

[FN#335] The Hebrew Pentateuch; Roll of the Law.

[FN#336] I need hardly notice the brass trays, platters and table-covers with inscriptions which are familiar to every reader: those made in the East for foreign markets mostly carry imitation inscriptions lest infidel eyes fall upon Holy Writ.

[FN#337] These six distichs are in Night xiii. I borrow Torrens (p. 125) to show his peculiar treatment of spinning out 12 lines to 38.

[FN#338] Arab. "Musбmirah"=chatting at night. Easterns are inordinately fond of the practice and the wild Arabs often sit up till dawn, talking over the affairs of the tribe, indeed a Shaykh is expected to do so. "Early to bed and early to rise" is a civilised, not a savage or a barbarous saying. Samнr is a companion in night talk; Rafнk of the road; Rahнb in riding horse or camel, Kб'id in sitting, Sharнb and Rafнs at drink, and Nadнm at table: Ahнd is an ally. and Sharнk a partner all on the model of "Fa'нl."

[FN#339] In both lover and beloved the excess of love gave them this clairvoyance.

[FN#340] The prayer will be granted for the excess (not the purity) of her love.

[FN#341] This wailing over the Past is one of the common-places of Badawi poetry. The traveller cannot fail, I repeat, to notice the chronic melancholy of peoples dwelling under the brightest skies.

[FN#342] Moons=Budъr

[FN#343] in Paradise as a martyr.

[FN#344] i.e. to intercede for me in Heaven; as if the young woman were the prophet.

[FN#345] The comparison is admirable as the two letters are written. It occurs in Al-Hariri (Ass. of Ramlah).

"So I embraced him close as Lбm cleaves to Alif:"

And again;

"She laid aside reluctance and I embraced her close

As if I were Lam and my love Alif."

The Lomad Olaph in Syriac is similarly colligated.

[FN#346] Here is a double entendre "and the infirm letters (viz. a, w and y) not subject to accidence, left him." The three make up the root "Awi"=pitying, condoling.

[FN#347] Showing that consummation had taken place. It was a sign of good breeding to avoid all "indecent hurry" when going to bed. In some Moslem countries the bridegroom does not consummate the marriage for seven nights; out of respect for (1) father (2) mother (3) brother and so forth. If he hurry matters he will be hooted as an "impatient man" and the wise will quote, "Man is created of precipitation" (Koran chaps. xxi. 38), meaning hasty and inconsiderate. I remark with pleasure that the whole of this tale is told with commendable delicacy. O si sic omnia!

[FN#348] Pers. "Nauroz"(=nau roz, new day):here used in the Arab. plur.'Nawбriz, as it lasted six days. There are only four: universal-festivals; the solstices and the equinoxes; and every successive religion takes them from the sun and perverts them to its own private purposes. Lane (ii. 496) derives the venerable Nauroz whose birth is hid in the outer glooms of antiquity from the "Jewish Passover"(!)

[FN#349] Again the "babes" of the eyes.

[FN#350] i.e. whose glance is as the light of the glowing braise or (embers). The Arab. "Mikbбs"=pan or pot full of small charcoal, is an article well known in Italy and Southern Europe. The word is apparently used here because it rhymes with "Anfбs" (souls, spirits).

[FN#351] i.e. martyrdom; a Koranic term "fi sabнli 'llahi" = on the way of Allah

[FN#352] These rhymes in -y, -ee and -ie are purposely affected, to imitate the cadence of the Arabic.

[FN#353] Arab. "Sujъd," the ceremonial-prostration, touching the ground with the forehead So in the Old Testament "he bowed (or fell down) and worshipped" (Gen. xxiv., 26 Mat. ii., 11), of which our translation gives a wrong idea.

[FN#354] A girl is called "Alfiyyah " = A-shaped.

[FN#355] i.e. the medial-form of m.

[FN#356] i.e. the inverted n.

[FN#357] It may also mean a "Sevignй of pearls."