Chapter 9

and Titania makes the lover on the pear-tree invisible. Mr. Clouston refers me also to the Bahár-i-Dánish, or Prime of Knowledge (Scott's translation, vol. ii., pp. 64—68); "How the Brahman learned the Tirrea Bede"; to the Turkish "Kirk Wazir" (Forty Wazirs) of the Shaykh-Zadeh (xxivth Wazir's story); to the "Comœdia Lydiæ," and to Barbazan's "Fabliaux et Contes" t. iii. p. 451, "La Saineresse," the cupping-woman.

[FN#372] In the European versions it is always a pear-tree.

[FN#373] This supernatural agency, ever at hand and ever credible to Easterns, makes this the most satisfactory version of the world-wide tale.

[FN#374] i.e. till next harvest time.

[FN#375] The "'Ashshár," or Tither, is most unpopular in the Nile-valley as in Wales; and he generally merits his ill-repute. Tales concerning the villainy of these extortioners abound in Egypt and Syria. The first step in improvement will be so to regulate the tithes that the peasants may not be at the mercy of these "publicans and sinners" who, however, can plead that they have paid highly for appointment to office and must recoup themselves.

[FN#376] Arab. "'Ammir"=cause to flourish.

[FN#377] Arab. "Afkah," a better Fakíh or theologian; all Moslem law being based upon the Koran, the Sayings (Hadis) and Doings (Sunnat) of the Prophet; and, lastly, the Rasm or immemorial custom of the country provided that it be not opposed to the other three.

[FN#378] If the number represent the days in the Moslem year it should be 354=6 months of 29 days and the rest of 30).

[FN#379] The affirmative particle "kad" preceding a verb in the past gives it a present and at times a future signification.

[FN#380] A danik, the Persian "Dáng," is one-sixth of a dirham, i.e. about one penny. See vol. ii. 204.

[FN#381] It would mightily tickle an Eastern audience to hear of a Tither being unable to do any possible amount of villainy.

[FN#382] i.e. The oath of triple divorce which is, I have said, irrevocable, and the divorcée may not be taken again by her husband till her marriage with another man (the Mustahill of The Nights) has been consummated. See vol. iv., 48.

[FN#383] i.e. thousandfold cuckold.

[FN#384] Arab. "Wadí'ah" = the blows which the Robber had given him.

[FN#385] Arab. "Sindiyán" (from the Persian) gen. used for the holm-oak, the Quercus pseudococcifera, vulgarly termed ilex, or native oak, and forming an extensive scrub in Syria. For this and other varieties of Quercus, as the Mallúl and the Ballút, see Unexplored Syria, i. 68.

[FN#386] Hibernicè.

[FN#387] Lit. "In the way of moderation" = at least, at the most moderate reckoning.

[FN#388] Arab. "Rasmál," the vulg. Syrian and Egyptian form of Raas al-mál = stock-in-trade.

[FN#389] Usually a ring or something from his person to show that all was fair play; here however, it was a watchword.

[FN#390] Arab. "Ya Madyúbah," prob. a clerical error for "Madyúnah," alluding to her many debts which he had paid. Here, however, I suspect the truly Egyptian term "Yá Manyúkah!"=O thou berogered; a delicate term of depreciation which may be heard a dozen times a day in the streets of Cairo. It has also a masculine form, "Yá Manyúk!"

[FN#391] About=100 lb. Mr. Sayce (Comparative Philol. p. 210) owns that Mn is old Egyptian but makes it a loan from the "Semites," like Sús (horse), Sar (prince), Sepet (lip) and Murcabutha (chariot), and goes to its origin in the Acratan column, because "it is not found before the times when the Egyptians borrowed freely from Palestine." But surely it is premature to draw such conclusion when we have so much still to learn concerning the dates of words in Egyptian.

[FN#392] Arab. Jámi'. This anachronism, like many of the same kind, is only apparent. The faith preached by Sayyidná Isà was the Islam of his day and dispensation, and it abrogated all other faiths till itself abrogated by the mission of Mahommed. It is therefore logical to apply to it terms which we should hold to be purely Moslem. On the other hand it is not logical to paint the drop-curtain of the Ober-Ammergau "Miracle-play" with the Mosque of Omar and the minarets of Al-Islam. I humbly represented this fact to the mechanicals of the village whose performance brings them in so large a sum every decade; but Snug, Snout and Bottom turned up the nose of contempt and looked upon me as a mere "shallow sceptic."

[FN#393] Arab. "Talámizah," plur. of Tilmíz, a disciple, a young attendant. The word is Syriac and there is a Heb. root but no Arabic. In the Durrat al-Ghawwás, however, Tilmíz, Bilkís, and similar words are Arabic in the form of Fa'líl and Fi'líl

[FN#394] Rúh Allah, lit.=breath of Allah, attending to the miraculous conception according to the Moslems. See vol. v. 238.

[FN#395] Readers will kindly pronounce this word "Sahrá" not Sahárá.

[FN#396] Mr. Clouston refers for analogies to this tale to his "Oriental Sources of some of Chaucer's Tales" (Notes and Queries, 1885—86), and he finds the original of The Pardoner's Tale in one of the Játakas or Buddhist Birth-stories entitled Vedabbha Jataka. The story is spread over all Europe; in the Cento Novelle Antiche; Morlini; Hans Sachs, etc. And there are many Eastern versions, e.g. a Persian by Faríd al-Dín "'Attar" who died at a great age in A.D. 1278; an Arabic version in The Orientalist (Kandy, 1884); a Tibetan in Rollston's Tibetan Tales; a Cashmirian in Knowles' Dict. of Kashmírí Proverbs, etc., etc., etc.

[FN#397] Arab. "'Awán" lit.=aids, helpers; the "Aun of the Jinn" has often occurred.

[FN#398] i.e. the peasant.

[FN#399] i.e. those serving on the usual feudal tenure; and bound to suit and service for their fiefs.

[FN#400] i.e. the yearly value of his fief.

[FN#401] i.e. men who paid taxes.

[FN#402] Arab. "Rasátík" plur. of Rusták. See vol. vi. 289.

[FN#403] This adventure is a rechauffé of Amjad's adventure (vol. iii. 333) without, however, its tragic catastrophe.

[FN#404] The text is so concise as to be enigmatical. The house was finely furnished for a feast, as it belonged to the Man who was lavish, etc.

[FN#405] Arab. "Khubz Samíz;" the latter is the Arabisation of the Pers. Samíd, fine white bread, simnel, Germ. semmel.

[FN#406] The text has "Bakúlát"=pot-herbs; but it is probably a clerical error for "Bakláwát." See vol. ii. 311.

[FN#407] Egyptian-like he at once calls upon Allah to witness a lie and his excuse would be that the lie was well-intentioned.

[FN#408] i.e. The private bagnio which in old days every grand house possessed.

[FN#409] This is a fancy title, but it suits the tale better than that in the text (xi. 183) "The Richard who lost his wealth and his wits." Mr. Clouston refers to similar stories in Sacchetti and other early Italian novelists.

[FN#410] Arab. "Al-Muwaswis": for "Wiswás" see vol. i. 106. This class of men in stories takes the place of our "cunning idiot," and is often confounded with the Saudáwi, the melancholist proper.

[FN#411] Arab. "Hamhama," an onomapœic, like our hum, hem, and haw.

[FN#412] Arab. "Barniyah," a vessel either of glass or pottery like that in which the manna was collected (Exod. xvi. 33).

[FN#413] A hasty man, as Ghazbán=an angry man.

[FN#414] The Bresl. Edit. misprint. "Khablas" in more places than one, now with a Sín, then with a Sád. Khalbas suggests "Khalbús," a buffoon, for which see vol. ii. 143. In Egypt, however, the latter generally ends in a Sad (see Lane's "Khalboos," M. E. chap. xxvii).

[FN#415] This story is a rechauffé of the Jewish Kazi and his pious wife; see vol. v. 256.

[FN#416] The Arab form of "Nayshápúr"=reeds of (King) Shapúr: see vol. ix. 230.

[FN#417] Arab. "Alà Tarík al-Satr wa al-Salámah," meaning that each other's wives did not veil before their brothers-in-law as is usually done. It may also mean that they were under Allah's protection and in best of condition.

[FN#418] i.e. he dared not rape her.

[FN#419] i.e. her "yes" meant "yes" and her "no" meant "no."

[FN#420] "Ignorance" (Jahl) may, here and elsewhere, mean wickedness, forwardness, folly, vicious folly or uncalled-for wrath. Here Arabic teaches a good lesson, for ignorance, intemperance and egoism are, I repeat, the roots of all evil.

[FN#421] So Mohammed said of a child born in adultery "The babe to the blanket (i.e. let it be nursed and reared) and the adultress to the stone."

[FN#422] Arab. "Wa há," etc., an interjection corresponding with the Syriac "ho" lo! (i.e., look) behold! etc.

[FN#423] This paragraph is supplied by Mr. Payne: something of the kind has evidently fallen out of the Arab text.

[FN#424] i.e. in the presence of witnesses, legally.

[FN#425] Lit. a myriad, ten thousand dirhams. See vol. iv. 281.

[FN#426] The fire was intended to defend the mother and babe from Jinns, bad spirits, the evil eye, etc. Romans lit candles in the room of the puerpara; hence the goddess Candelifera, and the term Candelaria applied to the B.V. In Brand's Popular Antiquities (ii. 144) we find, "Gregory mentions an ordinary superstition of the old wives who dare not trust a child in a cradle by itself alone without a candle;" this was for fear of the "night-hag" (Milton, P. L., ii. 662). The same idea prevailed in Scotland and in Germany: see the learned Liebrecht (who translated the Pentamerone) "Zur Volkskunde," p. 31. In Sweden if the candle go out, the child may be carried off by the Trolls (Weckenstedt, Wendische Sagen, p. 446). The custom has been traced to the Malay peninsula, whither it was probably imported by the Hindus or the Moslems, and amongst the Tajiks in Bokhara. For the Hindu practice, see Katha S. S. 305, and Prof. Tawney's learned note analysed above.

[FN#427] Arab. "Káhinah," fem. of Káhin (Cohen): see Kahánah, vol. i. 28.

[FN#428] i.e. for a long time, as has been before explained.

[FN#429] i.e. at his service. Arabia was well provided with Hetairæ and public women long before the days of Al-Islam.

[FN#430] Arab. "Athar"=sign, mark, trail.

[FN#431] i.e. Persia. See vol. v. 26.

[FN#432] Arab. "'Akákír" plur. of 'Akkár prop.=aromatic roots; but applied to vulgar drugs or simples, as in the Tale of the Sage Duban, i. 46.

[FN#433] Arab. "Si'at rizki-h" i.e., the ease with which he earned his copious livelihood.

[FN#434] i.e. the ten thousand dirhams of the bond, beside the unpaid and contingent portion of her "Mahr" or marriage-settlement.

[FN#435] Arab. "Al-Házúr" from Hazr=loquacity, frivolous garrulity. Every craft in the East has a jargon of its own and the goldsmith (Zargar) is famed for speaking a language made unintelligible by the constant insertion of a letter or letters not belonging to the word. It is as if we rapidly pronounced How d'ye do=Howth doth yeth doth?

[FN#436] Arab. "Asmá al-Adwiyah," such as are contained in volumes like the "Alfáz al-Adwi-yah" (Nomenclature of Drugs).

[FN#437] I am compelled to insert a line in order to make sense.

[FN#438] "Galen," who is considered by Moslems as a kind of pre-Islamitic Saint; and whom Rabelais (iii. c. 7) calls Le gentil Falot Galen, is explained by Eustathius as the Serene {Galenòs} from {geláoo}=rideo.

[FN#439] Arab. "Sáhah" the clear space before the house as opposed to the "Bathah" (Span. Patio) the inner court.

[FN#440] A naïve description of the naïve style of réclame adopted by the Eastern Bob Sawyer.

[FN#441] Which they habitually do, by the by, with an immense amount of unpleasant detail. See Pilgrimage i. 18.

[FN#442] The old French name for the phial or bottle in which the patient's water is sent.

[FN#443] A descendant from Mohammed, strictly through his grandson Husayn. See vol. iv. 170.

[FN#444] Arab. "Al-Futúh" lit. the victories; a euphemistic term for what is submitted to the "musculus guineaorum."

[FN#445] Arab. "Firásah" lit. judging the points of a mare (faras). Of physiognomy, or rather judging by externals, curious tales are told by the Arabs. In Al-Mas'udi's (chapt. lvi.) is the original of the camel blind of one eye, etc., which the genius of Voltaire has made famous throughout Europe.

[FN#446] I here quote Mr. Payne's note. "Sic in the text; but the passage is apparently corrupt. It is not plain why a rosy complexion, blue eyes and tallness should be peculiar to women in love. Arab women being commonly short, swarthy and blackeyed, the attributes mentioned appear rather to denote the foreign origin of the woman; and it is probable, therefore, that this passage has by a copyist's error, been mixed up with that which relates to the signs by which the mock physician recognised her strangerhood, the clause specifying the symptoms of her love-lorn condition having been crowded out in the process, an accident of no infrequent occurrence in the transcription of Oriental works."

[FN#447] Most men would have suspected that it was her lover.

[FN#448] The sumptuary laws, compelling for instance the Jews to wear yellow turbans, and the Christians to carry girdles date from the Capture of Jerusalem in A.D. 636 by Caliph Omar. See vol. i. 77; and Terminal Essay § 11.

[FN#449] i.e. Our Sunday: the Jewish week ending with the Sabbath (Saturday). I have already noted this term for Saturn's day, established as a God's rest by Commandment No. iv. How it lost its honours amongst Christians none can say: the text in Col. ii. 16, 17, is insufficient to abolish an order given with such pomp and circumstance to, and obeyed, so strictly and universally by, the Hebrews, including the Founder of Christianity. The general idea is that the Jewish Sabbath was done away with by the Christian dispensation (although Jesus kept it with the usual scrupulous care), and that sundry of the Councils at Colossæ and Laodicea anathematised those who observed the Saturday after Israelitish fashion. With the day its object changed; instead of "keeping it holy," as all pious Jews still do, the early Fathers converted it into the "Feast of the Resurrection," which could not be kept too joyously. The "Sabbatismus" of the Sabbatarian Protestant who keeps holy the wrong day is a marvellous perversion and the Sunday feast of France, Italy, and Catholic countries generally is far more logical than the mortification day of England and the so-called Reformed countries.

[FN#450] Haráis, plur. of Harísah: see vol. i. 131.

[FN#451] It would have been cooked on our Thursday night, or the Jewish Friday night and would be stale and indigestible on the next day.

[FN#452] Marw (Margiana), which the Turkomans pronounce "Mawr," is derived by Bournouf from the Sansk. Maru or Marw; and by Sir H. Rawlinson from Marz or Marj, the Lat. Margo; Germ. Mark; English March; Old French Marche and Neo-Lat. Marca. So Marzbán, a Warden of the Marches: vol. iii. 256. The adj. is not Marází, as stated in vol. iii. 222; but Marwazi, for which see Ibn Khallikan, vol. i. p. 7, etc.: yet there are good writers who use "Marází" as Rází for a native of Rayy.

[FN#453] i.e. native of Rayy city. See vol. iv. 104.

[FN#454] Normally used for fuel and at times by funny men to be put into sweetmeats by way of practical joke: these are called "Nukl-i-Pishkil"=goat-dung bonbons. The tale will remind old Anglo-Indians of the two Bengal officers who were great at such "sells" and who "swopped" a spavined horse for a broken-down "buggy."

[FN#455] In the text "khanádik," ditches, trenches; probably (as Mr. Payne suggests) a clerical or typographical error for "Fanádik," inns or caravanserais; the plural of "Funduk" (Span. Fonda), for which see vol. viii. 184.

[FN#456] This sentence is supplied by Mr. Payne to remedy the incoherence of the text. Moslems are bound to see True Believers decently buried and the poor often beg alms for the funeral. Here the tale resembles the opening of Hajji Baba by Mr. Morier, that admirable picture of Persian manners and morals.

[FN#457] Arab. "Al-ajr" which has often occurred.

[FN#458] Arab. "Hanút," i.e., leaves of the lotus-tree to be infused as a wash for the corpse; camphor used with cotton to close the mouth and other orifices; and, in the case of a wealthy man, rose-water, musk, ambergris, sandal-wood, and lign-aloes for fumigation.

[FN#459] Which always begin with four "Takbírs" and differ in many points from the usual orisons. See Lane (M. E. chapt. xxviii.) who is, however, very superficial upon an intricate and interesting subject. He even neglects to mention the number of Ruk'át (bows) usual at Cairo and the absence of prostration (sujúd) for which see vol. ii. 10.

[FN#460] Thus requiring all the ablutional offices to be repeated. The Shaykh, by handling the corpse, became ceremonially impure and required "Wuzu" before he could pray either at home or in the Mosque.

[FN#461] The Shaykh had left it when he went out to perform Wuzu.

[FN#462] Arab. "Satl"=the Lat. and Etruscan "Situla" and "Situlus," a water-pot.

[FN#463] Arab. "Lahd, Luhd," the niche or cell hollowed out in the side of the oblong trench: here the corpse is deposited and covered with palm-fronds etc. to prevent the earth touching it. See my Pilgrimage ii. 304.

[FN#464] For the incredible amount of torture which Eastern obstinacy will sometimes endure, see Al-Mas'udi's tale of the miserable little old man who stole the ten purses, vol. viii. 153 et seq.

[FN#465] Arab. "Jarídah" (whence the Jaríd-game) a palm-frond stripped of its leaves and used for a host of purposes besides flogging, chairs, sofas, bedsteads, cages, etc. etc. Tales of heroism in "eating stick" are always highly relished by the lower orders of Egyptians who pride themselves upon preferring the severest bastinado to paying the smallest amount of "rint."

[FN#466] Arab. "Náwús," the hollow tower of masonry with a grating over the central well upon which the Magian corpse is placed to be torn by birds of prey: it is kept up by the Parsi population of Bombay and is known to Europeans as the "Tower of Silence." Náís and Náwús also mean a Pyrethrum, a fire-temple and have a whimsical resemblance to the Greek .

[FN#467] For Munkar and Nakir, the Interrogating Angels, see vol. v. 111. According to Al-Mas'udi (chapt. xxxi.) these names were given by the Egyptians to the thirteenth and fourteenth cubits marked on the Nilometer which, in his day, was expected to show seventeen.

[FN#468] The text (xi. 227) has "Tannúr"=an oven, evidently a misprint for "Kubúr"=tombs.

[FN#469] Arab. "'An Abí"=(a propitiatory offering) for my father. So in Marocco the "Powder-players" dedicate a shot to a special purpose or person, crying "To my sweetheart!" "To my dead!" "To my horse!" etc.

[FN#470] For this formula see vol. i. 65. It is technically called "Haukalah" and "Haulakah," words in the third conjugation of increased triliterals, corresponding with the quadriliteral radicals and possessing the peculiar power of Kasr=abbreviation. Of this same class is Basmalah (vol. v. 206; ix. 1).

[FN#471] This scene with the watch would be relished in the coffee-house, where the tricks of robbers, like a gird at the police, are always acceptable.

[FN#472] Arab. "Lá af'al"; more commonly Má af'al. Má and Lá are synonymous negative particles, differing, however, in application. Má (Gr. {mè}) precedes definites, or indefinites: Lá and Lam (Gr. {oy}) only indefinites as "Lá iláha" etc.

[FN#473] Alluding to the proverb, "What hast thou left behind thee, O Asám?" i.e., what didst thou see?

[FN#474] Arab. "Sayrafi," s.s. as "Sarráf': see vol. i. 210.

[FN#475] Arab. "Al-Ma'rafah"=the place where the mane grows.

[FN#476] i.e. though the ass remain on thy hands.

[FN#477] "Halves," i.e. of dirhams: see vol. ii. 37.

[FN#478] Arab. "Taannafú,"=the Germ. lange Nase.

[FN#479] About forty shillings.

[FN#480] About £220.

[FN#481] Characteristically Eastern and Moslem is this action of the neighbours and bystanders. A walk through any Oriental city will show a crowd of people screaming and gesticulating, with thundering yells and lightning glances, as if about to close in mortal fight, concerning some matter which in no way concerns them. Our European cockneys and badauds mostly content themselves with staring and mobbing.

[FN#482] Arab. "Muruwwah," lit. manliness, especially in the sense of generosity. So the saying touching the "Miyán," or Moslem of India:—

Fí 'l-ruz Kuwwah: Fí 'l Hindí muruwwah.

When rice have strength, you'll haply find, In Hindi man, a manly mind.

[FN#483] i.e. His claim is just and reasonable.

[FN#484] I have noted (vol. i. 17) that good Moslems shun a formal oath, although "by Allah!" is ever on their tongues. This they seem to have borrowed from Christianity, which expressly forbade it, whilst Christians cannot insist upon it too much. The scandalous scenes lately enacted in a certain legislative assembly because an M.P. did not believe in a practice denounced by his creed, will be the wonder and ridicule of our descendants.

[FN#485] Most Arabs believe that the black cloud which sometimes produces, besides famine, contagious fevers and pestilence, like that which in 1799 depopulated the cities and country of Barbary, is led by a king locust, the Sultan Jarád.

[FN#486] The text is hopelessly corrupt, and we have no other with which to collate. Apparently a portion of the tale has fallen out, making a non-sens of its ending, which suggests that the kite gobbled up the two locusts at her ease, and left the falcon to himself.

[FN#487] The lines have occurred in vol. i. 265. I quote Mr. Payne.

[FN#488] The fabliau is a favourite in the East; this is the third time it has occurred with minor modifications. Of course the original was founded on fact, and the fact was and is by no means uncommon.

[FN#489] This would hardly be our Western way of treating a proposal of the kind; nor would the European novelist neglect so grand an opportunity for tall-talk.

[FN#490] This is a rechauffé of "The House with the Belvedere;" see vol. vi. 188.

[FN#491] Arab. "Mastúrah,"=veiled, well-guarded, confined in the Harem.

[FN#492] Arab. "'Ajúz nahs"=an old woman so crafty that she was a calamity to friends and foes.

[FN#493] Here, as in many places the text is painfully concise: the crone says only, "The Wuzu for the prayer!"

[FN#494] I have followed Mr. Payne who supplies this sentence to make the Tale run smoothly.

[FN#495] i.e. the half of the marriage-settlement due to the wife on divorcement and whatever monies he may have borrowed of her.

[FN#496] Here we find the vulgar idea of a rape, which is that a man can, by mere force, possess a woman against her will. I contend that this is impossible unless he use drugs like chloroform or violence, so as to make the patient faint or she be exceptionally weak. "Good Queen Bess" hit the heart of the question when she bade Lord High Chancellor sheath his sword, she holding the scabbard-mouth before him and keeping it in constant motion. But it often happens that the woman, unless she have a loathing for her violator, becomes infected with the amorous storge, relaxes her defense, feels pleasure in the outer contact of the parts and almost insensibly allows penetration and emission. Even conception is possible in such cases as is proved in that curious work, "The Curiosities of Medical Experience."

[FN#497] i.e. thou wilt have satisfied us all three.

[FN#498] Here I follow Mr. Payne who has skilfully fine-drawn the holes in the original text.

[FN#499] See vol. vii. 363; ix. 238.

[FN#500] Arab. "Musallà," which may be either a praying carpet, a pure place in a house, or a small chapel like that near Shiraz which Hafiz immortalised,

"Bring, boy, the sup that's in the cup; in highest Heaven man ne'er shall find Such watery marge as Ruknábád, MusalIà's mazes rose entwined."

[FN#501] Arab. "Ihtidá,"=divine direction to Hudà or salvation. The old bawd was still dressed as a devotee, and keeps up the cant of her caste. No sensible man in the East ever allows a religious old woman to pass his threshold.

[FN#502] In this tale "poetical justice" is neglected, but the teller skilfully caused the wife to be ravished and not to be a particeps criminis. The lover escapes scot-free because Moslems, as well as Hindus, hold that the amourist under certain conditions is justified in obtaining his object by fair means or foul. See p. 147 of "Early Ideas, a Group of Hindoo Stories," collected and collated by Anaryan: London, Allens, 1881.

[FN#503] This is supplied from the "Tale of the King and his Wazir's Wife," vol. vi. 129.

[FN#504] Arab. "Ibl," a specific name: it is presently opposed to "Nákah," a she-dromedary, and "Ráhilah," a riding-camel.

[FN#505] Here "Amsaytu" is used in its literal sense "I evened" (came at evening), and this is the case with seven such verbs, Asbaha, Amsá, Azhá, Azhara, A'tama, Zalla, and Báta, which either conjoin the sense of the sentence with their respective times, morning, evening, forenoon, noon and the first sundown watch, all day and all night or are used "elegantly," as grammarians say, for the simple "becoming" or "being."

[FN#506] The Badawi dogs are as dangerous as those of Montenegro but not so treacherous: the latter will sneak up to the stranger and suddenly bite him most viciously. I once had a narrow escape from an ignoble death near the slaughter-house of Alexandria-Ramlah, where the beasts were unusually ferocious. A pack assailed me at early dawn and but for an iron stick and a convenient wall I should have been torn to pieces.

[FN#507] These elopements are of most frequent occurrence: see Pilgrimage iii. 52.

[FN#508] The principal incidents, the loss and recovery of wife and children, occur in the Story of the Knight Placidus (Gesta Romanorum, cx.). But the ecclesiastical tale-teller does not do poetical justice upon any offenders, and he vilely slanders the great Cæsar, Trajan.

[FN#509] i.e. a long time: the idiom has already been noticed. In the original we have "of days and years and twelvemonths" in order that "A'wám" (years) may jingle with "Ayyám" (days).

[FN#510] Nothing can be more beautiful than the natural parks which travellers describe on the coasts of tropical seas.

[FN#511] Arab. "Khayyál" not only a rider but a good and a hard rider. Hence the proverb "Al-Khayyál" kabr maftúh=uomo a cavallo sepoltura aperta.

[FN#512] i.e. the crew and the islanders.

[FN#513] Arab. "Hadas," a word not easy to render. In grammar Lumsden renders it by "event" and the learned Captain Lockett (Miut Amil) in an awful long note (pp. 195 to 224) by "mode," grammatical or logical. The value of his disquisition is its proving that, as the Arabs borrowed their romance from the Persians, so they took their physics and metaphysics of grammar and syntax; logic and science in general, from the Greeks.

[FN#514] We should say the anchors were weighed and the canvas spread.

[FN#515] The rhymes are disposed in the quaintest way, showing extensive corruption. Mr. Payne has ordered them into couplets with a "bob" or refrain. I have followed suit, preserving the original vagaries of rhymes.

[FN#516] Arab. "Nuwab," broken plur. (that is, noun of multitude) of Naubah, the Anglo-Indian Nowbut. This is applied to the band playing at certain intervals before the gate of a Rajah or high official.

[FN#517] Arab. "Hájib"; Captain Trotter ("Our Mission to the Court of Morocco in 1880": Edinburgh, Douglas, 1881) speaks, passim, of the "cheery little Hájeb or Eyebrow." Really this is too bad: why cannot travellers consult an Orientalist when treating of Oriental subjects?

[FN#518] Suicide is rare in Moslem lands, compared with India, China, and similar "pagan" countries; for the Mussulman has the same objection as the Christian "to rush into the presence of his Creator," as if he could do so without the Creator's permission. The Hindu also has some curious prejudices on the subject; he will hang himself, but not by the neck, for fear lest his soul be defiled by exiting through an impure channel. In England hanging is the commonest form for men; then follow in due order drowning, cutting or stabbing, poison, and gun-shot: women prefer drowning (except in the cold months) and poison. India has not yet found a Dr. Ogle to tabulate suicide; but the cases most familiar to old Anglo-Indians are leaping down cliffs (as at Giruar), drowning, and starving to death. And so little is life valued that a mother will make a vow obliging her son to suicide himself at a certain age.

[FN#519] Arab. "Zarad-Khánah," before noticed: vol. vii. 363. Here it would mean a temporary prison for criminals of high degree. De Sacy, Chrestom, ii. 179.

[FN#520] Arab. "'Adúl," I have said, means in Marocco, that land of lies and subterfuges, a public notary.

[FN#521] This sentence is inserted by Mr. Payne to complete the sense.

[FN#522] i.e. he intended to marry her when time served.

[FN#523] Arab. from Pers. Khwájah and Khawáját: see vol. vi. 46.

[FN#524] Probably meaning by one mother whom he loved best of all his wives: in the next page we read of their sister.

[FN#525] Come down, i.e. from heaven.

[FN#526] This is the Bresl. Edit.'s form of Shahryár=city-keeper (like Marzbán, guardian of the Marches), for city-friend. The learned Weil has preferred it to Shahryár.

[FN#527] Sic: in the Mac. Edit. "Shahrázád" and here making nonsense of the word. It is regretable that the king's reflections do not run at times as in this text: his compunctions lead well up to the dénouement.

[FN#528] The careless text says "couplets." It has occurred in vol. i. 149: so I quote Torrens (p. 149).

[FN#529] In the text Salma is made to speak, utterly confusing the dialogue.

[FN#530] The well-known Baloch province beginning west of Sind: the term is supposed to be a corruption of Máhí-Khorán=Ichthyophagi. The reader who wishes to know more about it will do well to consult "Unexplored Baluchistan," etc. (Griffith and Farran, 1882), the excellent work of my friend Mr. Ernest A. Floyer, long Chief of the Telegraphic Department, Cairo.

[FN#531] Meaning the last city in Makran before entering Sind. Al-Sharr would be a fancy name, "The Wickedness."

[FN#532] i.e. think of nothing but his present peril.

[FN#533] Arab. "Munkati'ah"=lit. "cut off" (from the weal of the world). See Pilgrimage i. 22.

[FN#534] The lines are in vol. i. 207 and iv. 189. 1 here quote Mr. Payne.

[FN#535] i.e. I have another proposal to make.

[FN#536] i.e. In my heart's core: the figure has often occurred.

[FN#537] These sudden elevations, so common in the East and not unknown to the West in the Napoleonic days, explain how the legend of "Joanna Papissa" (Pope John XIII), who succeeded Leo IV. in A.D. 855 and was succeeded by Benedict III., found ready belief amongst the enemies of papacy. She was an English woman born in Germany who came to Rome and professed theology with éclat, wherefore the people enthroned her. "Pope Joan" governed with exemplary wisdom, but during a procession on Rogation Sunday she was delivered of a fine boy in the street: some make her die on the spot; others declare that she perished in prison.

[FN#538] That such things should happen in times of famine is only natural; but not at other seasons. This abomination on the part of the butcher is, however, more than once alluded toin The Nights: see vol. i. 332.

[FN#539] Opinions differ as to the site of this city, so celebrated in the mediæval history of Al-Islam: most probably it stood where Hyderabad of Sind now is. The question has been ably treated by Sir Henry M. Elliot in his "History of India," edited from his posthumous papers by Professor Dowson.

[FN#540] Which, by-the-by, the average Eastern does with even more difficulty than the average European. For the most part the charge to secrecy fixes the matter in his mind even when he has forgotten that it is to be kept secret. Hence the most unpleasant results.

[FN#541] Such an act appears impossible, and yet history tells us of a celebrated Sufi, Khayr al-Nassáj (the Weaver), who being of dark complexion was stopped on return from his pilgrimage at Kufah by a stranger that said, "Thou art my negro slave and thy name is Khayr." He was kept at the loom for years, till at last the man set him free, and simply said, "Thou wast not my slave" (Ibn Khall. i. 513).

[FN#542] These lines have occurred before. I quote Mr. Payne for variety.

[FN#543] Arab. "Tasill sallata 'l-Munkati'ín" = lit. "raining on the drouth-hardened earth of the cut-off." The metaphor is admissible in the eyes of an Arab who holds water to be the chiefest of blessings, and makes it synonymous with bounty and beneficence.

[FN#544] Possibly this is said in mere fun; but, as Easterns are practical physiognomists, it may hint the fact that a large nose in womankind is the sign of a masculine nature.

[FN#545] Arab. "Zakát wa Sadakat," = lit. paying of poor rate and purifying thy property by almsdeeds. See vol. i. 339.

[FN#546] I have noted (i. 293) that Kamís ({chitóon}, Chemise, Cameslia, Camisa) is used in the Hindostani and Bengali dialects. Like its synonyms prætexta and shift, it has an equivocal meaning and here probably signifies the dress peculiar to Arab devotees and devout beggars.

[FN#547] I omit here and elsewhere the parenthetical formula "Kála al-Ráwi," etc. = The Story-teller sayeth, reminding the reader of its significance in a work collected from the mouths of professional Tale-tellers and intended mainly for their use.

[FN#548] The usual sign of emotion, already often mentioned.

[FN#549] It being no shame to Moslems if a slave become King.

[FN#550] Arab. "Tarbiyatí," i.e., he was brought up in my house.

[FN#551] There is no Salic law amongst Moslems; but the Rasm or custom of AlIslam, established by the succession of the four first Caliphs, to the prejudice of Ayishah and other masterful women would be a strong precedent against queenly rule. It is the reverse with the Hindus who accept a Rani as willingly as a Rajah and who believe with Europeans that when kings reign women rule, and vice versa. To the vulgar Moslem feminine government appears impossible, and I was once asked by an Afghan, "What would happen if the queen were in childbed?"

[FN#552] Arab. "Khutbah," the sermon preached from the pulpit (Mimbar) after the congregational prayers on Friday noon. It is of two kinds, for which see Lane, M.E., chap. iii. This public mention of his name and inscribing it upon the newly-minted money are the special prerogatives of the Moslem king: hence it often happens that usurpers cause a confusion of Khutbah and coinage.

[FN#553] For a specimen of which, blowing a man up with bellows, see Al-Mas'udi, chap. cxxiii.

[FN#554] i.e. a long time: the idiom has been noted before more than once.

[FN#555] i.e. with what he had heard and what he was promised.

[FN#556] Arab. "Shakhs mafsúd," i.e. an infidel.

[FN#557] Arab. "Bunúd," plur. of Persian "band" = hypocrisy, deceit.

[FN#558] Arab. "Burúj" pl. of Burj. lit. = towers, an astrological term equivalent to our "houses" or constellations which form the Zodiacal signs surrounding the heavens as towers gird a city; and applied also to the 28 lunar Mansions. So in Al-Hariri (Ass. of Damascus) "I swear by the sky with its towers," the incept of Koran chapt. lxxxv.; see also chapts. xv. 26 and xxv. 62. "Burj" is a word with a long history: {pýrgos} burg, burgh, etc.

[FN#559] Arab. "Bundukah"=a little bunduk, nut, filbert, pellet, rule, musket bullet.

[FN#560] See John Raister's "Booke of the Seven Planets; or, Seven Wandering Motives," London, 1598.

[FN#561] i.e. for the king whom I love as my own soul.

[FN#562] The Bresl. Edit. (xi. 318-21) seems to assume that the tales were told in the early night before the royal pair slept. This is no improvement; we prefer to think that the time was before peep of day when Easterns usally awake and have nothing to do till the dawn-prayer.

[FN#563] See vol. ii. 161.

[FN#564] Arab. Al-Fákhir. No wonder that the First Hand who moulded the Man-mud is a lieu commun in Eastern thought. The Pot and the Potter began with the old Egyptians. "Sitting as a potter at the wheel, god Cneph (in Philæ) moulds clay, and gives the spirit of life (the Genesitic "breath") to the nostrils of Osiris." Then we meet him in the Vedas, the Being, "by whom the fictile vase is formed; the clay out of which it is fabricated." We find him next in Jeremiah (xviii. 2) "Arise and go down unto the Potter's house," etc., and in Romans (ix. 20), "Hath not the Potter power over the clay?" He appears in full force in Omar-i- Khayyám (No. xxxvii.):—

For I remember stopping by the way To watch a Potter thumping his wet Clay: An with its all obliterated Tongue It murmur'd—"Gently, Brother, gently, pray!"

Lastly the Potter shows in the Kasidah of Hají Abdú al-Yezid (p.4):—

"The first of pots the Potter made by Chrysorrhoas' blue- green wave; Methinks I see him smile to see what guerdon to the world he gave.