Chapter 4

ear will know the land by its call.

[FN#319] Arab. "Hadνs" or saying of the Apostle.

[FN#320] "Al-I'itikaf" resembles the Christian "retreat;" but the worshipper generally retires to a mosque, especially in Meccah. The Apostle practised it on Jabal Hira and other places.

[FN#321] The word is the Heb. "Hagg" whose primary meaning is circularity of form or movement. Hence it applied to religious festivals in which dancing round the idol played a prime part; and Lucian of "saltation" says, dancing was from the beginning and coeval with the ancient god, Love. But man danced with joy before he worshipped, and, when he invented a systematic saltation, he made it represent two things, and only two things, love and war, in most primitive form, courtship and fighting.

[FN#322] Two adjoining ground-waves in Meccah. For these and for the places subsequently mentioned the curious will consult my Pilgrimage, iii. 226, etc.

[FN#323] The 'Umrah or lesser Pilgrimage, I have noted, is the ceremony performed in Meccah at any time out of the pilgrim-season proper, i.e. between the eighth and tenth days of the twelfth lunar month Zu 'l-Hijjah. It does not entitle the Moslem to be called Hαjj (pilgrim) or Hαjν as Persians and Indians corrupt the word.

[FN#324] I need hardly note that Mohammed borrowed his pilgrimage-practices from the pagan Arabs who, centuries before his day, danced around the Meccan Ka'abah. Nor can he be blamed for having perpetuated a Gentile rite, if indeed it be true that the Ka'abah contained relics of Abraham and Ishmael.

[FN#325] On first sighting Meccah. See Night xci.

[FN#326] Arab. "Tawαf:" the place is called Matαf and the guide Mutawwif. (Pilgrimage, iii. 193, 205.) The seven courses are termed Ashwαt.

[FN#327] Stoning the Devil at Mina. (Pilgrimage, iii. 282.) Hence

Satan's title "the Stoned" (lapidated not castrated).

[FN#328] Koran viii. 66; in the chapter entided "Spoil," and relating mainly to the "day of Al-Bedr.

[FN#329] Arab. "AI-Ikαlah"= cancelling: Mr. Payne uses the technical term "resiliation."

[FN#330] Freedman of Abdallah, son of the Caliph Omar and noted as a traditionist.

[FN#331] i.e. at a profit: the exchange must be equal—an ordinance intended to protect the poor. Arabs have strange prejudices in these matters; for instance it disgraces a Badawi to take money for milk.

[FN#332] Arab. "Jamα'ah," which in theology means the Greek , our "Church," the congregation of the Faithful under a lawful head. Hence the Sunnis call themselves "People of the Sunnat and Jamα'at." In the text it is explained as "Ulfat" or intimacy.

[FN#333] Arab. "Al-Khalνl," i.e. of Allah=Abraham. Mohammed, following Jewish tradition, made Abraham rank second amongst the Prophets, inferior only to himself and superior to Hazrat Isa=Jesus. I have noted that Ishmael the elder son succeeded his father. He married Da'alah bint Muzαz bin Omar, a Jurhamite, and his progeny abandoning Hebrew began to speak Arabic (ta'arraba); hence called Muta'arribah or Arabised Arabs. (Pilgrimage iii. 190.) He died at Meccah and was buried with his mother in the space North of the Ka'abah called Al-Hijr which our writers continue to confuse with the city Al-Hijr. (Ibid. 165-66.)

[FN#334] This ejaculation, "In the name of Allah" is, I have noted, equivalent to "saying grace." If neglected it is a sin and entails a curse.

[FN#335] The ceremonious posture is sitting upon the shin-bones, not tailor-fashion; and "bolting food" is a sign of boorishness.

[FN#336] Arab. "Zidd," the word is a fair specimen of Arabic ambiguity meaning primarily opposite or contrary (as virtue to vice), secondarily an enemy or a friend (as being opposite to an enemy).

[FN#337] "The whole earth (shall be) but His handful on the Resurrection day and in His right hand shall the Heaven be rolled up (or folded together)."-Koran xxxix. 67.

[FN#338] See Night lxxxi.

[FN#339] Koran lxxviii. 19.

[FN#340] Arab. "Al-Munαfik," technically meaning one who outwardly professes Al-Islam while inwardly hating it. Thus the word is by no means synonymous with our "hypocrite," hypocrisy being the homage vice pays to virtue; a homage, I may observe, nowhere rendered more fulsomely than among the so-called Anglo-Saxon race.

[FN#341] Arab. "Tawakkul alα 'llah": in the imperative the phrase is vulgarly used="Be off!"

[FN#342] i.e. ceremonial impurity which is sui generis, a very different thing from general dirtiness.

[FN#343] A thick beard is one which does not show the skin; otherwise the wearer is a "Kausaj;" in Pers. "Kϊseh." See vol. iii., 246.

[FN#344] Arab. "Al-Khutnah." Nowhere commanded in the Koran and being only a practice of the Prophet, the rite is not indispensable for converts, especially the aged and the sick. Our ideas upon the subject are very hazy, for modern "niceness" allows a "Feast of the Circumcision," but no discussion thereon. Moses (alias Osarsiph) borrowed the rite from the Egyptian hierophants who were all thus "purified"; the object being to counteract the over-sensibility of the "sixth sense" and to harden the glans against abrasions and infection by exposure to air and friction against the dress. Almost all African tribes practise it but the modes vary and some are exceedingly curious: I shall notice a peculiarly barbarous fashion called Al-Salkh (the flaying) still practised in the Arabian province Al-Asνr. (Pilgrimage iii. 80.) There is a difference too between the Hebrew and the Moslem rite. The Jewish operator, after snipping off the foreskin, rips up the prepuce with his sharp thumb-nails so that the external cutis does not retract far from the internal; and the wound, when healed, shows a narrow ring of cicatrice. This ripping is not done by Moslems. They use a stick as a probe passed round between glans and prepuce to ascertain the extent of the frenum and that there is no abnormal adhesion. The foreskin is then drawn forward and fixed by the forceps, a fork of two bamboo splints, five or six inches long by a quarter thick, or in some cases an iron like our compasses. This is tied tightly over the foreskin so as to exclude about an inch and a half of the prepuce above and three quarters below. A single stroke of the razor drawn directly downwards removes the skin. The slight bleeding is stopped by burnt rags or ashes and healed with cerates, pledgets and fumigations. Thus Moslem circumcision does not prevent the skin retracting.

[FN#345] Of these 6336 versets only some 200 treat on law, civil and ceremonial, fiscal and political, devotional and ceremonial, canonical and ecclesiastical.

[FN#346] The learned young woman omitted Ukhnϊkh=Enoch, because not in Koran; and if she denoted him by "Idrνs," the latter is much out of place.

[FN#347] Some say grandson of Shem. (Koran vii. 71.)

[FN#348] Koran vii. 63, etc.

[FN#349] Father-in-law of Moses. (Koran vii. 83.)

[FN#350] Who is the last and greatest of the twenty-five.

[FN#351] See Night ccccxxxviii.

[FN#352] Koran ii., whose 256th Ayah is the far-famed and sublime Throne-verse which begins "Allah! there is no god but He, the Living, the Eternal One, whom nor slumber nor sleep seizeth on!" The trivial name is taken from the last line, "His throne overstretcheth Heaven and Earth and to Him their preservation is no burden for He is the most Highest, the Supreme." The lines are often repeated in prayers and engraved on agates, etc., as portable talismans.

[FN#353] Koran ii. 159.

[FN#354] Koran xvi. 92. The verset ends with, "He warneth you, so haply ye may be mindful."

[FN#355] Koran lxx. 38.

[FN#356] Koran xxxix. 54.

[FN#357] The Sunnis hold that the "Anbiyα" (=prophets, or rather announcers of Allah's judgments) were not sinless. But this dogma is branded as most irreverent and sinful by the Shi'ahs or Persian "followers of Ali," who make capital out of this blasphemy and declare that if any prophet sinned he sinned only against himself.

[FN#358] Koran xii. 18.

[FN#359] Koran ii. 107.

[FN#360] Koran ii. 57. He (Allah) does not use the plurale majestatis.

[FN#361] Koran ii. 28.

[FN#362] Koran xvi. 100. Satan is stoned in the Minα or Munα basin (Night ccccxlii.) because he tempted Abraham to disobey the command of Allah by refusing to sacrifice Ishmael. (Pilgrimage iii. 248.)

[FN#363] It may also mean "have recourse to God."

[FN#364] Abdallah ibn Abbas, before noticed, first cousin of

Mohammed and the most learned of the Companions. See D'Herbelot.

[FN#365] Koran xcvi., "Blood-clots," 1 and 2. "Read" may mean "peruse the revelation" (it was the first Koranic chapter communicated to Mohammed), or "recite, preach."

[FN#366] Koran xxvii. 30. Mr. Rodwell (p.1) holds to the old idea that the "Basmalah" is of Jewish origin, taught to the Kuraysh by Omayyah, of Taif, the poet and Hanνf (convert).

[FN#367] Koran ix.: this was the last chapter revealed and the only one revealed entire except verse 110.

[FN#368] Ali was despatched from Al-Medinah to Meccah by the Prophet on his own slit-eared camel to promulgate this chapter; and meeting the assembly at Al-'Akabah he also acquainted them with four things; (1) No Infidel may approach the Meccah temple; (2) naked men must no longer circut the Ka'abah; (3) only Moslems enter Paradise, and (4) public faith must be kept.

[FN#369] Dictionaries give the word "Basmalah" (=saying

Bismillah); but the common pronunciation is "Bismalah."

[FN#370] Koran xvii. 110, a passage revealed because the Infidels, hearing Mohammed calling upon The Compassionate, imagined that Al-Rahmαn was other deity but Allah. The "names" have two grand divisions, Asmα Jalαlν, the fiery or terrible attributes, and the Asmα Jamαlν (airy, watery, earthy or) amiable. Together they form the Asmα al-Husna or glorious attributes, and do not include the Ism al-A'azam, the ineffable name which is known only to a few.

[FN#371] Koran ii. 158.

[FN#372] Koran xcvi. before noticed.

[FN#373] A man of Al-Medinah, one of the first of Mohammed's disciples.

[FN#374] Koran lxxiv. 1, etc., supposed to have been addressed by Gabriel to Mohammed when in the cave of Hira or Jabal Nϊr. He returned to his wife Khadijah in sore terror at the vision of one sitting on a throne between heaven and earth, and bade her cover him up. Whereupon the Archangel descended with this text, supposed to be the first revealed. Mr. Rodwell (p. 3) renders it, "O thou enwrapped in thy mantle!" and makes it No. ii. after a Fatrah or silent interval of six months to three years.

[FN#375] There are several versets on this subject (chapts. ii. and xxx.)

[FN#376] Koran cx. 1.

[FN#377] The third Caliph; the "Writer of the Koran."

[FN#378] Koran, v. 4. Sale translates "idols." Mr. Rodwell, "On the blocks (or shafts) of Stone," rude altars set by the pagan Arabs before their dwellings.

[FN#379] Koran, v. 116. The words are put into the mouth of

Jesus.

[FN#380] The end of the same verse.

[FN#381] Koran, v. 89. Supposed to have been revealed when certain Moslems purposed to practise Christian asceticism, fasting, watching, abstaining from women and sleeping on hard beds. I have said Mohammed would have "no monkery in Al-Islam," but human nature willed otherwise. Mr. Rodwell prefers "Interdict the healthful viands."

[FN#382] Koran, iv. 124.

[FN#383] Arab. "Mukri." "Kαri" is one who reads the Koran to pupils; the Mukri corrects them. "With the passage of the clouds" = without a moment's hesitation.

[FN#384] The twenty-first, twenty-fourth and eighteenth Arabic letters.

[FN#385] Arab. "Hizb." The Koran is divided into sixty portions, answering to "Lessons" for convenience of public worship.

[FN#386] Arab. "Jalαlah,"=saying Jalla Jalαlu-hu=magnified be His

Majesty!, or glorified be His Glory.

[FN#387] Koran, xi. 50.

[FN#388] The partition-wall between Heaven and Hell which others call Al-'Urf (in the sing. from the verb meaning he separated or parted). The Jews borrowed from the Guebres the idea of a partition between Heaven and Hell and made it so thin that the blessed and damned can speak together. There is much dispute about the population of Al-A'arαf, the general idea being that they are men who do not deserve reward in Heaven or punishment in Hell. But it is not a "Purgatory" or place of expiating sins.

[FN#389] Koran, vii. 154.

[FN#390] A play on the word ayn, which means "eye" or the eighteenth letter which in olden times had the form of a circle.

[FN#391] From misreading these words comes the absurd popular belief of the moon passing up and down Mohammed's sleeves. George B. Airy (The Athenζum, Nov.29, 1884) justly objects to Sale's translation "The hour of judgment approacheth" and translates "The moon hath been dichotomised" a well-known astronomical term when the light portion of the moon is defined in a strait line: in other words when it is really a half-moon at the first and third quarters of each lunation. Others understand, The moon shall be split on the Last Day, the preterite for the future in prophetic style. "Koran Moslems" of course understand it literally.

[FN#392] Chapters liv., lv. and lvi.

[FN#393] We should say, not to utter, etc.

[FN#394] These well-known "humours of Hippocrates," which reappear in the form of temperaments of European phrenology, are still the base of Eastern therapeutics.

[FN#395] The doctrine of the three souls will be intelligible to

Spiritualists.

[FN#396] Arab. "Al-lαmi"=the l-shaped, curved, forked.

[FN#397] Arab. "Usus," our os sacrum because, being incorruptible, the body will be built up thereon for Resurrection-time. Hence Hudibras sings (iii. 2),

"The learned Rabbis of the Jews

Write there's a bone which they call leuz,

I' the rump of man, etc."

It is the Heb. "Uz," whence older scholars derived os. Sale (sect. iv.) called it "El Ajb, os coccygis or rump-bone."

[FN#398] Arab physiologists had difficulties in procuring "subjects"; and usually practised dissection on the simiads. Their illustrated books are droll; the figures have been copied and recopied till they have lost all resemblance to the originals.

[FN#399] The liver and spleen are held to be congealed blood.

Hence the couplet,

"We are allowed two carrions (i.e. with throats uncut) and

two bloods,

The fish and the locust, the liver and the spleen."

(Pilgrimage iii. 92.)

[FN#400] This is perfectly true and yet little known to the general.

[FN#401] Koran xvii. 39.

[FN#402] Arab. "Al-malikhulνya," proving that the Greeks then pronounced the penultimate vowel according to the acute accentνa; not as we slur it over. In old Hebrew we have the transliteration of four Greek words; in the languages of Hindostan many scores including names of places; and in Latin and Arabic as many hundreds. By a scholar-like comparison of these remains we should find little difficulty in establishing the true Greek pronunciation since the days of Alexander the Great; and we shall prove that it was pronounced according to accent and emphatically not quantity. In the next century I presume English boys will be taught to pronounce Greek as the Greeks do.

[FN#403] Educated Arabs can quote many a verse bearing upon domestic medicine and reminding us of the lines bequeathed to Europe by the School of Salerno. Such e.g. are;

"After the noon-meal, sleep, although for moments twain;

After the night-meal, walk, though but two steps be ta'en;

And after swiving stale, though but two drops thou drain."

[FN#404] Arab. "Sarνdah" (Tharνdah), also called "ghaut"=crumbled bread and hashed meat in broth; or bread, milk and meat. The Sarνdah of Ghassαn, cooked with eggs and marrow, was held a dainty dish: hence the Prophet's dictum.

[FN#405] Koran v. 92. "Lots"=games of chance and "images"=statues.

[FN#406] Koran ii. 216. The word "Maysar" which I have rendered "gambling" or gaming (for such is the modern application of the word), originally meant what St. Jerome calls and explains thereby the verse (Ezek. xxi. 22), "The King held in his hand the lot of Jerusalem" i.e. the arrow whereon the city-name was written. The Arabs use it for casting lots with ten azlam or headless arrows (for dice) three being blanks and the rest notched from one to seven. They were thrown by a "Zαrib" or punter and the stake was generally a camel. Amongst so excitable a people as the Arabs, this game caused quarrels and bloodshed, hence its prohibition: and the theologians, who everywhere and at all times delight in burdening human nature, have extended the command, which is rather admonitory than prohibitive, to all games of chance. Tarafah is supposed to allude to this practice in his Mu'allakah.

[FN#407] Liberal Moslems observe that the Koranic prohibition is not absolute, with threat of Hell for infraction. Yet Mohammed doubtless forbade all inebriatives and the occasion of his so doing is well known. (Pilgrimage ii. 322.)

[FN#408] I have noticed this soured milk in Pilgrimage i. 362.

[FN#409] He does not say the "Caliph" or successor of his uncle

Mohammed.

[FN#410] The Jewish Korah (Numbers xvi.) fabled by the Koran (xxviii. 76), following a Talmudic tradition, to have been a man of immense wealth. The notion that lying with an old woman, after the menses have ceased, is unwholesome, dates from great antiquity; and the benefits of the reverse process were well known to good King David. The faces of children who sleep with their grandparents (a bad practice now waxing obsolete in England), of a young wife married to an old man and of a young man married to an old woman, show a peculiar wizened appearance, a look of age overlaying youth which cannot be mistaken.

[FN#411] Arab. "Hindibα"(=endubium): the modern term is

Shakurνyah=chicorιe. I believe it to be very hurtful to the eyes.

[FN#412] Arab. "Khuffαsh" and "Watwαt": in Egypt a woman is called "Watwαtνyah" when the hair of her privities has been removed by applying bats' blood. I have often heard of this; but cannot understand how such an application can act depilatory.

[FN#413] Dictionaries render the word by "dragon, cockatrice." The Badawin apply it to a variety of serpents mostly large and all considered venomous.

[FN#414] Arab. "Zarr wa 'urwah," 1it.=handle. The button-hole, I have said, is a modern invention; Urwah is also applied to the loopshaped handle of the water-skin, for attachment of the Allαkah or suspensory thong.

[FN#415] Koran lxx. 40; see also the chapter following, v. 16.

[FN#416] Koran x. 5; the "her" refers to the sun.

[FN#417] Koran xxxvi. 40.

[FN#418] Koran xxii. 60.

[FN#419] Arab. "Manαzil:" these are the Hindu "Nakshatra"; extensively used in meteorology even by Europeans unconsciously: thus they will speak of the Elephantina-storm without knowing anything of the lunar mansion so called. The names in the text are successively Sharatαn=two horns of the Ram; (2) the Ram's belly; (3) the Pleiades; (4) Aldebaran; (5) three stars in Orion's head; (6) ditto in Orion's shoulder; (7) two stars above the Twins; (8) Lion's nose and first summer station; (9) Lion's eye; (1O) Lion's forehead; (11) Lion's mane; (12) Lion's heart; (13) the Dog, two stars in Virgo; (14) Spica Virginis; (15) foot of Virgo; (16) horns of Scorpio; (17) the Crown; (18) heart of Scorpio; (19) tail of Scorpio; (2O) stars in Pegasus; (21) where no constellation appears; (22) the Slaughterer's luck; (23) Glutton's luck; (24) Luck of Lucks, stars in Aquarius; (25) Luck of Tents, stars in Aquarius; (26) the fore-lip or spout of Urn; (27) hind lip of Urn; and (28) in navel of Fish's belly (Batn al-Hϊt); of these 28, to each of the four seasons 7 are allotted.

[FN#420] The Hebrew absey, still used by Moslems in chronograms. For mnemonic purposes the 28 letters are distributed into eight words of which the first and second are Abjad and Hawwaz. The last six letters in two words (Thakhiz and Zuzigh) are Arabian, unknown to the Jews and not found in Syriac.

[FN#421] Arab. "Zindνk;" properly, one who believes in two gods (the old Persian dualism); in books an atheist, i.e. one who does not believe in a god or gods; and, popularly, a free-thinker who denies the existence of a Supreme Being, rejects revelation for the laws of Nature imprinted on the heart of man and for humanity in its widest sense. Hence he is accused of permitting incestuous marriages and other abominations. We should now call him (for want of something better) an Agnostic.

[FN#422] Koran xxxi. 34. The words may still be applied to meteorologists especially of the scientific school. Even the experienced (as the followers of the late Mathieu de la Drτme) reckon far more failures than successes. The Koranic passage enumerates five things known only to Allah; Judgment-day; rain; sex of child in womb; what shall happen to-morrow and where a man shall die.

[FN#423] The fifth and seventh months (January and March) of the Coptic year which, being solar, is still used by Arab and Egyptian meteorologists. Much information thereon will be found in the "Egyptian Calendar" by Mr. Mitchell, Alexandria, 1876. It bears the appropriate motto "Anni certus modus apud solos semper Egyptios fuit." (Macrobius.) See also Lane M.E., chapt. ix.

[FN#424] Vulg. Kiyαk; the fourth month, beginning 9th—1Oth

December. The first month is Tϊt, commencing 1Oth—11th

September.

[FN#425] The 8th and 12th months partly corresponding with April and August: Hαtϊr is the 3rd (November) and AmshRr the 6th (February).

[FN#426] Moslems have been compelled to adopt infidel names for the months because Mohammed's Koranic rejection of Nasy or intercalation makes their lunar months describe the whole circle of the seasons in a cycle of about thirty-three and a half years. Yet they have retained the terms which contain the original motive of the denomination. The first month is Muharram, the "Holy," because war was forbidden; it was also known as Safar No. 1. The second Safar="Emptiness," because during the heats citizens left the towns and retired to Tαif and other cool sites. Rabν'a (first and second) alluded to the spring-pasturages; Jumαdα (first and second) to the "hardening" of the dry ground and, according to some, to the solidification, freezing, of the water in the highlands. Rajab (No.7)="worshipping," especially by sacrifice, is also known as Al-Asamm the deaf; because being sacred, the rattle of arms was unheard. Sha'abαn="collecting," dispersing, ruining, because the tribal wars recommenced: Ramazan (intensely hot) has been explained and Shawwαl (No. 10) derives from Shaul (elevating) when the he-camels raise their tails in rut. Zϊ'l-Ka'adah, the sedentary, is the rest time of the year, when fighting is forbidden and Zu'l-Hijjah explains itself as the pilgrimage-month.

[FN#427] The lowest of the seven.

[FN#428] Koran xxxvii. 5.

[FN#429] Arab. "Faylasϊf," an evident corruption from the Greek. Amongst the vulgar it denotes a sceptic, an atheist; much the same a "Frammαsϊn" or Freemason. The curious reader will consult the Dabistan, vol. iii. chapt. xi. p. 138 et seq. "On the Religion of the Wise" (philosophi), and, Beaconsfield's theft from Shaftesbury.

[FN#430] Koran xxxvi. 37-38.

[FN#431] Koran xxii. 7. The Hour i.e. of Judgment.

[FN#432] Koran xx. 58. The Midrasch Tanchumah on Exod. vii. gives a similar dialogue between Pharaoh and Moses. (Rodwell, in loco.)

[FN#433] Arab. "Sham'ϊn" or "Shim'ϊn," usually applied to Simon

Peter (as in Acts xv. 14). But the text alludes to Saint Simeon

(Luke ii. 25-35). See Gospel of Infancy (ii. 8) and especially

the Gospel of Nicodemus (xii. 3) which makes him a High-Priest.

[FN#434] Sαlih the Patriarch's she-camel, miraculously produced from the rock in order to convert the Thamϊd-tribe. (Koran vii.)

[FN#435] When Abu Bakr was hiding with Mohammed in a cave on the Hill Al-Saur (Thaur or Thϊr, Pilgrimage ii. 131) South of Meccah, which must not be confounded with the cave on Jabal Hirα now called Jabal Nϊr on the way to Arafat (Pilgrimage iii. 246), the fugitives were protected by a bird which built her nest at the entrance (according to another legend it was curtained by a spider's web), whilst another bird (the crow of whom I shall presently speak) tried to betray them. The first bird is popularly supposed to have been a pigeon, and is referred to by Hudibras,

"Th' apostles of this fierce religion

Like Mahomet, were ass and widgeon."

The ass I presume alludes to the marvellous beast Al-Burαk which the Greeks called from (Euthymius in Pocock, Spec. A.H. p.144) and which Indian Moslems picture with human face, ass's ears, equine body and peacock's wings and tail. The "widgeon" I presume to be a mistake or a misprint for pigeon.

[FN#436] The Arabs are not satisfied with the comparative moderation of the Hebrew miracle, and have added all manner of absurdities. (Pilgrimage ii. 288.)

[FN#437] Koran lxxxi. 18. Sale translates "by the morning when it appeareth;" and the word (tanaffus) will bear this meaning. Mr. Rodwell prefers, "By the dawn when it clears away the darkness by its breath."

[FN#438] As a rule Moslems are absurdly ignorant of arithmetic and apparently cannot master it. Hence in Egypt they used Copts for calculating-machines and further East Hindds. The mildest numerical puzzle, like the above, is sure of success.

[FN#439] The paradiseal tree which supplied every want. Mohammed borrowed it from the Christians (Rev. xxi. 10-21 and xxii. 1-2) who placed in their paradise the Tree of Life which bears twelve sorts of fruits and leaves of healing virtue. (See also the 3rd book of Hermas, his Similitudes.) The Hebrews borrowed it from the Persians. Amongst the Hindus it appears as "Kalpavriksha;" amongst the Scandinavians as Yggdrasil. The curious reader will consult Mr. James Fergusson's learned work, "Tree and Serpent Worship," etc. London, 1873.

[FN#440] Aaron's Rod becomes amongst Moslems (Koran vii. 110) Moses' Staff; the size being that of a top-mast. (Pilgrimage i. 300, 301.) In Koran xx. 18, 19, we find a notice of its uses; and during the Middle Ages it reappeared in the Staff of Wamba the Goth (A.D.672-680) the witch's broomstick was its latest development.

[FN#441] Christ, say the Eutychians, had only one nature, the divine; so he was crucified in effigy.

[FN#442] Jesus is compared with Adam in the Koran (chapt. iii.): his titles are Kalαmu 'llah (word of God) because engendered without a father, and Rϊhu 'llah (breath of God) because conceived by Gabriel in the shape of a beautifui youth breathing into the Virgin's vulva. Hence Moslems believe in a "miraculous conception" and consequently determine that one so conceived was, like Elias and Khizr, not subject to death; they also hold him born free from "original sin" (a most sinful superstition), a veil being placed before the Virgin and Child against the Evil One who could not touch them. He spoke when a babe in cradle; he performed miracles of physic; he was taken up to Heaven; he will appear as the forerunner of Mohammed on the White Tower of Damascus, and finally he will be buried at Al-Medinah. The Jews on the other hand speak of him as "that man:" they hold that he was begotten by Joseph during the menstrual period and therefore a born magician. Moreover he learned the Sham ha-maphrash or Nomen tetragrammaton, wrote it on parchment and placed it in an incision in his thigh, which closed up on the Name being mentioned (Buxtorf, Lex Talmud, 25-41). Other details are given in the Toldoth Jesu (Historia Joshuζ Nazareni). This note should be read by the eminent English littιrateur who discovered a fact, well known to Locke and Carlyle, that "Mohammedans are Christians." So they are and something more.

[FN#443] In the Kalamdαn, or pen-case, is a little inkstand of metal occupying the top of the long, narrow box.

[FN#444] A fair specimen of the riddle known as the "surprise."

[FN#445] Koran xli. 10.

[FN#446] Koran xxxvi. 82.

[FN#447] Here we enter upon a series of disputed points. The Wahhαbis deny the intercession of the Apostle (Pilgrimage ii. 76-77). The Shi'ahs place Ali next in dignity to Mohammed and there is a sect (Ali-Ilαhi) which believes him to be an Avatar or incarnation of the Deity. For the latter the curious reader will consult the "Dabistan," ii. 451. The Koran by its many contradictions seems to show that Mohammed never could make up his own mind on the subject, thinking himself at times an intercessor and then sharply denying all intercession.

[FN#448] Arab. "Kanjifah"=a pack of cards; corrupted from the Persian "Ganjνfah." We know little concerning the date or origin of this game in the East, where the packs are quite unlike ours.

[FN#449] It is interesting to compare this account with the pseudo Ovid and with Tale clxvi. in Gesta "Of the game of Schaci." Its Schacarium is the chess-board. Rochus (roccus, etc.) is not from the Germ. Rock (a coat) but from Rukh (Pers. a hero, a knight-errant) Alphinus (Ital. Alfino) is Al-Firzαn (Pers. science, wise).

[FN#450] Arab, "Baydak" or "Bayzak"; a corruption of the Persian "Piyαdah"=a footman, peon, pawn; and proving whence the Arabs derived the game. The Persians are the readiest backgammon-players known to me, better even than the Greeks; they throw the dice from the hand and continue foully abusing the fathers and mothers of the "bones" whilst the game lasts. It is often played in the intervals of dinner by the higher classes in Persia.

[FN#451] Metaphor from loading camels and mules. To "eat" a piece is to take it.

[FN#452] Arab. "Bilαbil"; a plural of "Bulbul" with a double entendre balαbil (plur. of ballalah)=heart's troubles, and "balα, bul"=a calamity, nay, etc.

[FN#453] The popular English idea of the Arab horse is founded upon utter unfact. Book after book tells us, "There are three distinct breeds of Arabians -the Attechi, a very superior breed; the Kadishi, mixed with these and of little value; and the Kochlani, highly prized and very difficult to procure." "Attechi" may be At-Tαzi (the Arab horse, or hound) or some confusion with "At" (Turk.) a horse. "Kadish" (Gadish or Kidish) is a nag; a gelding, a hackney, a "pacer" (generally called "Rahwαn"). "Kochlani" is evidently "Kohlαni," the Kohl-eyed, because the skin round the orbits is dark as if powdered. This is the true blue blood; and the bluest of all is "Kohlαni al-Ajϊz" (of the old woman) a name thus accounted for. An Arab mare dropped a filly when in flight; her rider perforce galloped on and presently saw the foal appear in camp, when it was given to an old woman for nursing and grew up to be famous. The home of the Arab horse is the vast plateau of Al-Najd: the Tahαmah or lower maritime regions of Arabia, like Malabar, will not breed good beasts. The pure blood all descends from five collateral lines called Al-Khamsah (the Cinque). Literary and pedantic Arabs derive them from the mares of Mohammed, a native of the dry and rocky region, Al-Hijaz, whither horses are all imported. Others go back (with the Koran, chapt. xxviii.) to Solomon, possibly Salmαn, a patriarch fourth in descent from Ishmael and some 600 years older than the Hebrew King. The Badawi derive the five from Rabν'at al-Faras (R. of the mare) fourth in descent from Adnαn, the fount of Arab genealogy. But they differ about the names: those generally given are Kahilan (Kohaylat), Saklαwi (which the Badawin pronounce Saglαwi), Abayαn, and Hamdαni; others substitute Manαkhi (the long-maned), Tanνs and Jalfϊn. These require no certificate amongst Arabs; for strangers a simple statement is considered enough. The Badawin despise all half-breeds (Arab sires and country mares), Syrian, Turkish, Kurdish and Egyptian. They call these (first mentioned in the reign of Ahmes, B.C. 1600) the "sons of horses"; as opposed to "sons of mares," or thorough-breds. Nor do they believe in city-bred animals. I have great doubts concerning our old English sires, such as the Darley Arabian which looks like a Kurdish half-bred, the descendant of those Cappadocians so much prized by the Romans: in Syria I rode a "Harfϊshν" (Kurd) the very image of it. There is no difficulty in buying Arab stallions except the price. Of course the tribe does not like to part with what may benefit the members generally; but offers of £500 to £1,000 would overcome men's scruples. It is different with mares, which are almost always the joint property of several owners. The people too dislike to see a hat on a thorough-bred mare: "What hast thou done that thou art ridden by that ill-omened Kafir?" the Badawin used to mutter when they saw a highly respectable missionary at Damascus mounting a fine Ruwalα mare. The feeling easily explains the many wars about horses occurring in Arab annals, e.g. about Dαhis and Ghabrα. (C. de Perceval, Essas, vol.ii.)

[FN#454] The stricter kind of Eastern Jew prefers to die on the floor, not in bed, as was the case with the late Mr. Emmanuel Deutsch, who in his well-known article on the Talmud had the courage to speak of "Our Saviour." But as a rule the Israelite, though he mostly appears as a Deist, a Unitarian, has a fund of fanatical feelings which crop up in old age and near death. The "converts" in Syria and elsewhere, whose Judaism is intensified by "conversion," when offers are made to them by the missionaries repair to the Khαkhαm (scribe) and, after abundant wrangling determine upon a modus vivendi. They are to pay a proportion of their wages, to keep careful watch in the cause of Israel and to die orthodox. In Istria there is a legend of a Jew Prior in a convent who was not discovered till he announced himself most unpleasantly on his death-bed. For a contrary reason to Jewish humility, the Roman Emperors preferred to die standing.

[FN#455] He wished to die in a state of ceremonial purity; as has before been mentioned.

[FN#456] Arab. "Badal": in Sind (not to speak of other places) it was customary to hire a pauper "badal" to be hanged in stead of a rich man. Sir Charles Napier signed many a death-warrant before he ever heard of the practice.

[FN#457] Arab. "La'an" = curse. The word is in every mouth though strongly forbidden by religion. Even of the enemies of Al-Islam the learned say, "Ila'an Yezνd wa lα tazνd" = curse Yezid but do not exceed (i.e. refrain from cursing the others). This, however, is in the Shafi'ν school and the Hanafνs do not allow it (Pilgrimage i. 198). Hence the Moslem when scrupulous uses na'al (shoe) for la'an (curse) as Ina'al abϊk (for Ila'an abu'-k) or, drat (instead of damn) your father. Men must hold Supreme Intelligence to be of feeble kind if put off by such miserable pretences.

[FN#458] Koran vi. 44, speaking of the Infidels. It is a most unamiable chapter, with such assertions as "Allah leadeth into error whom He pleaseth," etc.

[FN#459] Alluding to the "formication" which accompanies a stroke of paralysis.

[FN#460] Pronounce Zool Karnayn.

[FN#461] i.e. the Koranic and our mediζval Alexander, Lord of the two Horns (East and West) much "Matagrobolized" and very different from him of Macedon. The title is variously explained, from two protuberances on his head or helm, from two long locks and, possibly, from the ram-horns of Jupiter Ammon. The anecdote in the text seems suggested by the famous interview (probably a canard) with Diogenes: see in the Gesta, Tale cxlvi., "The answer of Diomedes the Pirate to Alexander." Iskandar was originally called Marzbαn (Lord of the Marches), son of Marzabah; and, though descended from Yunαn, son of Japhet, the eponymus of the Greeks, was born obscure, the son of an old woman. According to the Persians he was the son of the Elder Dαrαb (Darius Codomannus of the Kayanian or Second dynasty), by a daughter of Philip of Macedon; and was brought up by his grandfather. When Abraham and Isaac had rebuilt the Ka'abah they foregathered with him and Allah sent him forth against the four quarters of the earth to convert men to the faith of the Friend or to cut their throats; thus he became one of the four world-conquerors with Nimrod, Solomon, Bukht al-Nasr (Nabochodonosor); and he lived down two generations of men. His Wazir was Aristϊ (the Greek Aristotle) and he carried a couple of flags, white and black, which made day and night for him and facilitated his conquests. At the end of Persia, where he was invited by the people, on account of the cruelty of his half brother Darab II., he came upon two huge mountains on the same line, behind which dwelt a host of abominable pygmies, two spans high, with curious eyes, ears which served as mattresses and coverlets, huge fanged mouths, lions' claws and hairy hind quarters. They ate men, destroyed everything, copulated in public and had swarms of children. These were Yαjϊj and Mαjϊj (Gog and Magog) descendants of Japhet. Sikandar built against them the famous wall with stones cemented and riveted by iron and copper. The "Great Wall" of China, the famous bulwark against the Tartars, dates from B.C. 320 (Alexander of Macedon died B.C. 324); and as the Arabs knew Canton well before Mohammed's day, they may have built their romance upon it. The Guebres consigned Sikandar to hell for burning the Nusks or sections of the Zendavesta.

[FN#462] These terrific preachments to Eastern despots (who utterly ignore them) are a staple produce of Oriental tale-literature and form the chiaro-oscuro, as it were, of a picture whose lights are brilliant touches of profanity and indelicate humour. It certainly has the charm of contrast. Much of the above is taken from the Sikandar-nameh (Alexander Book) of the great Persian poet, Nizαmi, who flourished A.H. 515-597, between the days of Firdausi (ob. A.D.1021) and Sa'adi (ob. A.D. 1291). In that romance Sikandar builds, "where the sun goes down," a castle of glittering stone which kills men by causing excessive laughter and surrounds it with yellow earth like gold. Hence the City of Brass. He also converts, instead of being converted by, the savages of the text. He finds a stone of special excellence which he calls Almαs (diamond); and he obtains it from the Valley of Serpents by throwing down flesh to the eagles. Lastly he is accompanied by "Bilνnas" or "Bilνnus," who is apparently Apollonius of Tyana.

[FN#463] I have explained the beautiful name in Night cclxxxix:

He is stil famous for having introduced into Persia the fables of

Pilpay (Bidyapati, the lord of lore) and a game which the genius

of Persia developed into chess.

[FN#464] Here we find an eternal truth, of which Malthusians ever want reminding; that the power of a nation simply consists in its numbers of fighting men and in their brute bodily force. The conquering race is that which raises most foot-pounds: hence the North conquers the South in the Northern hemisphere and visa versa.

[FN#465] Arab. "Wayha," not so strong as "Woe to," etc. Al-Hariri often uses it as a formula of affectionate remonstrance.

[FN#466] As a rule (much disputed) the Sayyid is a descendant from Mohammed through his grandchild Hasan, and is a man of the pen; whereas the Sharif derives from Husayn and is a man of the sword. The Najνb al-taraf is the son of a common Moslemah by a Sayyid, as opposed to the "Najib al-tarafayn," when both parents are of Apostolic blood. The distinction is not noticed in Lane's "Modern Egyptians". The Sharif is a fanatic and often dangerous, as I have instanced in Pilgrimage iii. 132.

[FN#467] A theologian of Bassorah (eighth century): surnamed Abϊ Yahyα. The prayer for mercy denotes that he was dead when the tale was written.

[FN#468] A theologian of Bassorah (eighth century).

[FN#469] Arab. "Musallα"; lit. a place of prayer; an oratory, a chapel, opp. to "Jαmi'" = a (cathedral) mosque.

[FN#470] According to all races familiar with the negro, a calf like a shut fist planted close under the ham is, like the "cucumber shin" and "lark heel", a good sign in a slave. Shapely calves and well-made legs denote the idle and the ne'er-do-well. I have often found this true although the rule is utterly empirical. Possibly it was suggested by the contrast of the nervous and lymphatic temperaments.

[FN#471] These devotees address Allah as a lover would his beloved. The curious reader will consult for instances the Dabistan on Tasawwuf (ii. 221; i.,iii. end, and passim).

[FN#472] Arab. "Ma'rifat," Pers. Dαnish; the knowledge of the Truth. The seven steps are (1) Sharν'at, external law like night; (2) Tarνkat, religious rule like the stars; (3) Hakνkat, reality, truth like the moon; (4) Ma'arifat like the sun; (5) Kurbat, proximity to Allah; (6) Wasνlat, union with Allah, and (7) Suknat, dwelling in Allah. (Dabistan iii.29.)

[FN#473] Name of a fountain of Paradise: See Night xlix., vol. ii., p.100.

[FN#474] Arab. "Atbαk"; these trays are made of rushes, and the fans of palm-leaves or tail-feathers.

[FN#475] Except on the two great Festivals when fasting is forbidden. The only religion which has shown common sense in this matter is that of the Guebres or Parsis: they consider fasting neither meritorious nor lawful; and they honour Hormuzd by good living "because it keeps the soul stronger." Yet even they have their food superstitions, e.g. in Gate No. xxiv.: "Beware of sin specially on the day thou eatest flesh, for flesh is the diet of Ahriman." And in India the Guebres have copied the Hindus in not slaughtering horned cattle for the table.

[FN#476] Arab. "Jallαbiyah," a large-sleeved robe of coarse stuff worn by the poor.

[FN#477] His fear was that his body might be mutilated by the fall.

[FN#478] The phrase means "offering up many and many a prayer."

[FN#479] A saying of Mohammed is recorded "Al-fakru fakhrν" (poverty is my pride!), intelligible in a man who never wanted for anything. Here he is diametrically opposed to Ali who honestly abused poverty; and the Prophet seems to have borrowed from Christendom, whose "Lazarus and Dives" shows a man sent to Hell because he enjoyed a very modified Heaven in this life and which suggested that one of the man's greatest miseries is an ecclesiastical virtue—"Holy Poverty"—represented in the Church as a bride young and lovely. If a "rich man can hardly enter the kingdom" what must it be with a poor man whose conditions are far more unfavourable? Going to the other extreme we may say that Poverty is the root of all evil and the more so as it curtails man's power of benefiting others. Practically I observe that those who preach and praise it the most, practise it the least willingly: the ecclesiastic has always some special reasons, a church or a school is wanted; but not the less he wishes for more money. In Syria this Holy Poverty leads to strange abuses. At Bayrut I recognised in most impudent beggers well-to-do peasants from the Kasrawαn district, and presently found out that whilst their fields were under snow they came down to the coast, enjoyed a genial climate and lived on alms. When I asked them if they were not ashamed to beg, they asked me if I was ashamed of following in the footsteps of the Saviour and Apostles. How much wiser was Zoroaster who found in the Supreme Paradise (Minuwαn-minu) "many persons, rich in gold and silver who had worshipped the Lord and had been grateful to Him." (Dabistan i. 265.)

[FN#480] Koran vii. 52.

[FN#481] Arab. "Al-bayt" = the house. The Arabs had probably learned this pleasant mode of confinement from the Chinese whose Kea or Cangue is well known. The Arabian form of it is "Ghull," or portable pillory, which reprobates will wear on Judgment Day.

[FN#482] This commonest conjuring trick in the West becomes a miracle in the credulous East.

[FN#483] Arab. "Kαnϊn"; the usual term is Mankal (pron. Mangal) a pan of copper or brass. Some of these "chafing-dishes" stand four feet high and are works of art. Lane (M.E. chapt. iv) gives an illustration of the simpler kind, together with the "Azikν," a smaller pan for heating coffee. See Night dxxxviii.

[FN#484] See vol. iii., p.239. The system is that of the Roman As and Unciae. Here it would be the twenty-fourth part of a dinar or miskal; something under 5d. I have already noted that all Moslem rulers are religiously bound to some handicraft, if it be only making toothpicks. Mohammed abolished kingship proper as well as priestcraft.

[FN#485] Al-Islam, where salvation is found under the shade of the swords.

[FN#486] Moslems like the Classics (Aristotle and others) hold the clitoris (Zambϊr) to be the sedes et scaturigo veneris which, says Sonnini, is mere profanity. In the babe it protrudes beyond the labiζ and snipping off the head forms female circumcision. This rite is supposed by Moslems to have been invented by Sarah who so mutilated Hagar for jealousy and was afterwards ordered by Allah to have herself circumcised at the same time as Abraham. It is now (or should be) universal in Al-Islam and no Arab would marry a girl "unpurified" by it. Son of an "uncircumcised" mother (Ibn al-bazrα) is a sore insult. As regards the popular idea that Jewish women were circumcised till the days of Rabbi Gershom (A.D.1000) who denounced it as a scandal to the Gentiles, the learned Prof. H. Graetz informs me, with some indignation, that the rite was never practised and that the great Rabbi contended only against polygamy. Female circumcision, however, is I believe the rule amongst some outlying tribes of Jews. The rite is the proper complement of male circumcision, evening the sensitiveness of the genitories by reducing it equally in both sexes: an uncircumcised woman has the venereal orgasm much sooner and oftener than a circumcised man, and frequent coitus would injure her health; hence I believe, despite the learned historian, that it is practised by some Eastern Jews. "Excision" is universal amongst the negroids of the Upper Nile (Werne), the Somαl and other adjacent tribes. The operator, an old woman, takes up the instrument, a knife or razor-blade fixed into a wooden handle, and with three sweeps cuts off the labia and the head of the clitoris. The parts are then sewn up with a packneedle and a thread of sheepskin; and in Dar-For a tin tube is inserted for the passage of urine. Before marriage the bridegroom trains himself for a month on beef, honey and milk; and, if he can open his bride with the natural weapon, he is a sworder to whom no woman in the tribe can deny herself. If he fails, he tries penetration with his fingers and by way of last resort whips out his whittle and cuts the parts open. The sufferings of the first few nights must be severe. The few Somαli prostitutes who practised at Aden always had the labiζ and clitoris excised and the skin showing the scars of coarse sewing. The moral effect of female circumcision is peculiar. While it diminishes the heat of passion it increases licentiousness, and breeds a debauchery of mind far worse than bodily unchastity, because accompanied by a peculiar cold cruelty and a taste for artificial stimulants to "luxury." It is the sexlessness of a spayed canine imitated by the suggestive brain of humanity.

[FN#487] Koran vi. So called because certain superstitions about

Cattle are therein mentioned.

[FN#488] Koran iv. So called because it treats of marriages, divorces, etc.

[FN#489] Sνdi (contracted from Sayyidν = my lord) is a title still applied to holy men in Marocco and the Maghrib; on the East African coast it is assumed by negro and negroid Moslems, e.g. Sidi Mubαrak Bombay; and "Seedy boy" is the Anglo-Indian term for a Zanzibar-man. "Khawwαs" is one who weaves palm-leaves (Khos) into baskets, mats, etc.: here, however, it may be an inherited name.

[FN#490] i.e. in spirit; the "strangers yet" of poor dear Richard

Monckton Milnes, Lord Houghton.

[FN#491] Al-Hakk = the Truth, one of the ninety-nine names of

Allah.

[FN#492] The Moslem is still unwilling to address Salαm (Peace be with you) to the Christian, as it is obligatory (Farz) to a Moslem (Koran, chapt. iv. and lxviii.). He usually evades the difficulty by saluting the nearest Moslem or by a change of words Allah Yahdν-k (Allah direct thee to the right way) or "Peace be upon us and the righteous worshipers of Allah" (not you) or Al-Samm (for Salam) alayka = poison to thee. The idea is old: Alexander of Alexandria in his circular letter describes the Arian heretics as "men whom it is not lawful to salute or to bid God-speed."

[FN#493] Koran xxxvi. 82. I have before noted that this famous phrase was borrowed from the Hebrews, who borrowed it from the Egyptians.

[FN#494] The story of Moses and Khizr has been noticed before. See Koran chapt. xviii. 64 et seq. It is also related, says Lane (ii. 642), by Al-Kazwνni in the Ajαib al-Makhlϊkαt. This must be "The Angel and the Hermit" in the Gesta Romanorum, Tale lxxx. which possibly gave rise to Parnell's Hermit; and Tale cxxvii. "Of Justice and Equity." The Editor says it "contains a beautiful lesson:" I can find only excellent excuses for "doing evil that good may come of it."

[FN#495] Koran chapt. v.108.

[FN#496] The doggrel is phenomenal.

[FN#497] He went in wonder and softened heart to see the miracle of saintly affection.

[FN#498] In Sufistical parlance, the creature is the lover and the Creator the Beloved: worldly existence is Disunion, parting, severance; and the life to come is Reunion. The basis of the idea is the human soul being a divinζ particula aurζ, a disjoined molecule from the Great Spirit, imprisoned in a jail of flesh; and it is so far valuable that it has produced a grand and pathetic poetry; but Common Sense asks, Where is the proof? And Reason wants to know, What does it all mean?

[FN#499] Koran xiii. 41.

[FN#500] Robinson Crusoe, with a touch of Arab prayerfulness.

Also the story of the Knight Placidus in the Gesta (cx.),

Boccaccio, etc.

[FN#501] Arabs note two kinds of leprosy, "Bahak" or "Baras" the common or white, and "Juzam" the black leprosy; the leprosy of the joints, mal rouge. Both are attributed to undue diet as eating fish and drinking milk; and both are treated with tonics, especially arsenic. Leprosy is regarded by Moslems as a Scriptural malady on account of its prevalence amongst the Israelites who, as Manetho tells us, were expelled from Egypt because they infected and polluted the population. In mediζval Christendom an idea prevailed that the Saviour was a leper; hence the term "morbus sacer"; the honours paid to the sufferers by certain Saints and the Papal address (Clement III. A.D.1189) dilectis filiis leprosis. (Farrar's Life of Christ, i.149.) For the "disgusting and impetuous lust" caused by leprosy, see Sonnini (p.560) who visited the lepers at Canea in Candia. He is one of many who describes this symptom; but in the Brazil, where the foul malady still prevails, I never heard of it.

[FN#502] A city in Irak; famous for the three days' battle which caused the death of Yezdegird, last Sassanian king.

[FN#503] A mountain pass near Meccah famous for the "First Fealty of the Steep" (Pilgrimage ii. 126). The mosque was built to commemorate the event.

[FN#504] To my surprise I read in Mr. Redhouse's "Mesnevi" (Trubner, 1881), "Arafat, the mount where the victims are slaughtered by the pilgrims." (p.60). This ignorance is phenomenal. Did Mr. Redhouse never read Burckhardt or Burton?

[FN#505] i.e. listening to the sermon.

[FN#506] It is sad doggrel.

[FN#507] This long story, containing sundry episodes and occupying fifty-three Nights, is wholly omitted by Lane (ii. 643) because "it is a compound of the most extravagant absurdities." He should have enabled his readers to form their own judgment.

[FN#508] Called Jamasp (brother and minister of the ancient Persian King Gushtasp) in the translations of Trebutien and others from Von Hammer.

[FN#509] The usual term of lactation in the East, prolonged to two years and a-half, which is considered the rule laid down by the Shara' or precepts of the Prophet. But it is not unusual to see children of three and even four years hanging to their mothers' breasts. During this period the mother does not cohabit with her husband; the separation beginning with her pregnancy. Such is the habit, not only of the "lower animals," but of all ancient peoples, the Egyptians (from whom the Hebrews borrowed it), the Assyrians and the Chinese. I have discussed its bearing upon pregnancy in my "City of the Saints": the Mormons insist upon this law of purity being observed; and the beauty, strength and good health of the younger generation are proofs of their wisdom.

[FN#510] Thus distinguishing it from "Asal-kasab," cane honey or sugar. See vol. i., 271.

[FN#511] The student of Hinduism will remember the Nαga-Kings and

Queens (Melusines and Echidnζ) who guard the earth-treasures in

Naga-land. The first appearance of the snake in literature is in

Egyptian hieroglyphs, where he forms the letters f and t, and

acts as a determinative in the shape of a Cobra di Capello

(Coluber Naja) with expanded hood.

[FN#512] In token that he was safe.

[FN#513] "Akhir al-Zamαn." As old men praise past times, so prophets prefer to represent themselves as the last. The early Christians caused much scandal amongst the orderly law-loving Romans by their wild and mistaken predictions of the end of the world being at hand. The catastrophe is a fact for each man under the form of death; but the world has endured for untold ages and there is no apparent cause why it should not endure as many more. The "latter days," as the religious dicta of most "revelations" assure us, will be richer in sinners than in sanctity: hence "End of Time" is a facetious Arab title for a villain of superior quality. My Somali escort applied it to one thus distinguished: in 1875, I heard at Aden that he ended life by the spear as we had all predicted.

[FN#514] Jahannam and the other six Hells are personified as feminine; and (woman-like) they are somewhat addicted to prolix speechification.

[FN#515] These puerile exaggerations are fondly intended to act as nurses frighten naughty children.

[FN#516] Alluding to an oft-quoted saying "Lau lα-ka, etc. Without thee (O Mohammed) We (Allah) had not created the spheres," which may have been suggested by "Before Abraham was, I am" (John viii. 58); and by Gate xci. of Zoroastrianism "O Zardusht for thy sake I have created the world" (Dabistan i. 344). The sentiment is by no means "Shi'ah," as my learned friend Prof. Aloys Springer supposes. In his Mohammed (p. 220) we find an extract from a sectarian poet, "For thee we dispread the earth; for thee we caused the waters to flow; for thee we vaulted the heavens." As Baron Alfred von Kremer, another learned and experienced Orientalist, reminds me, the "Shi'ahs" have always shown a decided tendency to this kind of apotheosis and have deified or quasi-deified Ali and the Imams. But the formula is first found in the highly orthodox Burdah poem of Al-Busiri:—

"But for him (Lau lα-hu) the world had never come out of nothingness."

Hence it has been widely diffused. See Les Aventures de Kamrup (pp. 146-7) and Les uvres de Wali (pp. 51-52), by M. Garcin de Tassy and the Dabistan (vol. i. pp. 2-3).

[FN#517] Arab. "Sνmiyα" from the Pers., a word apparently built on the model of "Kαmiyα" = alchemy, and applied, I have said, to fascination, minor miracles and white magic generally like the Hindu "Indrajal." The common term for Alchemy is Ilm al-Kαf (the K-science) because it is not safe to speak of it openly as Alchemy.

[FN#518] Mare Tenebrarum = Sea of Darknesses; usually applied to the "mournful and misty Atlantic."

[FN#519] Some Moslems hold that Solomon and David were buried in Jerusalem, others on the shore of Lake Tiberias. Mohammed, according to the history of Al-Tabari (p. 56 vol. i. Duleux's "Chronique de Tabari") declares that the Jinni bore Solomon's corpse to a palace hewn in the rock upon an island surrounded by a branch of the "Great Sea" and set him on a throne, with his ring still on his finger, under a guard of twelve Jinns. "None hath looked upon the tomb save only two, Affan who took Bulukiya as his companion: with extreme pains they arrived at the spot, and Affan was about to carry off the ring when a thunderbolt consumed him. So Bulukiya returned."

[FN#520] Koran xxxviii. 34, or, "art the liberal giver."

[FN#521] i.e. of the last trumpet blown by the Archangel Israfil: an idea borrowed from the Christians. Hence the title of certain churches—ad Tubam.

[FN#522] This may mean that the fruits were fresh and dried like dates or tamarinds (a notable wonder), or soft and hard of skin like grapes and pomegranates.

[FN#523] Arab. "Ai-lksνr" meaning lit. an essence; also the philosopher's stone.

[FN#524] Name of the Jinni whom Solomon imprisoned in Lake

Tiberias (See vol. i., 41).

[FN#525] Vulgarly pronounced "Jahannum." The second hell is usually assigned to Christians. As there are seven Heavens (the planetary orbits) so, to satisfy Moslem love of symmetry, there must be as many earths and hells under the earth. The Egyptians invented these grim abodes, and the marvellous Persian fancy worked them into poem.

[FN#526] Arab. "Yαjϊj and Majuj," first named in Gen. x. 2, which gives the ethnology of Asia Minor, circ. B.C. 800. "Gomer" is the Gimri or Cymmerians; "Magog" the original Magi, a division of the Medes, "Javan" the Ionian Greeks, "Meshesh" the Moschi; and "Tires" the Turusha, or primitive Cymmerians. In subsequent times, "Magog" was applied to the Scythians, and modern Moslems determine from the Koran (chaps. xviii. and xxi.) that Yajuj and Majuj are the Russians, whom they call Moska or Moskoff from the Moskwa River,

[FN#527] I attempt to preserve the original pun; "Mukarrabin" (those near Allah) being the Cherubim, and the Creator causing Iblis to draw near Him (karraba).

[FN#528] A vulgar version of the Koran (chaps. vii.), which seems to have borrowed from the Gospel of Barnabas. Hence Adam becomes a manner of God-man.

[FN#529] These wild fables are caricatures of Rabbinical legends which began with "Lilith," the Spirit-wife of Adam: Nature and her counterpart, Physis and Antiphysis, supply a solid basis for folk-lore. Amongst the Hindus we have Brahma (the Creator) and Viswakarmα, the anti-Creator: the former makes a horse and a bull and the latter caricatures them with an ass and a buffalo, and so forth.

[FN#530] This is the "Lauh al-Mahfϊz," the Preserved Tablet, upon which are written all Allah's decrees and the actions of mankind good (white) and evil (black). This is the "perspicuous Book" of the Koran, chaps. vi. 59. The idea again is Guebre.

[FN#531] i.e. the night before Friday which in Moslem parlance would be Friday night.

[FN#532] Again Persian "Gαw-i-Zamνn" = the Bull of the Earth.

"The cosmogony of the world," etc., as we read in the Vicar of

Wakefield.

[FN#533] The Calc. Edit. ii. 614. here reads by a clerical error "bull."

[FN#534] i.e. Lakes and rivers.

[FN#535] Here some abridgement is necessary, for we have another recital of what has been told more than once.

[FN#536] This name, "King of Life," is Persian: "Tegh" or "Tigh" means a scimitar and "Bahrwαn," is, I conceive, a mistake for "Bihrϊn," the Persian name of Alexander the Great.

[FN#537] Arab. "Mulαkαt" or meeting the guest which, I have said, is an essential part of Eastern ceremony, the distance from the divan, room, house or town being proportioned to his rank or consideration.

[FN#538] Arab. "Sifr": whistling is held by the Badawi to be the speech of devils; and the excellent explorer Burckhardt got a bad name by the ugly habit.

[FN#539] The Arabs call "Shikk" (split man) and the Persians "Nνmchahrah" (half-face) a kind of demon like a man divided longitudinally: this gruesome creature runs with amazing speed and is very cruel and dangerous. For the celebrated soothsayers "Shikk" and "Sαtih" see Chenery's Al-Hariri, p. 371.

[FN#540] Arab. "Takht" (Persian) = a throne or a capital.

[FN#541] Arab. "Wady al-Naml"; a reminiscence of the Koranic Wady (chaps. xxvii.), which some place in Syria and others in Tαif.

[FN#542] This is the old, old fable of the River Sabbation which

Pliny ((xxx). 18) reports as "drying up every Sabbath-day"

(Saturday): and which Josephus reports as breaking the Sabbath by

flowing only on the Day of Rest.

[FN#543] They were keeping the Sabbath. When lodging with my Israelite friends at Tiberias and Safet, I made a point of never speaking to them (after the morning salutation) till the Saturday was over.

[FN#544] Arab. "La'al" and "Yαkϊt," the latter also applied to the garnet and to a variety of inferior stones. The ruby is supposed by Moslems to be a common mineral thoroughly "cooked" by the sun, and produced only on the summits of mountains inaccessible even to Alpinists. The idea may have originated from exaggerated legends of the Badakhshαn country (supposed to be the home of the ruby) and its terrors of break-neck foot-paths, jagged peaks and horrid ravines: hence our "balas-ruby" through the Spanish corruption "Balaxe." Epiphanius, archbishop of Salamis in Cyprus, who died A.D. 403, gives, m a little treatise (De duodecim gemmis rationalis summi sacerdotis Hebrζorum Liber, opera Fogginii, Romae, 1743, p. 30), a precisely similar description of the mode of finding jacinths in Scythia. "In a wilderness in the interior of Great Scythia," he writes, "there is a valley begirt with stony mountains as with walls. It is inaccessible to man, and so excessively deep that the bottom of the valley is invisible from the top of the surrounding mountains. So great is the darkness that it has the effect of a kind of chaos. To this place certain criminals are condemned, whose task it is to throw down into the valley slaughtered lambs, from which the skin has been first taken off. The little stones adhere to these pieces of flesh. Thereupon the eagles, which live on the summits of the mountains, fly down following the scent of the flesh, and carry away the lambs with the stones adhering to them. They, then, who are condemned to this place watch until the eagles have finished their meal, and run and take away the stones." Epiphanius, who wrote this, is spoken of in terms of great respect by many ecclesiastical writers, and St. Jerome styles the treatise here quoted, "Egregium volumen, quod si legere volueris, plenissimam scientiam consequeris ," and, indeed, it is by no means improbable that it was from the account of Epiphanius that this story was first translated into Arabic. A similar account is given by Marco Polo and by Nicolς de Conti, as of a usage which they had heard was practiced in India, and the position ascribed to the mountain by Conti, namely, fifteen days' journey north of Vijanagar, renders it highly probable that Golconda was alluded to. He calls the mountain Albenigaras, and says that it was infested with serpents. Marco Polo also speaks of these serpents, and while his account agrees with that of Sindbad, inasmuch as the serpents, which are the prey of Sindbad's Rukh, are devoured by the Venetian's eagles, that of Conti makes the vultures and eagles fly away with the meat to places where they may be safe from the serpents. (Introd. p. xiii., India in the Fifteenth Century, etc., R. H. Major, London, Hakluyt Soc. MDCCCLVII.)

[FN#545] Elder Victory: "Nasr" is a favourite name with Moslems.

[FN#546] These are the "Swan-maidens" of whom Europe in late years has heard more than enough. It appears to me that we go much too far for an explanation of the legend; a high-bred girl is so like a swan in many points that the idea readily suggests itself. And it is also aided by the old Egyptian (and Platonic) belief in pre-existence and by the Rabbinic and Buddhistic doctrine of ante-natal sin, to say nothing of metempsychosis. (Joseph Ant. xvii.. 153.)

[FN#547] The lines have occurred before. I quote Mr. Payne for variety.

[FN#548] Arab. "Al-Khayαl": it is a synonym of "al-Tayf' and the nearest approach to our "ghost," as has been explained. In poetry it is the figure of the beloved seen when dreaming.

[FN#549] He does not kiss her mouth because he intends to marry her.

[FN#550] It should be "manifest" excellence. (Koran xxvii. 16.)

[FN#551] The phrase is Koranic used to describe Paradise, and Damascus is a familiar specimen of a city under which a river, the Baradah, passes, distributed into a multitude of canals.

[FN#552] It may be noted that rose-water is sprinkled on the faces of the "nobility and gentry, " common water being good enough for the commonalty. I have had to drink tea made in compliment with rose-water and did not enjoy it.

[FN#553] The "Valley Flowery:" Zahrαn is the name of a place near

Al-Medinah.

[FN#554] The Proud or Petulant.

[FN#555] i.e. Lion, Son of ( ?).

[FN#556] i.e. Many were slain.

[FN#557] I venture to draw attention to this battle-picture which is at once simple and highly effective.

[FN#558] Anglicθ a quibble, evidently evasive.

[FN#559] In text "Anα A'amil," etc., a true Egypto-Syrian vulgarism.

[FN#560] i.e. magical formulζ. The context is purposely left vague.

[FN#561] The repetition is a condescension, a token of kindness.

[FN#562] This is the common cubic of 18 inches: the modern vary from 22 to 26.

[FN#563] I have noticed the two-humped Bactrian camel which the Syrians and Egyptians compare with an elephant. See p. 221 (the neo-Syrian) Book of Kalilah and Dimnah.

[FN#564] The Noachian dispensation revived the Islam or true religion first revealed to Adam and was itself revived and reformed by Moses.

[FN#565] Probably a corruption of the Turkish "Kara Tαsh" = black stone, in Arab. "Hαjar Jahannam" (hell-stone), lava, basalt.

[FN#566] A variant of lines in Night xx., vol. i., 211.

[FN#567] i.e. Daughter of Pride: the proud.

[FN#568] In the Calc. Edit. by misprint "Maktab." Jabal Mukattam is the old sea-cliff where the Mediterranean once beat and upon whose North-Western slopes Cairo is built.

[FN#569] Arab. "Kutb"; lie. an axle, a pole; next a prince; a high order or doyen in Sainthood especially amongst the Sufi-gnostics.

[FN#570] Lit. "The Green" (Prophet), a mysterious personage confounded with Elijah, St. George and others. He was a Moslem, i.e. a ewe believer in the Islam of his day and Wazir to Kaykobad, founder of the Kayanian dynasty, sixth century B.C. We have before seen him as a contemporary of Moses. My learned friend Ch. Clermone-Ganneau traces him back, with a multitude of his similars (Proteus, Perseus, etc.), to the son of Osiris (p. 45, Horus et Saint Georges).

[FN#571] Arab. "Waled," more ceremonious than "ibn." It is, by the by, the origin of our "valet" in its sense of boy or servant who is popularly addressed Yα waled. Hence I have seen in a French book of travels "un petit Iavelet."

[FN#572] Arab. "Azal" = Eternity (without beginning); "Abad" =

Infinity (eternity without end).

[FN#573] The Moslem ritual for slaughtering (by cutting the throat) is not so strict as that of the Jews; but it requires some practice; and any failure in the conditions renders the meat impure, mere carrion (fatνs).

[FN#574] The Wazir repeats all the words spoken by the Queen—but "in iteration there is no recreation."

[FN#575] A phrase always in the Moslem's mouth: the slang meaning of "we put our trust in Allah" is "let's cut our stick."

[FN#576] Koran liii. 14. This "Sidrat al-Muntahα" (Zizyphus lotus) stands m the seventh heaven on the right hand of Allah's throne: and even the angels may not pass beyond it.

[FN#577] Arab. "Habash" the word means more than "Abyssinia" as it includes the Dankali Country and the sea-board, a fact unknown to the late Lord Stratford de Redcliffe when he disputed with the Porte. I ventured to set him right and suffered accordingly.

[FN#578] Here ends vol. ii. of the Mac. Edit.