[FN#87] Or night. A metaphor for rushing into peril.

[FN#88] Plur. of kumkum, cucurbite, gourd-shaped vessel, jar.

[FN#89] A popular exaggeration for a very expert thief.

[FN#90] Arab. "Buka'at Ad-bum": lit. the "low place of blood" (where it stagnates): so Al-Buka'ah = Coelesyria.

[FN#91] That common and very unpleasant phrase, full of egotism and self-esteem, "I told you so," is even more common in the naive East than in the West. In this case the son's answer is far superior to the mother's question.

[FN#92] In order to keep his oath to the letter.

[FN#93] "Tabannuj; " literally "hemping" (drugging with hemp or henbane) is the equivalent in Arab medicine of our "anaesthetics." These have been used in surgery throughout the East for centuries before ether and chloroform became the fashion in the civilised West.

[FN#94] Arab. "Durka'ah," the lower part of the floor, opposed to the "liwan" or dais. Liwan =Al-Aywan (Arab. and Pers.) the hall (including the dais and the sunken parts)

[FN#95] i.e. he would toast it as he would a mistress.

[FN#96] This till very late years was the custom in Persia, and Fath Ali Shah never appeared in scarlet without ordering some horrible cruelties. In Dar-For wearing a red cashmere turban was a sign of wrath and sending a blood red dress to a subject meant that he would be slain.

[FN#97] That is, this robbery was committed in the palace by some one belonging to it. References to vinegar are frequent; that of Egypt being famous in those days. "Optimum et laudatissimum acetum a Romanis habebatur AEgyptum" (Facciolati); and possibly it was sweetened: the Gesta (Tale xvii.) mentions "must and vinegar." In Arab Proverbs, One mind by vinegar and another by wine"=each mind goes its own way, (Arab. Prov. . 628); or, "with good and bad," vinegar being spoilt wine.

[FN#98] We have not heard the last of this old "dowsing rod": the latest form of rhabdomancy is an electrical-rod invented in the United States.

[FN#99] This is the proces verbal always drawn up on such occasions.

[FN#100] The sight of running water makes a Persian long for strong drink as the sight of a fine view makes the Turk feel hungry.

[FN#101] Arab. "Min wahid aduww " a peculiarly Egyptian or rather Cairene phrase.

[FN#102] Al-Danaf=the Distressing Sickness: the title would be Ahmad the Calamity. Al-Zaybak (the Quicksilver)=Mercury Ali Hasan "Shuuman"=a pestilent fellow. We shall meet all these worthies again and again: see the Adventures of Mercury Ali of Cairo, Night dccviii., a sequel to The Rogueries of Dalilah, Night dcxcviii.

[FN#103] For the "Sacrifice-place of Ishmael" (not Isaac) see my Pilgrimage (iii. 306). According to all Arab ideas Ishmael, being the eldest son, was the chief of the family after his father. I have noted that this is the old old quarrel between the Arabs and their cousins the Hebrews.

[FN#104] This black-mail was still paid to the Badawin of Ramlah (Alexandria) till the bombardment in 1881.

[FN#105] The famous Issus of Cilicia, now a port-village on the Gulf of Scanderoon.

[FN#106] Arab. " Wada'a" = the concha veneris, then used as small change.

[FN#107] Arab. "Sakati"=a dealer in "castaway" articles, such es old metal,damaged goods, the pluck and feet of animals, etc.

[FN#108] The popular tale of Burckhardt's death in Cairo was that the names of the three first Caliphs were found written upon his slipper-soles and that he was put to death by decree of the Olema. It is the merest nonsense, as the great traveller died of dysentery in the house of my old friend John Thurburn and was buried outside the Bab al-Nasr of Cairo where his tomb was restored by the late Rogers Bey (Pilgrimage i. 123).

[FN#109] Prob. a mis-spelling for Arslan, in Turk. a lion, and in slang a piastre.

[FN#110] Arab. "Maka'ad;" lit. = sitting-room.

[FN#111] Arab. "Khammarah"; still the popular term throughout Egypt for a European Hotel. It is not always intended to be insulting but it is, meaning the place where Franks meet to drink forbidden drinks.

[FN#112] A reminiscence of Mohammed who cleansed the Ka'abah of its 360 idols (of which 73 names are given by Freytag, Einleitung, etc. pp. 270, 342-57) by touching them with his staff, whereupon all fell to the ground; and the Prophet cried (Koran xvii. 84), "Truth is come, and falsehood is vanished: verily, falsehood is a thing that vanisheth" (magna est veritas, etc.). Amongst the "idols" are said to have been a statue of Abraham and the horns of the ram sacrificed in lieu of Ishmael, which (if true) would prove conclusively that the Abrahamic legend at Meccah is of ancient date and not a fiction of Al-Islam. Hence, possibly, the respect of the Judaising Tobbas of Hiwyarland for the Ka'abah. (Pilgrimage, iii. 295.)

[FN#113] This was evidently written by a Sunni as the Shi'ahs claim to be the only true Moslems. Lane tells an opposite story (ii. 329). It suggests the common question in the South of Europe, "Are you a Christian or a Protestant?"

[FN#114] Arab. "Ana fi jirat-ak!" a phrase to be remembered as useful in time of danger.

[FN#115] i.e. No Jinni, or Slave of the Jewel, was there to answer.

[FN#116] Arab. "Kunsul" (pron. "Gunsul") which here means a well-to-do Frank, and shows the modern date of the tale as it stands.

[FN#117] From the Ital. "Capitano." The mention of cannon and other terms in this tale shows that either it was written during the last century or it has been mishandled by copyists.

[FN#118] Arab. "Mininah"; a biscuit of flour and clarified butter.

[FN#119] Arab. "Waybah"; the sixth part of the Ardabb=6 to 7 English gallons.

[FN#120] He speaks in half-jest a la fellah; and reminds us of "Hangman, drive on the cart!"

[FN#121] Yochanan (whom Jehovah has blessed) Jewish for John, is probably a copy of the Chaldean Euahanes, the Oannes of Berosus=Ea Khan, Hea the fish. The Greeks made it Joannes; the Arabs "Yohanna" (contracted to "Hanna," Christian) and "Yabya" (Moslem). Prester (Priest) John is probably Ung Khan, the historian prince conquered and slain by Janghiz Khan in A.D. 1202. The modern history of "John" is very extensive: there may be a full hundred varieties and derivation' of the name. "Husn Maryam" the beauty (spiritual. etc.) of the B.V.

[FN#122] Primarily being middle-aged; then aid, a patron, servant, etc. Also a tribe of the Jinn usually made synonymous with "Marid," evil controuls, hostile to men: modern spiritualists would regard them as polluted souls not yet purged of their malignity. The text insinuates that they were at home amongst Christians and in Genoa.

[FN#123] Arab. "Sar'a" = epilepsy, falling sickness, of old always confounded with "possession" (by evil spirits) or "obsession."

[FN#124] Again the true old charge of falsifying the so-called "Sacred books." Here the Koran is called "Furkan." Sale (sect. iii.) would assimilate this to the Hebr. "Perek" or "Pirka," denoting a section or portion of Scripture; but Moslems understand it to be the "Book which distinguisheth (faraka, divided) the true from the false." Thus Caliph Omar was entitled "Faruk" = the Distinguisher (between right and wrong). Lastly, "Furkan," meanings as in Syr. and Ethiop. deliverance, revelation, is applied alike to the Pentateuch and Koran.

[FN#125] Euphemistic for "thou shalt die."

[FN#126] Lit. "From (jugular) vein to vein" (Arab. "Warid"). Our old friend Lucretius again: "Tantane relligio," etc.

[FN#127] As opposed to the "but" or outer room.

[FN#128] Arab. "Darb al-Asfar" in the old Jamaliyah or Northern part of Cairo.

[FN#129] A noble tribe of Badawin that migrated from Al-Yaman and settled in Al-Najd Their Chief, who died a few years before Mohammed's birth, was Al-Hatim (the "black crow"), a model of Arab manliness and munificence; and although born in the Ignorance he will enter Heaven with the Moslems. Hatim was buried on the hill called Owarid: I have already noted this favourite practice of the wilder Arabs and the affecting idea that the Dead may still look upon his kith and kin. There is not an Arab book nor, indeed, a book upon Arabia which does not contain the name of Hatim: he is mentioned as unpleasantly often as Aristides.

[FN#130] Lord of "Cattle-feet," this King's name is unknown; but the Kamus mentions two Kings called Zu 'l Kala'a, the Greater and the Less. Lane's Shaykh (ii. 333) opined that the man who demanded Hatim's hospitality was one Abu'l-Khaybari.

[FN#131] The camel's throat, I repeat, is not cut as in the case of other animals, the muscles being too strong: it is slaughtered by the "nahr," i.e. thrusting a knife into the hollow at the commissure of the chest. (Pilgrimage iii. 303.)

[FN#132] Adi became a Moslem and was one of the companions of the Prophet.

[FN#133] A rival-in generosity to Hatim: a Persian poet praising his patron's generosity says that it buried that of Hatim and dimmed that of Ma'an (D'Herbelot). He was a high official-under the last Ommiade, Marwan al-Himar (the "Ass," or the "Century," the duration of Ommiade rule) who was routed and slain in A.H. 132=750. Ma'an continued to serve under the Abbasides and was a favourite with Al-Mansur. "More generous or bountiful than Ka'ab" is another saying (A. P., i. 325); Ka'ab ibn Mamah was a man who, somewhat like Sir Philip Sidney at Zutphen, gave his own portion of drink while he was dying of thirst to a man who looked wistfully at him, whence the saying "Give drink to thy brother the Namiri" (A. P., i. 608). Ka'ab could not mount, so they put garments over him to scare away the wild beasts and left him in the desert to die. "Scatterer of blessings" (Nashir al-Ni'am) was a title of King Malik of Al-Yaman, son of Sharhabil, eminent for his liberality. He set up the statue in the Western Desert, inscribed "Nothing behind me," as a warner to others.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#141] Sixth Ommiade Caliph, A.D. 705-716, from "Tarik" we have "Gibraltar"=Jabal-al-Tarik.

[FN#142] Arab. "Yunan" = Ionia, applied to ancient Greece as "Roum" is to the Graeco-Roman Empire.

[FN#143] Arab. "Bahramani ;" prob. alluding to the well-known legend of the capture of Somanath (Somnauth) from the Hindus by Mahmud of Ghazni. In the Aja'ib al-Hind (before quoted) the Brahmins are called Abrahamah.

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

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

[FN#146] Koran. xvi. 112.

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

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

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

[FN#150] Human blood being especially impure.

[FN#151] Jones, Brown and Robinson.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#159] The second couplet is not in the Mac. Edit. but Lane's Shaykh has supplied it (ii. 339)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#172] Some traditionist, but whether Sha'abi, Shi'abi or Shu'abi we cannot decide.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

"A pint is a pound All the world round;"

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#186] Arab. "Harrak," whence probably our "Carack" and "Carrack" (large ship), in dictionaries derived from Carrus Marinus.

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

[FN#188] Arab. "Sharab al-tuffah" = melapio or cider.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#196] Katil = the Irish "kilt."

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#205] The first couplet is not in the Mac. Edit. (ii. 171) which gives only a single couplet but it is found in the Bres. Edit. which entitles this tale "Story of the lying (or false kazib) Khalifah." Lane (ii. 392) of course does not translate it.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#214] Syene on the Nile.

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

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

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

[FN#218] In the Mac. Edit. (ii. 182) "Al-Kushayri." Al-Kasri was Governor of the two Iraks (I.e. Bassorah and Cufa) in the reign of Al-Hisham, tenth Ommiade (A.D. 723-741)

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

[FN#220] Koran, iii. 178.

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

[FN#222] To show her grief.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#246] Mansur al-Nimri, a poet of the time and a protege of Yahya's son, Al-Fazl.

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

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

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

[FN#250] Even now each Pasha-governor must keep a "Wakil" in Constantinople to intrigue and bribe for him at head-quarters.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#276] The river of Paradise.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#287] Arab. "Alama" = Ala-ma = upon what ? wherefore ?

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

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

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

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

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

"There is a pleasure sure in being mad Which none but madmen know."

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#300] Lane (ii. 453) has it. "that I may dress thy hair'" etc. This is Bowdlerising with a witness.

[FN#301] The sign of respect when a personage dismounts. (Pilgrimage i. 77.)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#310] Whose shell fits very tight.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#333] A Badawi tribe to which belonged the generous Ma'an bin Za'idab, often mentioned The Nights.

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

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

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

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

[FN#338] Arab. "Musamirah"=chatting at night. Easterns are inordinately fond of the practice and the wild Arabs often sit up till dawn, talking over the affairs of the tribe, indeed a Shaykh is expected to do so. "Early to bed and early to rise" is a civilised, not a savage or a barbarous saying. Samir is a companion in night talk; Rafik of the road; Rahib in riding horse or camel, Ka'id in sitting, Sharib and Rafis at drink, and Nadim at table: Ahid is an ally. and Sharik a partner all on the model of "Fa'il."

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

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

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

[FN#342] Moons=Budur

[FN#343] in Paradise as a martyr.

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

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

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

And again;

"She laid aside reluctance and I embraced her close As if I were Lam and my love Alif."

The Lomad Olaph in Syriac is similarly colligated.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[FN#358] Koran xxvii. 12. This was one of the nine "signs" to wicked "Pharaoh." The "hand of Moses" is a symbol of power and ability (Koran vii. 105). The whiteness was supernatural-beauty, not leprosy of the Jews (Exod. iv. 6); but brilliancy, after being born red or black: according to some commentators, Moses was a negro.

[FN#359] Koran iii. 103; the other faces become black. This explains I have noticed the use of the phrases in blessing and cursing.

[FN#360] Here we have the naked legend of the negro's origin, one of those nursery tales in which the ignorant of Christendom still believe But the deduction from the fable and the testimony to the negro's lack of intelligence, though unpleasant to our ignorant negrophils, are factual-and satisfactory.

[FN#361] Koran, xcii. 1, 2: an oath of Allah to reward and punish with Heaven and Hell.

[FN#362] Alluding to the "black drop" in the heart: it was taken from Mohammed's by the Archangel Gabriel. The fable seems to have arisen from the verse ' Have we not opened thy breast?" (Koran, chaps. xciv. 1). The popular tale is that Halimah, the Badawi nurse of Mohammed, of the Banu Sa'ad tribe, once saw her son, also a child, running towards her and asked him what was the matter. He answered, 'My little brother was seized by two men in white who stretched him on the ground and opened his bellyl" For a full account and deductions see the Rev. Mr. Badger's article, "Muhammed" (p. 959) in vol. in. "Dictionary of Christian Biography."

[FN#363] Arab. "Sumr," lit. brown (as it is afterwards used), but politely applied to a negro: "Ya Abu Sumrah!" O father of brownness.

[FN#364] Arab. 'Luma"=dark hue of the inner lips admired by the Arabs and to us suggesting most umpleasant ideas. Mr. Chenery renders it "dark red,' and "ruddy" altogether missing the idea.

[FN#365] Arab. "Sauda," feminine of aswad (black), and meaning black bile (melancholia) as opposed to leucocholia,

[FN#366] i.e. the Magians, Sabians, Zoroastrians.

[FN#367] The "Unguinum fulgor" of the Latins who did not forget to celebrate the shining of the nails although they did not Henna them like Easterns. Some, however, have suggested that alludes to colouring matter.

[FN#368] Women with white skins are supposed to be heating and unwholesome: hence the Hindu Rajahs slept with dark girls in the hot season.

[FN#369] Moslems sensibly have a cold as well as a hot Hell, the former called Zamharir (lit. "intense cold")or AI-Barahut, after a well in Hazramaut; as Gehenna (Arab. "Jahannam") from the furnace-like ravine East of Jerusalem (Night cccxxv.). The icy Hell is necessary in terrorem for peoples who inhabit cold regions and who in a hot Hell only look forward to an eternity of "coals and candles" gratis. The sensible missionaries preached it in Iceland till foolishly forbidden by Papal-Bull.

[FN#370] Koran ii. 26; speaking of Abraham when he entertained the angels unawares.

[FN#371] Arab. "Rakb," usually applied to a fast-going caravan of dromedary riders (Pilgrimage ii. 329). The "Cafilah" is Arab.: "Caravan" is a corruption of the Pers. "Karwan."

[FN#372] A popular saying. It is interesting to contrast this dispute between fat and thin with the Shakespearean humour of Falstaff and Prince Henry.

[FN#373] Arab. "Dalak" vulg. Hajar al-Hammam (Hammam-stone). The comparison is very apt: the rasps are of baked clay artificially roughened (see illustrations in Lane M. E. chaps. xvi.). The rope is called "Masad," a bristling line of palm-fibre like the coir now familiarly known in England.

[FN#374] Although the Arab's ideal-of beauty, as has been seen and said, corresponds with ours the Egyptians (Modern) the Maroccans and other negrofied races like "walking tun-butts" as Clapperton called his amorous widow.

[FN#375] Arab. "Khayzar" or "Khayzaran" the rattan-palm. Those who have seen this most graceful "palmijuncus" in its native forest will recognize the neatness of the simile.

[FN#376] This is the popular idea of a bushy "veil of nature" in women: it is always removed by depilatories and vellication. When Bilkis Queen of Sheba discovered her legs by lifting her robe (Koran xxvii.), Solomon was minded to marry her, but would not do so till the devils had by a depilatory removed the hair. The popular preparation (called Nurah) consists of quicklime 7 parts, and Zirnik or orpiment, 3 parts: it is applied in the Hammam to a perspiring skin, and it must be washed off immediately the hair is loosened or it burns and discolours. The rest of the body-pile (Sha'arat opp. to Sha'ar=hair) is eradicated by applying a mixture of boiled honey with turpentine or other gum, and rolling it with the hand till the hair comes off. Men I have said remove the pubes by shaving, and pluck the hair of the arm-pits, one of the vestiges of pre-Adamite man. A good depilatory is still a desideratum, the best perfumers of London and Paris have none which they can recommend. The reason is plain: the hair bulb can be eradicated only by destroying the skin.

[FN#377] Koran, ii. 64: referring to the heifer which the Jews were ordered to sacrifice,

[FN#378] Arab. "kalla," a Koranic term possibly from Kull (all) and la (not) =prorsus non-altogether not!

[FN#379] "Habab" or "Haba," the fine particles of dust, which we call motes. The Cossid (Arab. "Kasid") is the Anglo-Indian term for a running courier (mostly under Government), the Persian "Shatir" and the Guebre Ravand.

[FN#380] Arab. "Sambari" a very long thin lance so called after Samhar, the maker, or the place of making. See vol. ii. p. 1. It is supposed to cast, when planted in the ground, a longer shadow in proportion to its height, than any other thing of the kind.

[FN#381] Arab. "Sulafah ;" properly prisane which flows from the grapes before pressure. The plur. "Sawalif" also means tresses of hair and past events: thus there is a "triple entendre." And again "he" is used for "she."

[FN#382] There is a pun in the last line, "Khalun (a mole) khallauni" (rid me), etc.

[FN#383] Of old Fustat, afterwards part of Southern Cairo, a proverbially miserable quarter hence the saying, "They quoted Misr to Kahirah (Cairo), whereon Bab al-Luk rose with its grass," in derision of nobodies who push themselves forward. Burckhardt, Prov. 276.

[FN#384] Its fruits are the heads of devils; a true Dantesque fancy. Koran, chaps. xvii. 62, "the tree cursed in the Koran" and in chaps. xxxvii., 60, "is this better entertainment, or the tree of Al-Zakkum?" Commentators say that it is a thorn bearing a bitter almond which grows in the Tehamah and was therefore promoted to Hell.

[FN#385] Arab. "Lasm" (lathm) as opposed to Bausah or boseh (a buss) and Kublah (a kiss,

[FN#386] Arab. "Jufun" (plur. of Jafn) which may mean eyebrows or eyelashes and only the context can determine which. [FN#387] Very characteristic of Egyptian manners is the man who loves six girls equally well, who lends them, as it were, to the Caliph; and who takes back the goods as if in no wise damaged by the loan.

[FN#388] The moon is masculine possibly by connection with the Assyrian Lune-god "Sin"; but I can find no cause for the Sun (Shams) being feminine.

[FN#389] Arab. "Al-Amin," a title of the Prophet. It is usually held that this proud name "The honest man," was applied by his fellow-citizens to Mohammed in early life; and that in his twenty-fifth year, when the Eighth Ka'abah was being built, it induced the tribes to make him their umpire concerning the distinction of placing in position the "Black Stone" which Gabriel had brought from Heaven to be set up as the starting-post for the seven circuitings. He distributed the honour amongst the clans and thus gave universal satisfaction. His Christian biographers mostly omit to record an anecdote which speaks so highly in Mohammed's favour. (Pilgrimage iii. 192.)

[FN#390] The idea is that Abu Nowas was a thought-reader such being the prerogative of inspired poets in the East. His drunkenness and debauchery only added to his power. I have already noticed that "Allah strike thee dead" (Katala-k Allah) is like our phrase "Confound the fellow, how clever he is."

[FN#391] Again said facetiously, "Devil take you!"

[FN#392] In all hot-damp countries it is necessary to clothe dogs, morning and evening especially: otherwise they soon die of rheumatism and loin disease.

[FN#393] =Beatrice. A fragment of these lines is in Night cccxv. See also Night dcclxxxi.

[FN#394] The Moslems borrowed the horrible idea of a "jealous God" from their kinsmen, the Jews. Every race creates its own Deity after the fashion of itself: Jehovah is distinctly a Hebrew, the Christian Theos is originally a Judaeo-Greek and Allah a half-Badawi Arab. In this tale Allah, despotic and unjust, brings a generous and noble-minded man to beggary, simply because he fed his dogs off gold plate. Wisdom and morality have their infancy and youth: the great value of such tales as these is to show and enable us to measure man's development.

[FN#395] In Trebutien (Lane ii. 501) the merchant says to ex-Dives, "Thou art wrong in charging Destiny with injustice. If thou art ignorant of the cause of thy ruin I will acquaint thee with it. Thou feddest the dogs in dishes of gold and leftest the poor to die of hunger." A superstition, but intelligible.

[FN#396] Arab. "Sarraf" = a money changer.

[FN#397] Arab. "Birkah," a common feature in the landscapes of Lower Egypt: it is either a natural-pool left by the overflow of the Nile; or, as in the text, a built-up tank, like the "Talab" for which India is famous. Sundry of these Birkahs are or were in Cairo itself; and some are mentioned in The Nights.

[FN#398] This sneer at the "military" and the "police" might come from an English convict's lips.

[FN#399] Lit. "The conquering King;" a dynastic title assumed by Salah al-Din (Saladin) and sundry of the Ayyubi (Eyoubite) sovereigns of Egypt, whom I would call the "Soldans."

[FN#400] "Kahirah" (i.e. City of Mars the Planet) is our Cairo: Bulak is the port suburb on the Nile, till 1858 wholly disjoined from the City; and Fostat is the outlier popularly called Old Cairo. The latter term is generally translated "town of leathern tents;" but in Arabic "fustat" is an abode of Sha'ar=hair, such as horse-hair, in fact any hair but "Wabar"=soft hair, as the camel's. See Lane, Lex.

[FN#401] Arab. "Adl"=just: a legal-witness to whose character there is no tangible objection a prime consideration in Moslem law. Here "Adl" is evidently used ironically for a hypocritical-rascal

[FN#402] Lane (ii. 503) considers three thousand dinars (the figure in the Bres. Edit.) "a more probable sum." Possibly: but, I repeat, exaggeration is one of the many characteristics of The Nights.

[FN#403] Calc. Edit. "Kazir:" the word is generally written "Kazdir," Sansk. Kastira, born probably from the Greek .

[FN#404] This would have passed for a peccadillo in the "good old days." As late as 1840 the Arnaut soldiers used to "pot" any peasant who dared to ride (instead of walking) past their barracks. Life is cheap in hot countries.

[FN#405] Koran, xii. 46 — a passage expounding the doctrine of free will: "He who doth right doth it to the advantage of his own soul; and he who doth evil, doth it against the same; for thy Lord," etc.

[FN#406] Arab. "Suffah"; whence our Sofa. In Egypt it is a raised shelf generally of stone, about four feet high and headed with one or more arches. It is an elaborate variety of the simple "Tak" or niche, a mere hollow in the thickness of the wall. Both are used for such articles as basin. ewer and soap; coffee cups, water bottles etc.

[FN#407] In Upper Egypt (Apollinopolis Parva) pronounced "Goos," the Coptic Kos-Birbir, once an emporium of the Arabian trade.

[FN#408] This would appeal strongly to a pious Moslem.

[FN#409] i.e. "the father of a certain person"; here the merchant whose name may have been Abu'l Hasan, etc. The useful word (thingumbob, what d'ye call him, donchah, etc.) has been bodily transferred into Spanish and Portuguese Fulano. It is of old genealogy, found in the Heb. Fuluni which applies to a person only in Ruth iv. I, but is constantly so employed by Rabbinic writers. The Greek use {Greek Letters}.

[FN#410] Lit. "by his (i.e. her) hand," etc. Hence Lane (ii. 507) makes nonsense of the line.

[FN#411] Arab. "Badrah," as has been said, is properly a weight of 10,000 dirhams or drachmas; but popularly used for largesse thrown to the people at festivals.

[FN#412] Arab. "Allaho A'alam"; (God knows!) here the popular phrase for our, "I know not;" when it would be rude to say bluntly "M'adri"= "don't know."

[FN#413] There is a picturesque Moslem idea that good deeds become incarnate and assume human shapes to cheer the doer in his grave, to greet him when he enters Paradise and so forth. It was borrowed from the highly imaginative faith of the Guebre, the Zoroastrian. On Chinavad or Chanyud-pul (Sirat), the Judgement bridge, 37 rods (rasan) long, straight and 37 fathoms broad for the good, and crooked and narrow as sword-edge for the bad, a nymph-like form will appear to the virtuous and say, "I am the personification of thy good deeds!" In Hell there will issue from a fetid gale a gloomy figure with head like a minaret, red eyeballs, hooked nose, teeth like pillars, spear-like fangs, snaky locks etc. and when asked who he is he will reply, "I am the personification of thine evil acts!" (Dabistan i. 285.) The Hindus also personify everything.

[FN#414] Arab. "Banu Israil;" applied to the Jews when theirs was the True Faith i.e. before the coming of Jesus, the Messiah, whose mission completed that of Moses and made it obsolete (Matruk) even as the mission of Jesus was completed and abrogated by that of Mohammed. The term "Yahud"=Jew is applied scornfully to the Chosen People after they rejected the Messiah, but as I have said "Israelite" is used on certain occasions, Jew on others.

[FN#415] Arab. "Kasa'ah," a wooden bowl, a porringer; also applied to a saucer.

[FN#416] Arab. "Rasul"one sent, an angel, an "apostle;" not to be translated, as by the vulgar, "prophet." Moreover Rasul is higher than Nabi (prophet), such as Abraham, Isaac, etc., depositaries of Al-Islam, but with a succession restricted to their own families. Nabi-mursil (Prophet-apostle) is the highest of all, one sent with a book: of these are now only four, Moses, David, Jesus and Mohammed, the writings of the rest having perished. In Al-Islam also angels rank below men, being only intermediaries ( , nuncii, messengers) between the Creator and the Created. This knowledge once did me a good turn at Harar, not a safe place in those days. (First Footsteps in East Africa, p. 349.)

[FN#417] A doctor of law in the reign of Al-Maamun.

[FN#418] Here the exclamation is= D.V.; and it may be assumed generally to have that sense.

[FN#419] Arab. "Taylasan," a turban worn hood-fashion by the "Khatib" or preacher. I have sketched it in my Pilgrimage and described it (iii. 315). Some Orientalists derive Taylasan from Atlas=satin, which is peculiarly inappropriate. The word is apparently barbarous and possibly Persian like Kalansuwah, the Dervish cap. "Thou son of a Taylasan"=a barbarian. (De Sacy, Chrest. Arab. ii. 269.)

[FN#420] Arab. " Kinyah" vulg. "Kunyat" = patronymic or matronymic; a name beginning with "Abu" (father) or with "Umm" (mother). There are so few proper names in Al-Islam that such surnames, which, as will be seen, are of infinite variety, become necessary to distinguish individuals. Of these sobriquets I shall give specimens further on.

[FN#421] "Whoso seeth me in his sleep, seeth me truly; for Satan cannot assume my semblance," said (or is said to have said) Mohammed. Hence the vision is true although it comes in early night and not before dawn. See Lane M. E., chaps. ix.

[FN#422] Arab. "Al-Maukab ;" the day when the pilgrims march out of the city; it is a holiday for all, high and low.

[FN#423] "The Gate of Salutation ;" at the South-Western corner of the Mosque where Mohammed is buried. (Pilgrimage ii. 60 and plan.) Here "Visitation" (Ziyarah) begins.

[FN#424] The tale is told by Al-Ishaki in the reign of Al-Maamun.

[FN#425] The speaker in dreams is the Heb. "Waggid," which the learned and angry Graetz (Geschichte, etc. vol. ix.) absurdly translates "Traum souffleur."

[FN#426] Tenth Abbaside. A.D. 849-861

[FN#427] Arab. "Muwallad" (fem. "Muwalladah"); a rearling, a slave born in a Moslem land. The numbers may appear exaggerated, but even the petty King of Ashanti had, till the last war, 3333 "wives."

[FN#428] The Under-prefect of Baghdad.

[FN#429] "Ja'afar," our old Giaffar (which is painfully like "Gaffer," i.e. good father) means either a rushing river or a rivulet.

[FN#430] A regular Fellah's name also that of a village (Pilgrimage i. 43) where a pleasant story is told about one Haykal.

[FN#431] The "Mountain" means the rocky and uncultivated ground South of Cairo, such as Jabal-al-Ahmar and the geological-sea-coast flanked by the old Cairo-Suez highway.

[FN#432] A popular phrase=our "sharp as a razor."

[FN#433] i.e. are men so few; a favourite Persian phrase.

[FN#434] She is a woman of rank who would cause him to be assassinated.

[FN#435] This is not Al-Hakimbi' Amri'llah the famous or infamous founder of the Druze ((Duruz)) faith and held by them to be, not an incarnation of the Godhead, but the Godhead itself in propria persona, who reigned A.D. 926-1021: our Hakim is the orthodox Abbaside Caliph of Egypt who dated from two centuries after him (A.D. 1261). Had the former been meant, it would have thrown back this part of The Nights to an earlier date than is generally accepted. But in a place still to come I shall again treat of the subject.

[FN#436] For an account of a similar kind which was told to me during the last few years see "Midian Revisited," i. 15. These hiding-places are innumerable in lands of venerable antiquity like Egypt; and, if there were any contrivance for detecting hidden treasure, it would make the discoverer many times a millionaire.

[FN#437] i.e. it had been given to him or his in writing, like the book left to the old woman before quoted in "Midian," etc.

[FN#438] Arab. "Kird" (pron. in Egypt "Gird"). It is usually the hideous Abyssinian cynocephalus which is tamed by the ape-leader popularly called Kuraydati (Lane, M.E., chaps. xx.). The beast has a natural-penchant for women ; I heard of one which attempted to rape a girl in the public street and was prevented only by a sentinel's bayonet. They are powerful animals and bite like greyhounds.

[FN#439] Easterns attribute many complaints (such as toothache) to worms, visible as well as microscopic, which may be held a fair prolepsis of the "germ-theory" the bacterium. the bacillus, the microbe. Nymphomania, the disease alluded to in these two tales is always attributed to worms in the vagina.

[FN#440] Bestiality, very rare in Arabia is fatally common amongst those most debauched of debauched races, the Egyptian proper and the Sindis. Hence the Pentateuch, whose object was to breed a larger population of fighting men, made death the penalty for lying with a beast (Deut. xxvii. 21). C. S. Sonnini (Travels, English translation, p. 663) gives a curious account of Fellah lewdness. "The female crocodile during congress is turned upon her back ( ?) and cannot rise without difficulty. Will it be believed that there are men who take advantage of the helpless situation of the female, drive off the male, and supplant him in this frightful intercourse ? Horrible embraces, the knowledge of which was wanting to complete the disgusting history of human perversity!" The French traveller forgets to add the superstitious explanation of this congress which is the sovereignest charm for rising to rank and riches. The Ajaib al-Hind tells a tale (chaps. xxxix.) of a certain Mohammed bin Bullishad who had issue by a she-ape: the young ones were hairless of body and wore quasi-human faces; and the father's sight had become dim by his bestial-practice.

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