Tales from the Arabic Part 65

[FN#214] i.e. Maharajah.

[FN#215] Or "government."

[FN#216] Every Muslim is bound by law to give alms to the extent of two and half per cent. of his property.

[FN#217] In North-east Persia.

[FN#218] Alleged to have been found by the Arab conquerors of Spain on the occasion of the sack of Toledo and presented by them to the Ommiade Khalif El Welid ben Abdulmelik (A.D.

705-716). See my "Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night," Vol. III. p. 331.

[FN#219] i.e. such as are fit to be sent from king to king.

[FN#220] i.e, the price of his victual and other necessaries for the voyage.

[FN#221] Lit. riding-beast (French monture, no exact English equivalent), whether camel, mule or horse does not appear.

[FN#222] The Envier and the Envied.

[FN#223] After the manner of Orientalists, a far more irritable folk than any poets.

[FN#224] By the by, apropos of this soi-disant complete translation of the great Arabian collection of romantic fiction, it is difficult to understand how an Orientalist of repute, such as Dr.

Habicht, can have put forth publication of this kind, which so swarms with blunders of every description as to throw the mistakes of all other translators completely into the shade and to render it utterly useless to the Arabic scholar as a book of reference. We can only conjecture that he must have left the main portion of the work to be executed, without efficient supervision, by incapable collaborators or that he undertook and executed the translation in such haste as to preclude the possibility of any preliminary examination and revision, worthy of the name, of the original MS.; and this latter supposition appears to be borne out by the fact that the translation was entirely published before the appearance of any portion of the Arabic Text, as printed from the Tunis Ma.n.u.script. Whilst on the subject of German translations, it may be well to correct an idea, which appears to prevail among non-Arabic scholars, to the effect that complete translations of the Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night exist in the language of Hoffmann and Heine, and which is (as far, at least, as my own knowledge extends) a completely erroneous one. I have, I believe, examined all the German translations in existence and have found not one of them worthy of serious consideration; the best, that of Hammer-Purgstall, to which I had looked for help in the elucidation of doubtful and corrupt pa.s.sages, being so loose and unfaithful, so disfigured by ruthless retrenchments and abridgments, no less than by gross errors of all kinds, that I found myself compelled to lay it aside as useless. It is but fair, however, to the memory of the celebrated Austrian Orientalist, to state that the only form in which Von Hammer's translation is procurable is that of the German rendering of Prof. Zinserling (1823-4), executed from the original (French) ma.n.u.script, which latter was unfortunately lost before publication.

[FN#225] The Boulac Edition omits this story altogether.

[FN#226] Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac 134b. "The Merchant's Wife and the Parrot."

[FN#227] This will be found translated in my "Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night,"

Vol. VII. p. 307, as an Appendix to the Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac version of the story, from which it differs in detail.

[FN#228] Called "Bekhit" in Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac Editions.

[FN#229] Yehya ben Khalid (Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac).

[FN#230] "Shar" (Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac).

[FN#231] "Jelyaad" (Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac).

[FN#232] Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac, No. 63. See my "Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night," Vol. IV. p. 211.

[FN#233] Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac, "Jaafer the Barmecide."

[FN#234] Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac, "The Thief turned Merchant and the other Thief," No.

88.

[FN#235] This story will be found translated in my "Book at the Thousand Nights and One Night,' Vol. V. p. 345.

[FN#236] The Third Old Man's Story is wanting.

[FN#237] The Story of the Portress is wanting.

[FN#238] Calcutta (1839-42), Boulac and Breslan, "The Controller's Story."

[FN#239] Calcutta (1839-42) and Boulac, "Sindbad the Sailor and Sindbad the Porter."

[FN#240] Tuhfeh.