The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume II Part 16

(i.e. a pa.s.sive catamite) Nay, I am the thick one (the p.e.n.i.s which gives pleasure) and thou art the thin! And so forth with most unpleasant pleasantries.

[FN#16] In the old version she is called "The Fair Persian,"

probably from the owner: her name means "The Cheerer of the Companion."

[FN#17] p.r.o.nounce "Nooraddeen." I give the name written in Arabic.

[FN#18] Amongst Moslems, I have said, it is held highly disgraceful when the sound of women's cries can be heard by outsiders.

[FN#19] In a case like this, the father would be justified by Rasm (or usage) not by Koranic law, in playing Brutus with his son. The same would be the case in a detected intrigue with a paternal concubine and, in very strict houses, with a slave-girl.

[FN#20] Orientals fear the "Zug" or draught as much as Germans; and with even a better reason. Draughts are most dangerous in hot climates.

[FN#21] The Unity of the G.o.dhead and the Apostleship of Mohammed.

[FN#22] This would be done only in the case of the very poor.

[FN#23] Prayers over the dead are not universal in Al-Islam; but when they are recited they lack the "sijdah" or prostration.

[FN#24] Or, "Of the first and the last," i.e. Mohammed, who claimed (and claimed justly) to be the "Seal" or head and end of all Prophets and Prophecy. For note that whether the Arab be held inspired or a mere imposter, no man making the same pretension has moved the world since him. Mr. J. Smith the Mormon (to mention one in a myriad) made a bold attempt and failed.

[FN#25] i.e. flatterers.

[FN#26] In one matter Moslems contrast strongly with Christians, by most scrupulously following the example of their law-giver: hence they are the model Conservatives. But (European) Christendom is here, as in other things, curiously contradictory: for instance, it still keeps a "Feast of the Circ.u.mcision," and practically holds circ.u.mcision in horror. Eastern Christians, however, have not wholly abolished it, and the Abyssinians, who find it a useful hygenic precaution, still practise it. For ulcers, syphilis and other venereals which are readily cured in Egypt become dangerous in the Highlands of Ethiopia.

[FN#27] Arab. "Sabab," the orig. and material sense of the word; hence "a cause," etc.

[FN#28] Thus he broke his promise to his father, and it is insinuated that retribution came upon him.

[FN#29] "O Pilgrim" (Ya Hajj) is a polite address even to those who have not pilgrimaged. The feminine "Hajjah" (in Egypt p.r.o.nounced "Haggeh") is similarly used.

[FN#30] Arab. "usul"=roots, i.e. I have not forgotten my business.

[FN#31] Moslems from Central and Western North Africa.

(Pilgrimage i. 261; iii. 7, etc); the "Jabarti" is the Moslem Abyssinian.

[FN#32] This is a favourite bit of chaff and is to be lengthened out almost indefinitely e.g. every brown thing is not civet nor every shining thing a diamond; every black thing is not charcoal nor every white chalk; every red thing is not a ruby nor every yellow a topaz; every long-necked thing is not a camel, etc., etc., etc.

[FN#33] He gives him the name of his grandfather; a familiar usage.

[FN#34] Arab. "Ma'janah," a place for making unbaked bricks (Tob=Span. Adobe) with chaff and bruised or charred straw. The use of this article in rainless lands dates from ages immemorial, and formed the outer walls of the Egyptian temple.

[FN#35] Arab. "Barsh," a bit of round matting used by the poor as a seat. The Wazir thus showed that he had been degraded to the condition of a mat-maker.

[FN#36] The growth (a Poa of two species) which named Wady Halfa (vulg. "Halfah"), of which the home public has of late heard perhaps a trifle too much. Burckhardt (Prov. 226) renders it "dry reeds"?-incorrectly enough.

[FN#37] This "Hashimi" vein, as they call it, was an abnormal development between the eyes of the house of Abbas, inherited from the great- grandfather of the Prophet; and the latter had it remarkably large, swelling in answer and battle-rage. The text, however, may read "The sweat of wrath," etc.

[FN#38] Torrens and Payne prefer "Ilm"=knowledge. Lane has more correctly "Alam"=a sign, a flag.

[FN#39] The lines were in Night xi.: I have quoted Torrens (p.

379) for a change.

[FN#40] Still customary in Tigris-Euphrates land, where sea-craft has not changed since the days of Xisisthrus-Noah, and long before.

[FN#41] To cool the contents.

[FN#42] Hence the Khedivial Palace near Cairo "Kasr al-Nuzhah;"

literally, "of Delights;" one of those flimsy new-Cairo buildings which contrast so marvellously with the architecture of ancient and even of mediaeval Egypt, and which are covering the land with modern ruins. Compare Mohammed Ali's mosque in the citadel with the older Sultan Hasan. A popular tale is told that, when the conquering Turk, Yawuz Sultan Selim, first visited Cairo, they led him to Mosque Al-Ghuri. "This is a splendid Ka'ah (saloon)!"

quoth he. When he entered Sultan Hasan, he exclaimed, "This is a citadel!"; but after inspecting the Mosque Al-Mu'ayyad he cried, "'Tis a veritable place of prayer, a fit stead for the Faithful to adore the Eternal!"

[FN#43] Arab. gardeners are very touchy on this point. A friend of mine was on a similar occasion addressed, in true Egyptian lingo, by an old Adam-son, "Ya ibn al-Kalb! beta'mil ay?" (O dog- son, what art thou up to?).

[FN#44] "The green palm-stick is of the trees of Paradise;" say the Arabs in Solomonic style but not Solomonic words: so our "Spare the rod," etc.

[FN#45] Wayfarers, travellers who have a claim on the kindness of those at home: hence Abd al-Rahman al-Burai sings in his famous Ode:--

He hath claim on the dwellers in the places of their birth, *

Whoso wandereth the world, for he lacketh him a home.

It is given in my "First Footsteps in East Africa" (pp. 53-55).

[FN#46] The good old man treated the youth like a tired child.

[FN#47] In Moslem writings the dove and turtle-dove are mostly feminine, whereas the female bird is always mute and only the male sings to summon or to amuse his mate.

[FN#48] An unsavoury comparison of the cla.s.sical Narcissus with the yellow white of a n.i.g.g.e.r's eyes.

[FN#49] A tree whose coals burn with fierce heat: Al-Hariri (Vth Seance). This Artemisia is like the tamarisk but a smaller growth and is held to be a characteristic of the Arabian Desert. A Badawi always hails with pleasure the first sight of the Ghaza, after he has sojourned for a time away from his wilds. Mr.

Palgrave (i. 38) describes the "Ghada" as an Euphorbia with a woody stem often 5-6 feet high and slender, flexible green twigs (?), "forming a feathery tuft, not ungraceful to the eye, while it affords some shelter to the traveller, and food to his camels."

[FN#50] Arab. "Sal'am"=S(alla) A(llah) a(layhi) was S(allam); A(llah) b(less) h(im) a(nd) k(eep)=Allah keep him and a.s.sain!

[FN#51] The a.s.s is held to be ill-omened. I have noticed the braying elsewhere. According to Mandeville the Devil did not enter the Ark with the a.s.s, but he left it when Noah said "Benedicite." In his day (A.D. 1322) and in that of Benjamin of Tudela, people had seen and touched the ship on Ararat, the Judi (Gordiaei) mountains; and this dates from Berosus (S.C. 250) who, of course, refers to the Ark of Xisisthrus. See Josephus Ant. i.

3, 6; and Rodwell (Koran, pp. 65, 530).

[FN#52] As would happen at a "Zikr," rogation or litany. Those who wish to see how much can be made of the subject will read "Pearls of the Faith, or Islam's Rosary, being the ninety-nine beautiful names of Allah" (Asma-el-Husna) etc. by Edwin Arnold: London, Trubner, 1883.

[FN#53] i.e. the Saki, cup-boy or cup-bearer. "Moon-faced," as I have shown elsewhere, is no compliment in English, but it is in Persian and Arabic.

[FN#54] He means we are "Zahiri," plain honest Moslems, not "Batini," gnostics (ergo reprobates) and so forth, who disregard all appearances and external ordinances. This suggests his opinion of Shaykh Ibrahim and possibly refers to Ja'afar's suspected heresy.

[FN#55] This worthy will be noticed in a subsequent page.

[FN#56] Arab. "Lisam," the end of the "Kufiyah," or head-kerchief pa.s.sed over the face under the eyes and made fast on the other side. This mouth-veil serves as a mask (eyes not being recognisable) and defends from heat, cold and thirst. I also believe that hooding the eyes with this article, Badawi-fashion, produces a sensation of coolness, at any rate a marked difference of apparent temperature; somewhat like a pair of dark spectacles or looking at the sea from a sandy sh.o.r.e. (Pilgrimage i., 210 and 346.) The woman's "Lisam" (chin-veil) or Yashmak is noticed in i., 337.

[FN#57] Most characteristic is this familiarity between the greatest man then in the world and his pauper subject. The fisherman alludes to a practise of Al-Islman, inst.i.tuted by Caliph Omar, that all rulers should work at some handicraft in order to spare the public treasure. Hence Sultan Mu'ayyad of Cairo was a calligrapher who sold his handwriting, and his example was followed by the Turkish Sultans Mahmud, Abd al-Majid and Abd al-Aziz. German royalties prefer carpentering and Louis XVI, watch-making.

[FN#58] There would be nothing singular in this request. The democracy of despotism levels all men outside the pale of politics and religion.