The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume XV Part 32

[FN#384] The barber being a surgeon and ever ready to bleed a madman.

[FN#385] i.e. Can play off equally well the soft-brained and the hard-headed.

[FN#386] i.e. a deputy (governor, etc.); in old days the governor of Constantinople; in these times a lieutenant-colonel, etc.

[FN#387] Which, as has been said, is the cab of Modern Egypt, like the gondola and the caque. The heroine of the tale is a Nilotic version of "Aurora Floyd."

[FN#388] In text "Rafaka" and infra (p. 11) "Zafaka."

[FN#389] [In text "Misla 'l-Kalam," which I venture to suggest is another clerical blunder for: "misla 'l-Kilab"=as the dogs do.-- ST.]

[FN#390] i.e. My wife. In addition to notes in vols. i. 165, and iv. 9, 126, I would observe that "Harim" (women) is the broken plur. of "Hurmah;" from Haram, the honour of the house, forbidden to all save her spouse. But it is also an infinitive whose plur.

is Harimat=the women of a family; and in places it is still used for the women's apartment, the gynaeceum. The latter by way of distinction I have mostly denoted by the good old English corruption "Harem."

[FN#391] In text "Misla 'l-kharuf" (for Kharuf) a common phrase for an "innocent," a half idiot, so our poets sing of "silly (harmless, Germ. Selig) sheep."

[FN#392] In text this ends the tale.

[FN#393] In text "Wa la huwa 'ashamna min-ka talkash 'ala Harimi-na." "'Ashama," lit.=he greeded for; and "Lakasha"=he conversed with. [There is no need to change the "talkas" of the text into "talkash." "Lakasa" is one of the words called "Zidd,"

i.e. with opposite meanings: it can signify "to incline pa.s.sionately towards," or "to loath with abhorrence." As the noun "Laks" means "itch" the sentence might perhaps be translated: "that thou hadst an itching after our Harim." What would lead me to prefer the reading of the MS. is that the verb is construed with the preposition "'ala"=upon, towards, for, while "lakash,"

to converse, is followed by "ma'"=with.--ST.]

[FN#394] Such was the bounden duty of a good neighbour.

[FN#395] He does not insist upon his dancing because he looks upon the offence as serious, but he makes him tell his tale--for the sake of the reader.

[FN#396] "Sahib al-Hayat:" this may also=a physiognomist, which, however, is probably not meant here.

[FN#397] In text "Hararah"=heat, but here derived from "Hurr"=freeborn, n.o.ble.

[FN#398] In text "Azay ma tafut-ni?"

[FN#399] In the Arab. "Rajul Khuzari"=a green-meat man. [The reading "Khuzari" belongs to Lane, M.E. ii. 16, and to Bocthor.

In Schiaparelli's Vocabulista and the Muhit the form "Khuzri" is also given with the same meaning.--ST.]

[FN#400] [In text "Farariji," as if the pl. of "Farruj"=chicken were "Fararij" instead of "Fararij." In modern Egyptian these nouns of relation from irregular plurals to designate tradespeople not only drop the vowel of the penultimate but furthermore, shorten that of the preceding syllable, so that "Farariji" becomes "Fararji." Thus "Sanadiki," a maker of boxes, becomes "Sanadki," and "Dakhakhini, a seller of tobacco brands,"

"Dakhakhni." See Spitta Bey's Grammar, p. 118.--ST.]

[FN#401] In the Arab. "Al-Majur," for "Maajur"=a vessel, an utensil.

[FN#402] In text "shaklaba" here="shakala"=he weighed out (money, whence the Heb. Shekel), he had to do with a woman.

[FN#403] [The trade of the man is not mentioned here, p. 22 of the 5th vol. of the MS., probably through negligence of the copyist, but it only occurs as far lower down as p. 25.--ST.]

[FN#404] A certain reviewer proposes "stained her eyes with Kohl," showing that he had never seen the Kohl-powder used by Asiatics.

[FN#405] ["Bi-Ma al-fasikh 'ala Akras al-Jullah." "Ma al-Fasikh"=water of salt-fish, I would translate by "dirty brine"

and "Akras al-Jullah" by "dung-cakes," meaning the tale should be written with a filthy fluid for ink upon a filthy solid for paper, more expressive than elegant.--ST.]

[FN#406] "Al-Janinati"; or, as the Egyptians would p.r.o.nounce the word, "Al-Ganinati". [Other Egyptian names for gardener are "Janaini," p.r.o.nounced "Ganaini," "Bustanji" p.r.o.nounced "Bustangi," with a Turkish termination to a Persian noun, and "Bakhshaw.a.n.gi," for Baghchawanji," where the same termination is pleonastically added to a Persian word, which in Persian and Turkish already means "gardener."--ST.]

[FN#407] A Koranic quotation from "Joseph," chap. xii. 28: Sale has "for verily your cunning is great," said by Potiphar to his wife.

[FN#408] I have inserted this sentence, the tale being absolutely without termination. So in the Mediaeval Lat. translations the MSS. often omit "explicit capitulum (primum). Sequitur capitulum secundum," this explicit being a sine qua non.

[FN#409] In text "Fatairi" = a maker of "Fatirah" = pancake, or rather a kind of pastry rolled very thin, folded over like a napkin, saturated with b.u.t.ter and eaten with sugar or honey poured over it.

[FN#410] In Arab. "Nayizati," afterwards "Nuwayzati," and lastly "Rayhani" (p. 34)=a man who vends sweet and savoury herbs. We have neither the craft nor the article, so I have rendered him by "Herbalist."

[FN#411] In text a "Mihtar"=a prince, a sweeper, a scavenger, the Pers. "Mihtar," still used in Hindostani. [In Quatremere's Histoire des Sultans Mamlouks "Mihtar" occurs also in the sense of superintendent, of head-equerry, and of chief of a military band. See Dozy Supp. s. v.--ST.]

[FN#412] "Ant' aysh" for "man," decidedly not complimentary, "What (thing) art thou?"

[FN#413] Arab. "Kabsh." Amongst the wilder tubes of the East ram's mutton is preferred because it gives the teeth more to do: on the same principle an old c.o.c.k is the choicest guest-gift in the way of poultry.

[FN#414] "Naubah," lit.=a period, keeping guard, and here a band of pipes and kettledrums playing before the doors of a great man at certain periods.

[FN#415] In text "Al-Mubtali."

[FN#416] Arab. "Hawwalin"; the pa.s.sage is apparently corrupt.

["Hawalin" is clerical error for either "hawala"=all around, or "Hawali" = surroundings, surrounding parts, and "Audan" is pl. of the popular "Widn" or "Wudn" for the literary "Uzn," ear.--ST.]

[FN#417] The exclamation would be uttered by the scribe or by Shahrazad. I need hardly remind the reader that "Khizr" is the Green Prophet and here the Prophet of greens.

[FN#418] For "Israfil"=Raphael, the Archangel who will blow the last trump, see vol. ii. 287.

[FN#419] Gen. meaning "Look sharp," here syn. with "Allah!

Allah!"=I conjure thee by G.o.d. Vol. i. 346.

[FN#420] A Persian would say, "I am a Irani but Wallahi indeed I am not lying."

[FN#421] [This sentence of wholesale extermination pa.s.sed upon womankind, reminds me of the Persian lines which I find quoted in 'Abdu 'l-Jalil's History of the Barmecides:

Agar nek budi Zan u Ray-i-Zan Zan-ra Ma-zan Nam budi, na Zan,

and which I would render Anglice:

If good there were in Woman and her way Her name would signify "Slay not," not "Slay."

"Zan" as noun=woman; as imp. of "zadan"=strike, kill, whose negative is "mazan."--ST.]

[FN#422] In the text the Shaykh, to whom "Aman" was promised, is also gelded, probably by the neglect of the scribe.

[FN#423] This tale is a variant of "The First Constable's History:" Suppl. Nights, vol. ii. 3-11.

[FN#424] In text "Al-Bawwabah"=a place where door-keepers meet, a police-station; in modern tongue "Karakol," for "Karaghol-khanah"=guard-house.

[FN#425] In text 'Kazi al-'Askar"=the great legal authority of a country: vol. vi. 131.