The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume XVI Part 37

I have carefully noted these lapses and incongruities: not the less, however, I thoroughly appreciate the general excellence of the workmanship, and especially the imaginative scenery and the architectural designs of Mr. W. Harvey. He has shown the world how a work of the kind should be ill.u.s.trated, and those who would surpa.s.s him have only to avoid the minor details here noticed.

[FN#448] See in M. Zotenberg's "Ala al-Din" the text generally; also p. 14.

[FN#449] Mr. Payne, in his Essay, vol. ix., 281, computes less than two hundred tales in all omitting the numerous incidentals; and he notices that the number corresponds with the sum of the "Night-stories" attributed to the Hazar Afsan by the learned author of the "Fihrist" (see Terminal Essay, vol. x. pp. 70). In p. 367 (ibid.) he a.s.sumes the total at 264.

[FN#450] This parlous personage thought proper to fall foul of me (wholly unprovoked) in the Athenaeum of August 25, '88. I give his production in full:--

Lord Stratford De Redcliffe.

August 18, 1888.

In the notice of Sir R. Burton's "Life" in to-day's Athenaeum it is mentioned that his biographer says that Capt. Burton proposed to march with his Bashi-bazuks to the relief of Kars, but was frustrated by Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, who, according to Sir Richard, "gained a prodigious reputation in Europe, chiefly by living out of it."

This is a strange inversion of facts. The proposal to relieve Kars by way of Redoutkale and Kutais originated, not with Capt.

Burton, but with the Turkish Seraskier, who recommended for this purpose the employment of Vivian's Turkish Contingent and part of Beatson's Horse ("his Bashi-bazuks"), in which Capt. Burton held a staff appointment. In the last days of June, 1855, General Mansfield, Lord Stratford's military adviser, was in constant communication on this subject with the Turkish Ministers, and the details of the expedition were completely arranged to the satisfaction of military opinion, both British and Turkish, at Constantinople. Lord Stratford officially recommended the plan to his Government, and in his private letters to the Foreign Secretary strongly urged it upon him and expressed a sanguine hope of its success. But on July 14th, Lord Clarendon telegraphed: "The plan for reinforcing the army at Kars contained in your despatches of 30th June and 1st inst. is disapproved."

Lord Panmure really "frustrated" the Turkish plan; Lord Stratford never "frustrated" any attempt to succour the Army of Asia, but, contrariwise, did all in his power to forward the object.

As to the amiable reference to the Great Elchi's reputation, no one knows better than Sir R. Burton by what queer methods reputations may be annexed, but it is strange that anyone with the reputation of a traveller should consider Constantinople to be "out of Europe."

S. Lane-Poole.

The following was my reply:--

Lord Stratford De Redcliffe and Mr. S. Lane-Poole.

London, Aug. 26, 1888.

Will you kindly spare me s.p.a.ce for a few lines touching matters personal?

I am again the victim (Athenaeum, August 25) of that everlasting reclame. Mr. S. Lane-Poole has contracted to "do" a life of Lord Stratford, and, ergo, he condemns me in magistral tone and a style of uncalled-for impertinence, to act as his "advt." In relating how, by order of the late General Beatson, then commanding Bash-buzuk (Bashi-bazuk is the advertiser's own property), I volunteered to relieve Cars, how I laid the project before the "Great Eltchee," how it was received with the roughest language and how my first plan was thoroughly "frustrated." I have told a true tale, and no more. "A strange perversion of facts," cries the sapient criticaster, with that normal amenity which has won for him such honour and troops of unfriends: when his name was proposed as secretary to the R. A. S., all prophesied the speediest dissolution of that infirm body.

I am aware that Constantinople is not geographically "out of Europe." But when Mr. S. Lane-Poole shall have travelled a trifle more he may learn that ethnologically it is. In fact, most of South-Eastern Europe holds itself more or less non-European, and when a Montenegrin marries a Frenchwoman or a German, his family will tell you that he has wedded a "European."

"No one knows better than Sir R. Burton by what queer methods reputation may be annexed." Heavens, what English! And what may the man mean? But perhaps he alludes in his own silly, saltless, sneering way to my Thousand Nights and a Night, which has shown what the "Uncle and Master's" work should have been. Some two generations of poules mouillees have reprinted and republished Lane's "Arabian Notes" without having the simple honesty to correct a single bevue, or to abate one blunder; while they looked upon the Arabian Nights as their own especial rotten borough. But more of this in my tractate, "The Reviewer Reviewed," about to be printed as an appendix to my Supplemental Volume, No. vi.

Richard F. Burton.

And here is the rejoinder (Athenaeum, September 8):--

Lord Stratford and Sir R. Burton.

September 4, 1888.

Sir R. Burton, like a prominent Irish politician, apparently prefers to select his own venue, and, in order to answer my letter in the Athenaeum of August 25, permits himself in the Academy of September 1 an exuberance of language which can injure no one but himself. Disregarding personalities, I observe that he advances no single fact in support of the statements which I contradicted, but merely reiterates them. It is a question between doc.u.ments and Sir R. Burton's word.

S. Lane-Poole.

It is not a question between doc.u.ments and my word, but rather of the use or abuse of doc.u.ments by the "biographer." My volunteering for the relief of Kars was known to the whole camp at the Dardanelles, and my visit to the Emba.s.sy at Constantinople is also a matter of "doc.u.ments." And when Mr. S. Lane-Poole shall have produced his I will produce mine.

[FN#451] It appears to me that our measures, remedial and punitive, against "p.o.r.nographic publications" result mainly in creating "vested interests" (that English abomination) and thus in fostering the work. The French printer, who now must give name and address, stamps upon the cover Avis aux Libraires under Edition privee and adds Ce volume ne doit pas etre mis en vente ou expose dans les lieux publics (Loi du 29 Juillet, 1881). He also prints upon the back the number of copies for sale We treat "p.o.r.nology" as we handle prost.i.tution, unwisely ignore it, well knowing the while that it is a natural and universal demand of civilised humanity; and whereas continental peoples regulate it and limit its abuses we pa.s.s it by, Pharisee-like, with nez en-l'air. Our laws upon the subject are made only to be broken, and the authorities are unwilling to persecute, because by so doing they advertise what they condemn. Thus they offer a premium to the greedy and unscrupulous publisher and immensely enhance the value of productions ("f.a.n.n.y Hill" by Richard Cleland for instance) which, if allowed free publication, would fetch pence instead of pounds. With due diffidence, I suggest that the police be directed to remove from booksellers' windows and to confiscate all indecent pictures, prints and photographs; I would forbid them under penalty of heavy fines to expose immoral books for sale, and I would leave "cheap and nasty" literature to the good taste of the publisher and the public. Thus we should also abate the scandal of providing the secretaries and officers of the various anti-vice societies with libraries of p.o.r.nological works which, supposed to be escheated or burned, find their way into the virtuous hands of those who are supposed to destroy them.

[FN#452] "Quand aux ma.n.u.scrits de la redaction egyptienne, l'omission de cet episode parait devoir etre attribuee a la tendance qui les caracterise generalement, d'abreger et de condenser la narrative " (loc. cit. p. 7: see also p. 14).

[FN#453] Here I would by no means a.s.sert that the subject matter of The Nights is exhausted: much has been left for future labourers. It would be easy indeed to add another five volumes to my sixteen as every complete ma.n.u.script contains more or less of novelty. Dr. Pertsch, the learned librarian of Saxe-Gotha, informs me that no less than two volumes are taken up by a variant of Judar the Egyptian (in my vol. vi. 213) and by the History of Zahir and Ali. For the Turkish version in the Bibliotheque Nationale see M. Zotenberg (pp. 21-23). The Rich MS.

in the British Museum abounds in novelties, of which a specimen was given in my Prospectus to the Supplemental Volumes.

In the French Scholar's "Ala al-Din" (p. 45) we find the MSS. of The Nights divided into three groups. No. i. or the Asian (a total of ten specified) are mostly incomplete and usually end before the half of the text. The second is the Egyptian of modern date, characterised by an especial style and condensed narration and by the nature and ordinance of the tales, by the number of fables and historiettes, and generally by the long chivalrous Romance of Omar bin al-Nu'uman. The third group, also Egyptian, differs only in the distribution of the stories.]

[FN#454] My late friend, who brought home 3,000 copies of inscriptions from the so-called Sinai which I would term in ancient days the Peninsula of Paran. and in our times the Peninsula of Tor.

[FN#455] See M. Zotenberg, pp. 4, 26.

[FN#456] M. Zotenberg (p. 5) wrote la seconde moitie du xive.

Siecle, but he informed me that he has found reason to antedate the text.

[FN#457] I regret the necessity of exposing such incompetence and errors which at the time when Lane wrote were venial enough; his foolish friend, however, by unskilful and exaggerated pretensions and encomiums, compels me to lay the case before the reader.

[FN#458] This past tense, suggesting that an act is complete, has a present sense in Arabic and must be translated accordingly.

[FN#459] Quite untrue: the critic as usual never read and probably never saw the subject of his criticism. In this case I may invert one of my mottoes and write, "To the foul all things"