The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume III Part 33

[FN#198] i.e. her fair face shining through the black hair.

"Camphor" is a favourite with Arab poets: the Persians hate it because connected in their minds with death; being used for purifying the corpse. We read in Burckhardt (Prov. 464) "Singing without siller is like a corpse without Hanut"--this being a mixture of camphor and rose-water sprinkled over the face of the dead before shrouded. Similarly Persians avoid speaking of coffee, because they drink it at funerals and use tea at other times.

[FN#199] i.e. she is angry and bites her carnelion lips with pearly teeth.

[FN#200] Arab. "Wa ba'ad;" the formula which follows "Bismillah"--In the name of Allah. The French translate it or sus, etc. I have noticed the legend about its having been first used by the eloquent Koss, Bishop of Najran.

[FN#201] i.e. Her mind is so troubled she cannot answer for what she writes.

[FN#202] The Bul. Edit. (i. 329) and the Mac. Edit. (i. 780) give to Shams al-Nahar the greater part of Ali's answer, as is shown by the Calc. Edit. (230 et seq.) and the Bresl. Edit. (ii. 366 et seq.) Lane mentions this (ii. 74) but in his usual perfunctory way gives no paginal references to the Calc. or Bresl.; so that those who would verify the text may have the displeasure of hunting for it.

[FN#203] Arab. "Bi'smi 'llahi' r-Rahmani'r-Rahim." This auspicatory formula was borrowed by Al-Islam not from the Jews but from the Guebre "Ba nam-i-Yezdan bakhshaishgar-i-dadar!" (in the name of Yezdan-G.o.d--All-generous, All-just!). The Jews have, "In the name of the Great G.o.d;" and the Christians, "In the name of the Father, etc." The so-called Sir John Mandeville begins his book, In the name of G.o.d, Glorious and Almighty. The sentence forms the first of the Koran and heads every chapter except only the ninth, an exception for which recondite reasons are adduced.

Hence even in the present day it begins all books, letters and writings in general; and it would be a sign of Infidelity (i.e.

non-Islamism) to omit it. The difference between "Rahman" and "Rahim" is that the former represents an accidental (compa.s.sionating), the latter a constant quality (compa.s.sionate).

Sale therefore renders it very imperfectly by "In the name of the most merciful G.o.d;" the Latinists better, "In nomine Dei misericordis, clementissimi" (Gottwaldt in Hamza Ispahanensis); Mr. Badger much better, "In the name of G.o.d, the Pitiful, the Compa.s.sionate"--whose only fault is not preserving the a.s.sonance: and Maracci best, "In nomine Dei miseratoris misericordis."

[FN#204] Arab. Majnun (i.e. one possessed by a Jinni) the well-known model lover of Layla, a fict.i.tious personage for whom see D'Herbelot (s. v. Megnoun). She was celebrated by Abu Mohammed Nizam al-Din of Ganjah (ob. A.H. 597=1200) pop. known as Nizami, the caustic and austere poet who wrote:--

The weals of this world are the a.s.s's meed!

Would Nizami were of the a.s.s's breed.

The series in the East begins chronologically with Yusuf and Zulaykha (Potiphar's wife) sung by Jami (nat. A.H. 817=1414); the next in date is Khusraw and Shirin (also by Nizami); Farhad and Shirin; and Layla and Majnun (the Night-black maid and the Maniac-man) are the last. We are obliged to compare the lovers with "Romeo and Juliet," having no corresponding instances in modern days: the cla.s.sics of Europe supply a host as Hero and Leander, Theagenes and Charicleia, etc. etc.

[FN#205] The jeweller of Eastern tales from Marocco to Calcutta, is almost invariably a rascal: here we have an exception.

[FN#206] This must not be understood of sealing-wax, which, however, is of ancient date. The Egyptians (Herod. ii. 38) used "sealing earth" ( ) probably clay, impressed with a signet ( ); the Greeks mud-clay ( ); and the Romans first cretula and then wax (Beckmann). Mediaeval Europe had bees-wax tempered with Venice turpentine and coloured with cinnabar or similar material. The modern sealing-wax, whose distinctive is sh.e.l.l-lac, was brought by the Dutch from India to Europe; and the earliest seals date from about A.D. 1560. They called it Ziegel-lak, whence the German Siegel-lack, the French preferring cire-a-cacheter, as distinguished from cire-a-sceller, the softer material. The use of sealing-wax in India dates from old times and the material, though coa.r.s.e and unsightly, is still preferred by Anglo-Indians because it resists heat whereas the best English softens like pitch.

[FN#207] Evidently referring to the runaway Abu al-Hasan, not to the she-Mercury.

[FN#208] An unmarried man is not allowed to live in a respectable quarter of a Moslem city unless he takes such precaution. Lane (Mod. Egypt. pa.s.sim) has much to say on this point; and my excellent friend the late Professor Spitta at Cairo found the native prejudice very troublesome.

[FN#209] Arab. "Ya fulan"=O certain person (fulano in Span. and Port.) a somewhat contemptuous address.

[FN#210] Mr. Payne remarks, "These verses apparently relate to Aboulhusn, but it is possible that they may be meant to refer to Shemsennehar." (iii. 80.)

[FN#211] Arab. and Pers "Bulur" (vulg. billaur) retaining the venerable tradition of the Belus- river. In Al-Hariri (a.s.s. of Halwan) it means crystal and there is no need of proposing to translate it by onyx or to identify it with the Greek , the beryl.

[FN#212] The door is usually shut with a wooden bolt.

[FN#213] Arab. "Ritanah," from "Ratan," speaking any tongue not Arabic, the allusion being to foreign mercenaries, probably Turks. In later days Turkish was called Muwalla', a pied horse, from its mixture of languages.

[FN#214] This is the rule; to guard against the guet-apens.

[FN#215] Arab. "Walidati," used when speaking to one not of the family in lieu of the familiar "Ummi"=my mother. So the father is Walid=the begetter.

[FN#216] This is one of the many euphemistic formulae for such occasions: they usually begin "May thy head live." etc.

[FN#217] Arab. "Kanun," an instrument not unlike the Austrian zither; it is ill.u.s.trated in Lane (ii. 77).

[FN#218] This is often done, the merit of the act being transferred to the soul of the deceased.

[FN#219] The two amourists were martyrs; and their amours, which appear exaggerated to the Western mind, have many parallels in the East. The story is a hopeless affair of love; with only one moral (if any be wanted) viz., there may be too much of a good thing. It is given very concisely in the Bul. Edit. vol. i.; and more fully in the Mac. Edit. aided in places by the Bresl. (ii.

320) and the Calc. (ii. 230).

## [FN#220] Lane is in error (vol. ii. 78) when he corrects this to "Shah Zeman"; the name is fanciful and intended to be old Persian, on the "weight" of Kahraman. The Bul. Edit. has by misprint "Shahraman."

[FN#221] The "topothesia" is worthy of Shakespeare's day.

"Khalidan" is evidently a corruption of "Khalidatani" (for Khalidat), the Eternal, as Ibn Wardi calls the Fortunate Islands, or Canaries, which owe both their modern names to the cla.s.sics of Europe. Their present history dates from A.D. 1385, unless we accept the Dieppe-Rouen legend of Labat which would place the discovery in A.D. 1326. I for one thoroughly believe in the priority on the West African Coast, of the gallant descendants of the Northmen.

[FN#222] Four wives are allowed by Moslem law and for this reason. If you marry one wife she holds herself your equal, answers you and "gives herself airs"; two are always quarrelling and making a h.e.l.l of the house; three are "no company" and two of them always combine against the nicest to make her hours bitter.

Four are company, they can quarrel and "make it up" amongst themselves, and the husband enjoys comparative peace. But the Moslem is bound by his law to deal equally with the four, each must have her dresses her establishment and her night, like her sister wives. The number is taken from the Jews (Arbah Turim Ev.

Hazaer, i.) "the wise men have given good advice that a man should not marry more than four wives." Europeans, knowing that Moslem women are cloistered and appear veiled in public, begin with believing them to be mere articles of luxury, and only after long residence they find out that nowhere has the s.e.x so much real liberty and power as in the Moslem East. They can possess property and will it away without the husband's leave: they can absent themselves from the house for a month without his having a right to complain; and they a.s.sist in all his counsels for the best of reasons: a man can rely only on his wives and children, being surrounded by rivals who hope to rise by his ruin. As regards political matters the Circa.s.sian women of Constantinople really rule the Sultanate and there soignez la femme! is the first lesson of getting on in the official world.

[FN#223] This two-bow prayer is common on the bride-night; and at all times when issue is desired.

[FN#224] The older Camaralzaman="Moon of the age." Kamar is the moon between her third and twenty-sixth day: Hilal during the rest of the month: Badr (plur. Budur whence the name of the Princess) is the full moon.

[FN#225] Arab "Ra'aya" plur. of 'Ra'iyat" our Anglo-Indian Ryot, lit. a liege, a subject; secondarily a peasant, a Fellah.

[FN#226] Another audacious parody of the Moslem "testification"

to the one G.o.d, and to Mohammed the Apostle.

[FN#227] Showing how long ago forts were armed with metal plates which we have applied to war-ships only of late years.

[FN#228] The comparison is abominably true--in the East.

[FN#229] Two fallen angels who taught men the art of magic. They are mentioned in the Koran (chaps. ii.), and the commentators have extensively embroidered the simple text. Popularly they are supposed to be hanging by their feet in a well in the territory of Babel, hence the frequent allusions to "Babylonian sorcery" in Moslem writings; and those who would study the black art at head-quarters are supposed to go there. They are counterparts of the Egyptian Jamnes and Mambres, the Jannes and Jambres of St.

Paul (2 Tim. iii. 8).

[FN#230] An idol or idols of the Arabs (Allat and Ozza) before Mohammed (Koran chaps. ii. 256). Etymologically the word means "error" and the termination is rather Hebraic than Arabic.

[FN#231] Arab. "Khayt hamayan" (wandering threads of vanity), or Mukhat al-Shaytan (Satan's snivel),=our "gossamer"=G.o.d's summer (Mutter Gottes Sommer) or G.o.d's cymar (?).

[FN#232] These lines occur in Night xvii.; so I borrow from Torrens (p. 163) by way of variety.

[FN#233] A posture of peculiar submission; contrasting strongly with the att.i.tude afterwards a.s.sumed by Prince Charming.

[FN#234] A mere term of vulgar abuse not reflecting on either parent: I have heard a mother call her own son, "Child of adultery."

[FN#235] Arab. "Ghaza," the Artemisia (Euphorbia ?) before noticed. If the word be a misprint for Ghada it means a kind of Euphorbia which, with the Arak (wild caper-tree) and the Daum palm (Crucifera thebiaca), is one of the three normal growths of the Arabian desert (Pilgrimage iii. 22).

[FN#236] Arab. "Banat al-Na'ash," usually translated daughters of the bier, the three stars which represent the horses in either Bear, "Charles' Wain," or Ursa Minor, the waggon being supposed to be a bier. "Banat" may be also sons, plur. of Ibn, as the word points to irrational objects. So Job (ix. 9 and x.x.xviii. 32) refers to U. Major as "Ash" or "Aysh" in the words, "Canst thou guide the bier with its sons?" (erroneously rendered "Arcturus with his sons") In the text the lines are enigmatical, but apparently refer to a death parting.

[FN#237] The Chapters are: 2, 3, 36, 55, 67 and the two last ("Daybreak" cxiii. and "Men" cxiv.), which are called Al-Mu'izzatani (vulgar Al-Mu'izzatayn), the "Two Refuge-takings or Preventives," because they obviate enchantment. I have translated the two latter as follows:--

"Say:--Refuge I take with the Lord of the Day-break *

from mischief of what He did make *

from mischief of moon eclipse-showing *

and from mischief of witches on cord-knots blowing *

and from mischief of envier when envying."