The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume III Part 35

[FN#272] The Egyptian author cannot refrain from this characteristic polissonnerie; and reading it out is always followed by a roar of laughter. Even serious writers like Al- Hariri do not, as I have noted, despise the indecency.

[FN#273] "'Long beard and little wits," is a saying throughout the East where the Kausaj (= man with thin, short beard) is looked upon as cunning and tricksy. There is a venerable Joe Miller about a schoolmaster who, wis.h.i.+ng to singe his long beard short, burnt it off and his face to boot:--which reminded him of the saying. A thick beard is defined as one which wholly conceals the skin; and in ceremonial ablution it must be combed out with the fingers till the water reach the roots. The Sunnat, or practice of the Prophet, was to wear the beard not longer than one hand and two fingers' breadth. In Persian "Kuseh" (thin beard) is an insulting term opposed to "Khush-rish," a well-bearded man. The Iranian growth is perhaps the finest in the world, often extending to the waist; but it gives infinite trouble, requiring, for instance, a bag when travelling. The Arab beard is often composed of two tufts on the chin-sides and straggling hairs upon the cheeks; and this is a severe mortification, especially to Shaykhs and elders, who not only look upon the beard as one of man's characteristics, but attach a religious importance to the appendage. Hence the enormity of Kamar al-Zaman's behaviour. The Persian festival of the vernal equinox was called Kusehnis.h.i.+n (Thin-beard sitting). An old man with one eye paraded the streets on an a.s.s with a crow in one hand and a scourge and fan in the other, cooling himself, flogging the bystanders and crying heat! heat! (garma! garma!).

For other particulars see Richardson (Dissertation, p. Iii.).

This is the Italian Giorno delle Vecchie, Thursday in Mid Lent, March 12 (1885), celebrating the death of Winter and the birth of Spring.

[FN#274] I quote Torrens (p. 400) as these lines have occurred in Night x.x.xviii.

[FN#275] Moslems have only two names for week days, Friday, Al-Jum'ah or meeting-day, and Al-Sabt, Sabbath day, that is Sat.u.r.day. The others are known by numbers after Quaker fas.h.i.+on with us, the usage of Portugal and Scandinavia.

[FN#276] Our last night.

[FN#277] Arab. "Tayf"=phantom, the nearest approach to our "ghost," that queer remnant of Fetis.h.i.+sm imbedded in Christianity; the phantasma, the shade (not the soul) of tile dead. Hence the accurate Niebuhr declares, "apparitions (i.e., of the departed) are unknown in Arabia." Haunted houses are there tenanted by Ghuls, Jinns and a host of supernatural creatures; but not by ghosts proper; and a man may live years in Arabia before he ever hears of the "Tayf." With the Hindus it is otherwise (Pilgrimage iii. 144). Yet the ghost, the embodied fear of the dead and of death is common, in a greater or less degree, to all peoples; and, as modern Spiritualism proves, that ghost is not yet laid.

[FN#278] Mr. Payne (iii. 133) omits the lines which are apropos de rein and read much like "nonsense verses." I retain them simply because they are in the text.

[FN#279] The first two couplets are the quatrain (or octave) in Night x.x.xv.

[FN#280] Arab. "Ar'ar," the Heb. "Aroer," which Luther and the A.

V. translate "heath." The modern Aramaic name is "Lizzab"

(Unexplored Syria. i. 68).

[FN#281] In the old version and the Bresl. Edit. (iii. 220) the Princess beats the "Kahramanah," but does not kill her.

[FN#282] 'This is still the popular Eastern treatment of the insane.

[FN#283] Pers. "Marz-ban" = Warden of the Marches, Margrave. The foster-brother in the East is held dear as, and often dearer than, kith and kin.

[FN#284] The moderns believe most in the dawn-dream.

--Quirinus

Post mediam noctem visus, quum somnia vera.

(Horace Sat. i. 10, 33,)

[FN#285] The Bresl. Edit. (iii. 223) and Galland have "Torf:"

Lane (ii. 115) "El-Tarf."

[FN#286] Arab. "Maghzal ;" a more favourite comparison is with a tooth pick. Both are used by Nizami and Al-Hariri, the most "elegant" of Arab writers.

[FN#287] These form a Kasidah, Ode or Elegy= rhymed couplets numbering more than thirteen: If shorter it is called a "Ghazal."

I have not thought it necessary to preserve the monorhyme.

[FN#288] Sulayma dim. of Salma= any beautiful woman Rabab = the viol mostly single stringed: Tan'oum=she who is soft and gentle.

These fict.i.tious names are for his old flames.

[FN#289] i.e. wine. The distich is highly fanciful and the conceits would hardly occur to a

[FN#290] Arab. "Andam," a term applied to Brazil-wood (also called "Bakkam") and to "dragon's blood," but not, I think, to tragacanth, the "goat's thorn," which does not dye. Andam is often mentioned in The Nights.

[FN#291] The superior merit of the first (explorer, etc.) is a lieu commun with Arabs. So Al-Hariri in Preface quotes his predecessor:--

Justly of praise the price I pay; The praise is his who leads the way.

[FN#292] There were two Lukmans, of whom more in a future page.

[FN#293] This symbolic action is repeatedly mentioned in The Nights.

[FN#294] Arab. "Shakhs"=a person, primarily a dark spot. So "Sawad"=blackness, in Al-Hariri means a group of people who darken the ground by their shade.

[FN#295] The first bath after sickness, I have said, is called "Ghusl al-Sihhah,"--the Was.h.i.+ng of Health.

[FN#296] The words "malady" and "disease" are mostly avoided during these dialogues as ill-omened words which may bring on a relapse.

[FN#297] Solomon's carpet of green silk which carried him and all his host through the air is a Talmudic legend generally accepted in Al-Islam though not countenanced by the Koran. chaps xxvii.

When the "gnat's wing" is mentioned, the reference is to Nimrod who, for boasting that he was lord of all, was tortured during four hundred years by a gnat sent by Allah up his ear or nostril.

[FN#298] The absolute want of morality and filial affection in the chaste young man is supposed to be caused by the violence of his pa.s.sion, and he would be pardoned because he "loved much."

[FN#299] I have noticed the geomantic process in my "History of Sindh" (chaps. vii.). It is called "Zarb al-Ram!" (strike the sand, the French say "frapper le sable") because the rudest form is to make on the ground dots at haphazard, usually in four lines one above the other: these are counted and, if even-numbered, two are taken ( ** ); if odd one ( * ); and thus the four lines will form a scheme say * *

This is repeated three times, producing the same number of figures; and then the combination is sought in an explanatory table or, if the pract.i.tioner be expert, he p.r.o.nounces off-hand.

The Nights speak of a "Takht Raml" or a board, like a schoolboy's slate, upon which the dots are inked instead of points in sand.

The moderns use a "Kura'h," or oblong die, upon whose sides the dots, odd and even, are marked; and these dice are hand-thrown to form the e figure. By way of complication Geomancy is mixed up with astrology and then it becomes a most complicated kind of ariolation and an endless study. "Napoleon's Book of Fate," a chap-book which appeared some years ago, was Geomancy in its simplest and most ignorant shape. For the rude African form see my Mission to Dahome, i. 332, and for that of Darfour, pp. 360-69 of Shaykh Mohammed's Voyage before quoted.

[FN#300] Translators understand this of writing marriage contracts; I take it in a more general sense.

[FN#301] These lines are repeated from Night Ixxv.: with Mr.

Payne's permission I give his rendering (iii. 153) by way of variety.

[FN#302] The comparison is characteristically Arab.

[FN#303] Not her "face": the head, and especially the back of the head, must always be kept covered, even before the father.

[FN#304] Arab. "Siwak"=a tooth-stick; "Siwa-ka"=lit. other than thou.

[FN#305] Arab. "Arak"=tooth stick of the wild caper-tree; "Ara-ka" lit.=I see thee. The capparis spinosa is a common desert-growth and the sticks about a span long (usually called Miswak), are sold in quant.i.ties at Meccah after being dipped in Zemzem water. In India many other woods are used, date-tree, Salvadora, Achyrantes, phyllanthus, etc. Amongst Arabs peculiar efficacy accompanies the tooth-stick of olive, "the tree springing from Mount Sinai" (Koran xxiii. 20); and Mohammed would use no other, because it prevents decay and scents the mouth.

Hence Koran, chaps. xcv. 1. The "Miswak" is held with the unused end between the ring-finger and minimus, the two others grasp the middle and the thumb is pressed against the back close to the lips. These articles have long been sold at the Medical Hall near the "Egyptian Hall," Piccadilly. They are better than our unclean tooth-brushes because each tooth gets its own especial rubbing'

not a general sweep; at the same time the operation is longer and more troublesome. In parts of Africa as well as Asia many men walk about with the tooth-stick hanging by a string from the neck.

[FN#306] The "Mehari," of which the Algerine-French speak, are the dromedaries bred by the Mahrah tribe of Al-Yaman, the descendants of Mahrat ibn Haydan. They are covered by small wild camels (?) called Al-Hush, found between Oman and Al-s.h.i.+hr: others explain the word to mean "stallions of the Jinns " and term those savage and supernatural animals, "Najaib al-Mahriyah"?n.o.bles of the Mahrah.

[FN#307] Arab. "Khaznah"=a thousand purses; now about 5000. It denotes a large sum of money, like the "Badrah," a purse containing 10,000 dirhams of silver (Al-Hariri), or 80,000 (Burckhardt Prov. 380); whereas the "Nisab" is a moderate sum of money, gen. 20 gold dinars=200 silver dirhams.

[FN#308] As The Nights show, Arabs admire slender forms; but the hips and hinder cheeks must be highly developed and the stomach fleshy rather than lean. The reasons are obvious. The Persians who exaggerate everything say e.g. (Husayn Vaiz in the Anvar-i-Suhayli):--

How paint her hips and waist ? Who saw A mountain (Koh) dangling to a straw (kah)?