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

[FN#402] Khulanjan. Sic all editions; but Khalanj, or Khaulanj adj. Khalanji, a tree with a strong-smelling wood which held in hand as a chaplet acts as perfume, as is probably intended. In Span. Arabic it is the Erica-wood. The "Muhit" tells us that is a tree parcel yellow and red growing in parts of India and China, its leaf is that of the Tamarisk (Tarfa); its flower is coloured red, yellow and white; it bears a grain like mustard-seed (Khardal) and of its wood they make porringers. Hence the poet sings,

"Yut 'amu 'l-shahdu fi 'l-jifani, wa yuska * Labanu 'l-Bukhti fi Kusa'i 'l-Khalanji: Honey's served to them in platters for food; * Camels' milk in bowls of the Khalanj wood."

The pl. Khalanij is used by Himyan bin Kahafah in this "bayt",

"Hatta iza ma qazati 'l-Hawaija * Wa malaat Halaba-ha 'l-Khalanija: Until she had done every work of hers * And with sweet milk had filled the porringers."

[FN#403] In text Al-Sha'ir Al-Walahan, vol. iii. 226.

[FN#404] The orange I have said is the growth of India and the golden apples of the Hesperides were not oranges but probably golden nuggets. Captain Rolleston (Globe, Feb. 5, '84, on "Morocco-Lixus") identifies the Garden with the mouth of the Lixus River while M. Antichan would transfer it to the hideous and unwholesome Bissagos Archipelago.

[FN#405] Arab. "Ikyan," the living gold which is supposed to grow in the ground.

[FN#406] For the Kubbad or Captain Shaddock's fruit see vol. ii.

310, where it is misprinted Kubad.

[FN#407] Full or Fill in Bresl. Edit. = Arabian jessamine or cork-tree ( ). The Bul. and Mac. Edits. read "filfil" = pepper or palm-fibre.

[FN#408] Arab. "Sumbul al-'Anbari"; the former word having been introduced into England by patent medicines. "Sumbul" in Arab.

and Pers. means the hyacinth, the spikenard or the Sign Virgo.

[FN#409] Arab. "Lisan al-Hamal" lit. = Lamb's tongue.

[FN#410] See in Bresl. Edit. X, 221. Taif, a well-known town in the mountain region East of Meccah, and not in the Holy Land, was once famous for scented goat's leather. It is considered to be a "fragment of Syria" (Pilgrimage ii. 207) and derives its name = the circ.u.mambulator from its having circuited pilgrim-like round Ka'abah (Ibid.).

[FN#411] Arab. "Mikhaddah" = cheek-pillow: Ital. guanciale. In Bresl. Edit. Mudawwarah (a round cus.h.i.+on) Sinjabiyah (of Ermine).

For "Mudawwarah" see vol. iv. 135.

[FN#412] "Coffee" is here evidently an anachronism and was probably inserted by the copyist. See vol. v. 169, for its first metnion. But "Kahwah" may have preserved its original meaning = strong old wine (vol. ii. 261); and the amount of wine-drinking and drunkenness proves that the coffee movement had not set in.

[FN#413] i.e. they are welcome. In Marocco "La baas" means, "I am pretty well" (in health).

[FN#414] The Rose (Ward) in Arab. is masculine, sounding to us most uncouth. But there is a fem. form Wardah = a single rose.

[FN#415] Arab. "Akmam," pl. of k.u.mm, a sleeve, a petal. See vol.

iv. 107 and supra p. 267. The Moslem woman will show any part of her person rather than her face, instinctively knowing that the latter may be recognised whereas the former cannot. The traveller in the outer East will see ludicrous situations in which the modest one runs away with hind parts bare and head and face carefully covered.

[FN#416] Arab. "Ikyan" which Mr. Payne translates "vegetable gold" very picturesquely but not quite preserving the idea. See supra p. 272.

[FN#417] It is the custom for fast youths, in Egypt, Syria, and elsewhere to stick small gold pieces, mere spangles of metal on the brows, cheeks and lips of the singing and dancing girls and the perspiration and mask of cosmetics make them adhere for a time till fresh movement shakes them off.

[FN#418] See the same idea in vol. i. 132, and 349.

[FN#419] "They will ask thee concerning wine and casting of lots; say: 'In both are great sin and great advantages to mankind; but the sin of them both is greater than their advantage.'" See Koran ii. 216. Mohammed seems to have made up his mind about drinking by slow degrees; and the Koranic law is by no means so strict as the Mullahs have made it. The prohibitions, revealed at widely different periods and varying in import and distinction, have been discussed by Al-Bayzawi in his commentary on the above chapter. He says that the first revelation was in chapt. xvi. 69 but, as the pa.s.sage was disregarded, Omar and others consulted the Apostle who replied to them in chapt. ii. 216. Then, as this also was unnoticed, came the final decision in chapt. v. 92, making wine and lots the work of Satan. Yet excuses are never wanting to the Moslem, he can drink Champagne and Cognac, both unknown in Mohammed's day and he can use wine and spirits medicinally, like sundry of ourselves, who turn up the nose of contempt at the idea of drinking for pleasure.

[FN#420] i.e. a fair-faced cup-bearer. The lines have occurred before: so I quote Mr. Payne.

[FN#421] It is the custom of the Arabs to call their cattle to water by whistling; not to whistle to them, as Europeans do, whilst making water.

[FN#422] i.e. bewitching. See vol. i. 85. These incompatible metaphors are brought together by the Saj'a (prose rhyme) in--"iyah."

[FN#423] Mesopotamian Christians, who still turn towards Jerusalem, face the West, instead of the East, as with Europeans: here the monk is so dazed that he does not know what to do.

[FN#424] Arab. "Bayt Sha'ar" = a house of hair (tent) or a couplet of verse. Watad (a tentpeg) also is prosodical, a foot when the two first letters are "moved" (vowelled) and the last is jazmated (quiescent), e.g. Lakad. It is termed Majmu'a (united), as opposed to "Mafruk" (separated), e.g. Kabla, when the "moved"

consonants are disjoined by a quiescent.

[FN#425] Lit. standing on their heads, which sounds ludicrous enough in English, not in Arabic.

[FN#426] These lines are in vol. iii. 251. I quote Mr. Payne who notes "The bodies of Eastern women of the higher cla.s.ses by dint of continual maceration, Esther-fas.h.i.+on, in aromatic oils and essences, would naturally become impregnated with the sweet scents of the cosmetics used."

[FN#427] These lines occur in vol. i. 218: I quote Torrens for variety.

[FN#428] So we speak of a "female screw." The allusion is to the dove-tailing of the pieces. This personification of the lute has occurred before: but I solicit the reader's attention to it; it has a fulness of Oriental flavour all its own.

[FN#429] I again solicit the reader's attention to the simplicity, the pathos and the beauty of this personification of the lute.

[FN#430] "They" for she.

[FN#431] The Arabs very justly make the "'Andalib" = nightingale, masculine.

[FN#432] Anwar = lights or flowers: See Night dccclxv. supra p.

270.

[FN#433] These couplets have occurred in vol. i. 168; so I quote Mr. Payne.

[FN#434] i.e. You may have his soul but leave me his body: company with him in the next world and let me have him in this.

[FN#435] Alluding to the Koranic (cxiii. 1.), "I take refuge with the Lord of the Daybreak from the mischief of that which He hath created, etc." This is shown by the first line wherein occurs the Koranic word "Ghasik" (cxiii. 3) which may mean the first darkness when it overspreadeth or the moon when it is eclipsed.

[FN#436] "Malak" = level ground; also tract on the Nile sea.

Lane M.E. ii. 417, and Bruckhardt Nubia 482.

[FN#437] This sentiment has often been repeated.

[FN#438] The owl comes in because "b.u.m" (p.r.o.n. boom) rhymes with Kayyum = the Eternal.

[FN#439] For an incident like this see my Pilgrimmage (vol. i.

176). How true to nature the whole scene is; the fond mother excusing her boy and the practical father putting the excuse aside. European paternity, however, would probably exclaim, "The beast's in liquor!"

[FN#440] In ancient times this seems to have been the universal and perhaps instinctive treatment of the hand that struck a father. By Nur al-Din's flight the divorce-oath became technically null and void for Taj al-Din had sworn to mutilate his son next morning.

[FN#441] So Roderic Random and his companions "sewed their money between the lining and the waistband of their breeches, except some loose silver for immediate expense on the road." For a description of these purses see Pilgrimage i. 37.

[FN#442] Arab. Ras.h.i.+d (our Rosetta), a corruption of the Coptic Tras.h.i.+t; ever famous for the Stone.

[FN#443] For a parallel pa.s.sage in praise of Alexandria see vol.

i. 290, etc. The editor or scribe was evidently an Egyptian.