The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume X Part 67

[FN#295] My attention has been called to the resemblance between the half-lie and Job (i. 13- 19).

[FN#296] Boccaccio (ob. Dec. 2, 1375), may easily have heard of The Thousand Nights and a Night or of its archetype the Hazar Afsanah. He was followed by the Piacevoli Notti of Giovan Francisco Straparola (A. D. 1550), translated into almost all European languages but English: the original Italian is now rare.

Then came the Heptameron ou Histoire des amans fortunez of Marguerite d'Angouleme, Reyne de Navarre and only sister of Francis I. She died in 1549 before the days were finished: in 1558 Pierre Boaistuan published the Histoire des amans fortunez and in 1559 Claude Guiget the "Heptameron." Next is the Hexameron of A. de Torquemada, Rouen, 1610; and, lastly, the Pentamerone or El c.u.n.to de li c.u.n.te of Giambattista Basile (Naples 1637), known by the meagre abstract of J. E. Taylor and the caricatures of George Cruikshank (London 1847-50). I propose to translate this Pentamerone direct from the Neapolitan and have already finished half the work.

[FN#297] Translated and well annotated by Prof. Tawney, who, however, affects asterisks and has considerably bowdlerised sundry of the tales, e. g. the Monkey who picked out the Wedge (vol. ii. 28). This tale, by the by, is found in the Khirad Afroz (i. 128) and in the Anwar-i-Suhayli (chapt. i.) and gave rise to the Persian proverb, "What has a monkey to do with carpentering?"

It is curious to compare the Hindu with the Arabic work whose resemblances are as remarkable as their differences, while even more notable is their correspondence in impressioning the reader.

The Thaumaturgy of both is the same: the Indian is profuse in demonology and witchcraft; in transformation and restoration; in monsters as wind-men, fire-men and water-men, in air-going elephants and flying horses (i. 541-43); in the wis.h.i.+ng cow, divine goats and laughing fishes (i. 24); and in the speciosa miracula of magic weapons. He delights in fearful battles (i.

400) fought with the same weapons as the Moslem and rewards his heroes with a "turband of honour" (i. 266) in lieu of a robe.

There is a quaint family likeness arising from similar stages and states of society: the city is adorned for gladness, men carry money in a robe-corner and exclaim "Ha! good!" (for "Good, by Allah!"), lovers die with exemplary facility, the "soft-sided"

ladies drink spirits (i. 61) and princesses get drunk (i. 476); whilst the Eunuch, the Hetaira and the bawd (Kuttini) play the same preponderating parts as in The Nights. Our Brahman is strong in love-making; he complains of the pains of separation in this phenomenal universe; he revels in youth, "twin-brother to mirth,"

and beauty which has illuminating powers; he foully reviles old age and he alternately praises and abuses the s.e.x, concerning which more presently. He delights in truisms, the fas.h.i.+on of contemporary Europe (see Palmerin of England chapt. vii), such as "It is the fas.h.i.+on of the heart to receive pleasure from those things which ought to give it," etc. etc. What is there the wise cannot understand? and so forth. He is liberal in trite reflections and frigid conceits (i. 19, 55, 97, 103, 107, in fact everywhere); and his puns run through whole lines; this in fine Sanskrit style is inevitable. Yet some of his expressions are admirably terse and telling, e. g. Ascending the swing of Doubt: Bound together (lovers) by the leash of gazing: Two babes looking like Misery and Poverty: Old Age seized me by the chin: (A lake) first a.s.say of the Creator's skill: (A vow) difficult as standing on a sword-edge: My vital spirits boiled with the fire of woe: Transparent as a good man's heart: There was a certain convent full of fools: Dazed with scripture-reading: The stones could not help laughing at him: The Moon kissed the laughing forehead of the East: She was like a wave of the Sea of Love's insolence (ii.

127), a wave of the Sea of Beauty tossed up by the breeze of Youth: The King played dice, he loved slave-girls, he told lies, he sat up o' nights, he waxed wroth without reason, he took wealth wrongously, he despised the good and honoured the bad (i.

562); with many choice bits of the same kind. Like the Arab the Indian is profuse in personification; but the doctrine of pre-existence, of incarnation and emanation and an excessive spiritualism ever aiming at the infinite, makes his imagery run mad. Thus we have Immoral Conduct embodied; the G.o.d of Death; Science; the Svarga-heaven; Evening; Untimeliness, and the Earth-bride, while the Ace and Deuce of dice are turned into a brace of Demons. There is also that grotesqueness which the French detect even in Shakespeare, e. g. She drank in his ambrosial form with thirsty eyes like partridges (i. 476) and it often results from the comparison of incompatibles, e. g. a row of birds likened to a garden of nymphs; and from forced allegories, the favourite figure of contemporary Europe. Again, the rhetorical Hindu style differs greatly from the sobriety, directness and simplicity of the Arab, whose motto is Brevity combined with precision, except where the latter falls into "fine writing." And, finally, there is a something in the atmosphere of these Tales which is unfamiliar to the West and which makes them, as more than one has remarked to me, very hard reading.

[FN#298] The Introduction (i. 1-5) leads to the Curse of Pushpadanta and Malyavan who live on Earth as Vararuchi and Gunadhya and this runs through lib. i. Lib. ii. begins with the Story of Udayana to whom we must be truly grateful as our only guide: he and his son Naravahanadatta fill up the rest and end with lib. xviii. Thus the want of the clew or plot compels a division into books, which begin for instance with "We wors.h.i.+p the elephantine proboscis of Ganesha" (lib. x. i.) a reverend and awful object to a Hindu but to Englishmen mainly suggesting the "Zoo." The "Bismillah" of The Nights is much more satisfactory.

[FN#299] See pp. 5-6 Avertiss.e.m.e.nt des editeurs, Le Cabinet des Fees, vol. x.x.xviii: Geneva 1788. Galland's Edit. of mdccxxvi ends with Night ccx.x.xiv and the English translations with ccx.x.xvi and cxcvii. See retro p. 82.

[FN#300] There is a shade of difference in the words; the former is also used for Reciters of Traditions--a serious subject. But in the case of Hammad surnamed Al-Rawiyah (the Rhapsode) attached to the Court of Al-Walid, it means simply a conteur. So the Greeks had Homeristae = reciters of Homer, as opposed to the Homeridae or School of Homer.

[FN#302] Vol. i, Preface p. v. He notes that Mr. Dallaway describes the same scene at Constantinople where the Story-teller was used, like the modern "Organs of Government" in newspaper shape, for "reconciling the people to any recent measure of the Sultan and Vizier." There are women Rawiyahs for the Harems and some have become famous like the Mother of Hasan al-Basri (Ibn Khall. i, 370).

[FN#302] Hence the Persian proverb, "Baki-e-dastan farda = the rest of the tale to-morrow," said to askers of silly questions.

[FN#303] The scene is excellently described in, "Morocco: Its People and Places," by Edmondo de Amicis (London: Ca.s.sell, 1882), a most refres.h.i.+ng volume after the enforced plat.i.tudes and commonplaces of English travellers.

[FN#304] It began, however, in Persia, where the celebrated Darwaysh Mukhlis, Chief Sofi of Isfahan in the xviith century, translated into Persian tales certain Hindu plays of which a MS.

ent.i.tled Alfaraga Badal-Schidda (Al-faraj ba'd al-s.h.i.+ddah = Joy after annoy) exists in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. But to give an original air to his work, he ent.i.tled it "Hazar o yek Ruz" = Thousand and One Days, and in 1675 he allowed his friend Petis de la Croix, who happened to be at Isfahan, to copy it. Le Sage (of Gil Blas) is said to have converted many of the tales of Mukhlis into comic operas, which were performed at the Theatre Italien. I still hope to see The Nights at the Lyceum.

[FN#305] This author, however, when hazarding a change of style which is, I think, regretable, has shown abundant art by filling up the frequent deficiencies of the text after the fas.h.i.+on of Baron McGuckin de Slane in Ibn Khallikan. As regards the tout ensemble of his work, a n.o.ble piece of English, my opinion will ever be that expressed in my Foreword. A carping critic has remarked that the translator, "as may be seen in every page, is no Arabic scholar." If I be a judge, the reverse is the case: the brilliant and beautiful version thus traduced is almost entirely free from the blemishes and carelessness which disfigure Lane's, and thus it is far more faithful to the original. But it is no secret that on the staff of that journal the translator of Villon has sundry enemies, vrais diables enjuppones, who take every opportunity of girding at him because he does not belong to the clique and because he does good work when theirs is mostly sham.

The sole fault I find with Mr. Payne is that his severe grace of style treats an uncla.s.sical work as a cla.s.sic, when the romantic and irregular would have been a more appropriate garb. But this is a mere matter of private judgment.

[FN#306] Here I offer a few, but very few, instances from the Breslau text, which is the greatest sinner in this respect. Mas.

for fem., vol. i. p. 9, and three times in seven pages, Ahna and nahna for nahnu (iv. 370, 372); Ana ba-ashtari = I will buy (iii.

109): and Ana 'amil = I will do (v. 367). Alayki for Alayki (i.

18), Anti for Anti (iii. 66) and generally long i for short .

'Ammal (from 'amala = he did) tahlam = certainly thou dreamest, and 'Ammalin yaakulu = they were about to eat (ix. 315): Aywa for Ay wa'llahi = yes, by Allah (pa.s.sim). Bita' = belonging to, e.g.

Sara bita'k = it is become thine (ix. 352) and Mata' with the same sense (iii. 80). Da 'l-khurj = this saddle-bag (ix. 336) and Di (for hazah) = this woman (iii. 79) or this time (ii. 162).

Fayn as raha fayn = whither is he gone? (iv. 323). Kama badri = he rose early (ix. 318): Kaman = also, a word known to every European (ii. 43): Katt = never (ii. 172): Kawam (p.r.o.nounced 'awam) = fast, at once (iv. 385) and Rih asif kawi (p.r.o.n. 'awi) = a wind, strong very. Laysh, e.g. bi tasalni laysh (ix. 324) = why do you ask me? a favourite form for li ayya shayyin: so Mafish = ma fihi shayyun (there is no thing) in which Herr Landberg (p.

425) makes "Sha, le present de pouvoir." Min ajali = for my sake; and Li ajal al-taudi'a = for the sake of taking leave (Mac. Edit.

i. 384). Rijal nautiyah = men sailors when the latter word would suffice: Shuwayh (dim. of shayy) = a small thing, a little (iv.

309) like Moyyah (dim. of Ma) a little water: Wadduni = they carried me (ii. 172) and lastly the abominable Wahid gharib = one (for a) stranger. These few must suffice: the tale of Judar and his brethren, which in style is mostly Egyptian, will supply a number of others. It must not, however, be supposed, as many have done, that vulgar and colloquial Arabic is of modern date: we find it in the first century of Al-Islam, as is proved by the tale of Al-Hajjaj and Al-Shabi (Ibn Khallikan, ii. 6). The former asked "Kam ataa-k?' (= how much is thy pay?) to which the latter answered, "Alfayn!" (= two thousand!). "Tut," cried the Governor, "Kam atau-ka?" to which the poet replied as correctly and cla.s.sically, "Alfani."

[FN#307] In Russian folk-songs a young girl is often compared with this tree e.g.--

Ivooshka, ivooshka zelonaia moia!

(O Willow, O green Willow mine!)

[FN#308] So in Hector France ("La vache enragee") "Le sourcil en accent circonflexe et l'oeil en point d'interrogation."

[FN#309] In Persian "ab-i-ru" in India p.r.o.nounced abru.

FN#310] For further praises of his poetry and eloquence see the extracts from Fakhr al-Din of Rayy (an annalist of the xivth century A.D.) in De Sacy's Chrestomathie Arabe, vol. i.

[FN#311] After this had been written I received "Babylonian, das reichste Land in der Vorzeit und das lohnendste Kolonisationsfeld fur die Gegenwart," by my learned friend Dr. Aloys Sprenger, Heidelberg, 1886.

[FN#312] The first school for Arabic literature was opened by Ibn Abbas, who lectured to mult.i.tudes in a valley near Meccah; this rude beginning was followed by public teaching in the great Mosque of Damascus. For the rise of the "Madrasah," Academy or College' see Introduct. to Ibn Khallikan pp. xxvii-x.x.xii.

[FN#313] When Ibn Abbad the Sahib (Wazir) was invited to visit one of the Samanides, he refused, one reason being that he would require 400 camels to carry only his books.

[FN#314] This "Salmagondis" by Francois Beroalde de Verville was afterwards worked by Tabarin , the pseudo-Bruscambille d'Aubigne and Sorel.

[FN#315] I prefer this derivation to Strutt's adopted by the popular, "mumm is said to be derived from the Danish word mumme, or momme in Dutch (Germ. = larva), and signifies disguise in a mask, hence a mummer." In the Promptorium Parvulorum we have "Mummynge, mussacio, vel mussatus": it was a pantomime in dumb show, e.g. "I mumme in a mummynge;" "Let us go mumme (mummer) to nyghte in women's apparayle." "Mask" and "Mascarade," for persona, larva or vizard, also derive, I have noticed, from an Arabic word--Maskharah.

[FN#316] The Pre-Adamite doctrine has been preached with but scant success in Christendom. Peyrere, a French Calvinist, published (A.D. 1655) his "Praadamitae, sive exercitatio supra versibus 12, 13, 14, cap. v. Epist. Paul. ad Romanos," contending that Adam was called the first man because with him the law began. It brewed a storm of wrath and the author was fortunate to escape with only imprisonment.

[FN#317] According to Socrates the verdict was followed by a free fight of the Bishop-voters over the word "consubstantiality."

[FN#318] Servetus burnt (in A.D. 1553 for publis.h.i.+ng his Arian tractate) by Calvin, whom half-educated Roman Catholics in England firmly believe to have been a pederast. This arose I suppose, from his meddling with Rabelais who, in return for the good joke Rabie laesus, presented a better anagram, "Jan (a pimp or cuckold) Cul" (Calvinus).

[FN#319] There is no more immoral work than the "Old Testament."

Its deity is an ancient Hebrew of the worst type, who condones, permits or commands every sin in the Decalogue to a Jewish patriarch, qua patriarch. He orders Abraham to murder his son and allows Jacob to swindle his brother; Moses to slaughter an Egyptian and the Jews to plunder and spoil a whole people, after inflicting upon them a series of plagues which would be the height of atrocity if the tale were true. The nations of Canaan are then extirpated. Ehud, for treacherously disembowelling King Eglon, is made judge over Israel. Jael is blessed above women (Joshua v. 24) for vilely murdering a sleeping guest; the horrid deeds of Judith and Esther are made examples to mankind; and David, after an adultery and a homicide which deserved ignominious death, is suffered to ma.s.sacre a host of his enemies, cutting some in two with saws and axes and putting others into brick-kilns. For obscenity and impurity we have the tales of Onan and Tamar, Lot and his daughters, Amnon and his fair sister (2 Sam. xiii.), Absalom and his father's concubines, the "wife of wh.o.r.edoms" of Hosea and, capping all, the Song of Solomon. For the horrors forbidden to the Jews who, therefore, must have practiced them, see Levit. viii. 24, xi. 5, xvii. 7, xviii. 7, 9, 10, 12, 15, 17, 21, 23, and xx. 3. For mere filth what can be fouler than 1st Kings xviii. 27; Tobias ii. 11; Esther xiv. 2, Eccl. xxii. 2; Isaiah x.x.xvi. 12, Jeremiah iv. 5, and (Ezekiel iv.

12-15), where the Lord changes human ordure into "Cow-chips!" Ce qui excuse Dieu, said Henri Beyle, c'est qu'il n'existe pas,--I add, as man has made him.

[FN#320] It was the same in England before the "Reformation," and in France where, during our days, a returned priesthood collected in a few years "Peter-pence" to the tune of five hundred millions of francs. And these men wonder at being turned out!

[FN#321] Deutsch on the Talmud: Quarterly Review, 1867.

[FN#322] Evidently. Its cosmogony is a myth read literally: its history is, for the most part, a highly immoral distortion, and its ethics are those of the Talmudic Hebrews. It has done good work in its time; but now it shows only decay and decrepitude in the place of vigour and progress. It is dying hard, but it is dying of the slow poison of science.

[FN#323] These Hebrew Stoics would justly charge the Founder of Christianity with preaching a more popular and practical doctrine, but a degradation from their own far higher and more ideal standard.

[FN#324] Dr. Theodore Christlieb ("Modern Doubt and Christian Belief," Edinburgh: Clark 1874) can even now write:--"So then the 'full age' to which humanity is at present supposed to have attained, consists in man's doing good purely for goodness sake!

Who sees not the hollowness of this bombastic talk. That man has yet to be born whose practice will be regulated by this insipid theory (dieser grauen theorie). What is the idea of goodness per se? * * * The abstract idea of goodness is not an effectual motive for well-doing" (p. 104). My only comment is c'est ignolile! His Reverence acts the part of Satan in Holy Writ, "Does Job serve G.o.d for naught?" Compare this selfish, irreligious, and immoral view with Philo Judaeus (On the Allegory of the Sacred Laws, cap. 1viii.), to measure the extent of the fall from Pharisaism to Christianity. And the latter is still infected with the "bribe-and-threat doctrine:" I once immensely scandalised a Consular Chaplain by quoting the n.o.ble belief of the ancients, and it was some days before he could recover mental equanimity. The degradation is now inbred.

[FN#325] Of the doctrine of the Fall the heretic Marcion wrote: "The Deity must either be deficient in goodness if he willed, in prescience if he did not foresee, or in power if he did not prevent it."

[FN#326] In his charming book, "India Revisited."

[FN#327] This is the answer to those who contend with much truth that the moderns are by no means superior to the ancients of Europe: they look at the results of only 3000 years instead of 30,000 or 300,000.

[FN#328] As a maxim the saying is attributed to the Duc de Levis, but it is much older.

[FN#329] There are a few, but only a few, frightful exceptions to this rule, especially in the case of Khalid bin Walid, the Sword of Allah, and his ferocious friend, Darar ibn al-Azwar. But their cruel excesses were loudly blamed by the Moslems, and Caliph Omar only obeyed the popular voice in superseding the fierce and furious Khalid by the mild and merciful Abu Obaydah.

[FN#330] This too when St. Paul sends the Christian slave Onesimus back to his unbelieving (?) master, Philemon; which in Al-Islam would have created a scandal.

[FN#331] This too when the Founder of Christianity talks of "Eating and drinking at his table!" (Luke xxn. 29.) My notes have often touched upon this inveterate prejudice the result, like the soul-less woman of Al-Islam, of ad captandum, pious fraud. "No soul knoweth what joy of the eyes is reserved for the good in recompense for their works" (Koran x.x.xn. 17) is surely as "spiritual" as St. Paul (I Cor. ii., 9). Some lies, however are very long-lived, especially those begotten by self interest.