The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume XI Part 17

[FN#182] A fancy name intended to be Persian

[FN#183] i.e. thy Harem, thy women.

[FN#184] i.e. thy life hath been unduly prolonged.

[FN#185] See Chavis and Cazotte, "Story of Ravia (Arwa!) the Resigned." Dadbin (Persian)=one who looks to justice, a name hardly deserved in this case.

[FN#186] For this important province and city of Persia, see Al-Mas'udi, ii. 2; iv. 86, etc. It gave one of the many names to the Caspian Sea. The adjective is Tabari, whereas Tabarani=native of Tiberias (Tabariyah).

[FN#187] Zor-khan=Lord Violence, and Kar-dan=Business-knower; both Persian.

[FN#188] "Arwa" written with a terminal of ya is a woman's P.N.

in Arabic.

[FN#189] i.e. Not look down upon me with eyes of contempt. This "marrying below one" is still an Eastern idea, very little known to women in the West.

[FN#190] Chavis and Cazotte call the Dabbus a "dabour" and explain it as a "sort of scepter used by Eastern Princes, which serves also as a weapon." For the Dabbus, or mace, see vol. vi.

249.

[FN#191] i.e. Let thy purposes be righteous as thine outward profession.

[FN#192] See vol. vi. 130. This is another lieu commun amongst Moslems; and its unfact requires only statement.

[FN#193] Afterwards called his "chamberlain," i.e. guardian of the Harem-door.

[FN#194] i.e. Chosroes, whom Chavis and Cazotte make "Cyrus."

[FN#195] Arab. "Takiyah," used for the Persian Takhtrawan, common in The Nights.

[FN#196] Arab. "Kubbah," a dome-shaped tent, as elsewhere.

[FN#197] This can refer only to Abu al-Khayr's having been put to death on Kardan's charge, although the tale-teller, with characteristic inconsequence, neglected to mention the event.

[FN#198] Not referring to skull sutures, but to the forehead, which is poetically compared with a page of paper upon which Destiny writes her irrevocable decrees.

[FN#199] Said in the grimmest earnest, not jestingly, as in vol.

iv. 264.

[FN#200] i.e. the lex talionis, which is the essence of Moslem, and indeed, of all criminal jurisprudence. We cannot wonder at the judgment of Queen Arwa: even Confucius, the mildest and most humane of lawgivers, would not pardon the man who allowed his father's murderer to live. The Moslem lex talionis (Koran ii.

173) is identical with that of the Jews (Exod. xxi. 24), and the latter probably derives from immemorial usage. But many modern Rabbins explain away the Mosaical command as rather a demand for a pecuniary mulct than literal retaliation. The well-known Isaac Aburbanel cites many arguments in proof of this position: he asks, for instance, supposing the accused have but one eye, should he lose it for having struck out one of another man's two?

Moreover, he dwells upon the impossibility of inflicting a punishment the exact equivalent of the injury; like Shylock's pound of flesh without drawing blood. Moslems, however, know nothing of these frivolities, and if retaliation be demanded the judge must grant it. There is a legend in Marocco of an English merchant who was compelled to forfeit tooth for tooth at the instance of an old woman, but a profitable concession gilded the pill.

[FN#201] In Chavis and Cazotte "Story of Bhazmant (!); or the Confident Man." "Bakht (-i-) Zaman" in Pers. would=Luck of the Time.

[FN#202] Chavis and Cazotte change the name to "Abadid," which, like "Khadidan," is nonsignificant.

[FN#203] Arab. "Faris," here a Reiter, or Dugald Dolgetti, as mostly were the hordes led by the mediaeval Italian Condottieri.

[FN#204] So Napoleon the Great also believed that Providence is mostly favorable to "gros bataillons."

[FN#205] Pers. and Arab.="Good perfection."

[FN#206] In Chavis and Cazotte "Story of Baharkan." Bihkard (in s.h.i.+raz p.r.o.nounced "Kyard")="Well he did."

[FN#207] See "Katru" in the Introduction to the Bakhtiyar-namah.

[FN#208] The text has "Jaukalan" for Saulajan, the Persian "Chaugan"=the crooked bat used in Polo. See vol. 1. 46.

[FN#209] Amongst Moslems, I have noted, circ.u.mstantial evidence is not lawful: the witness must swear to what he has seen. A curious consideration, how many innocent men have been hanged by "circ.u.mstantial evidence." See vol. v. 97.

[FN#210] In Chavis and Cazotte "Story of Abattamant (!), or the Prudent Man;" also Aylan Shah becomes Olensa after Italian fas.h.i.+on.

[FN#211] In Arab. idiom a long hand or arm means power, a phrase not wholly unused in European languages. Chavis and Cazotte paraphrase "He who keeps his hands crossed upon his breast, shall not see them cut off."

[FN#212] Arab. "Jama'a atrafah," lit.=he drew in his extremities, it being contrary to "etiquette" in the presence of a superior not to cover hands and feet. In the wild Argentine Republic the savage Gaucho removes his gigantic spurs when coming into the presence of his master.

[FN#213] About the equivalent to the Arab. or rather Egypto- Syrian form "Jiddan," used in the modern slang sense.

[FN#214] i.e. that he become my son-in-law.

[FN#215] For the practice of shampooing often alluded to in The Nights, see vol. iii. 17. The king "sleeping on the boys' knees"

means that he dropped off whilst his feet were on the laps of the lads.

[FN#216] Meaning the honour of his Harem.

[FN#217] Pardon, lit.=security; the cry for quarter already introduced into English

"Or raise the craven cry Aman."

It was Mohammed's express command that this prayer for mercy should be respected even in the fury of fight. See vol. i. 342.

[FN#218] A saying found in every Eastern language beginning with Hebrew; Proverbs xxvi. 27, "Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein."

[FN#219] i.e. a domed tomb where prayers and perlections of the Koran could be made. "Kubbah" in Marocco is still the term for a small square building with a low medianaranja cupola under which a Santon lies interred. It is the "little Waly" of our "blind travellers" in the unholy "Holy Land."

[FN#220] i.e. to secure her a.s.sistance in arousing the king's wrath.

[FN#221] i.e. so slow to avenge itself.

[FN#222] Story of Sultan Hebriam (!), and his Son" (Chavis and Cazotte). Unless they greatly enlarged upon the text, they had a much fuller copy than that found in the Bresl. Edit.

[FN#223] A right kingly king, in the Eastern sense of the word, would strike off their heads for daring to see omens threatening his son and heir: this would be constructive treason of the highest because it might be expected to cause its own fulfilment.

[FN#224] Mohammed's Hadis "Kazzibu 'l-Munajjimuna bi Rabbi 'I-Ka'abah"=the Astrologers lied, by the Ka'abah's Lord!

[FN#225] Arab. "Khawatin," plur. of Khatun, a matron, a lady, vol. iv. 66.

[FN#226] See Al-Mas'udi, chapt. xvii. (Fr. Transl. ii. 48-49) of the circular cavity two miles deep and sixty in circuit inhabited by men and animals on the Caucasus near Derbend.