The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Volume XII Part 25

[FN#235] Sic in text xii. 20. It may be a misprint for Abu al-Tawaif, but it can also mean "O Shaykh of the Tribes (of Jinns)!"

[FN#236] The capital of King Al-s.h.i.+sban.

[FN#237] Arab "Fajj", the Spanish "Vega" which, however, means a mountain-plain, a plain.

[FN#238] i.e. I am quite sure: emphatically.

[FN#239] i.e. all the Jinn's professions of affection and promises of protection were mere lies.

[FN#240] In the original this apodosis is wanting: see vol. vi.

203, 239.

[FN#241] Arab. "Dahiyat al-Dawahi;" see vol. ii. 87.

[FN#242] Arab. "Al-Jabal al-Mukawwar"= Chaine de montagnes de forme demi circulaire, from Kaur, a park, an enceinte.

[FN#243] Arab. "Ruhi" lit. my breath, the outward sign of life.

[FN#244] i.e. Kaf.

[FN#245] i.e. A bit of burning charcoal.

[FN#246] Arab. "Al-yad al-bayza,"=lit. The white hand: see vol.

iv. 185.

[FN#247] Showing the antiquity of "Apres moi le deluge," the fame of all old politicians and aged statesmen who can expect but a few years of life. These "burning questions" (e.g. the Bulgarian) may be smothered for a time, but the result is that they blaze forth with increased violence. We have to thank Lord Palmerston (an Irish landlord) for ignoring the growth of Fenianism and another aged statesman for a st.u.r.dy attempt to disunite the United Kingdom. An old nation wants young blood at its head.

[FN#248] Suggesting the nursery rhyme:

Fee, fo, fum I smell the blood of an Englishman.

[FN#249] i.e. why not at once make an end of her.

[FN#250] The well-known war-cry.

[FN#251] Lit. "Smoke" pop. applied, like our word, to tobacco.

The latter, however, is not here meant.

[FN#252] Arab. "Ghurab al-bayn," of the wold or of parting. See vol. vii. 226.

[FN#253] Arab. "Halawah"; see vol. iv. 60.

[FN#254] Here the vocative particle "Ya" is omitted.

[FN#255] Lit. "The long-necked (bird)" before noticed with the Rukh (Roc) in vol. v. 122. Here it becomes a Princess, daughter of Bahram-i-Gur (Bahram of the Onager, his favourite game), the famous Persian king in the fifth century, a contemporary of Theodosius the younger and Honorius. The "Anka" is evidently the Iranian Simurgh.

[FN#256] "Chamber" is becoming a dangerous word in English. Roars of laughter from the G.o.ds greeted the great actor's declamation, "The bed has not been slept in! Her little chamber is empty!"

[FN#257] Choice Gift of the breast (or heart).

[FN#258] From the Calc. Edit. (1814?18), Nights cxcvi.?cc., vol.

ii., pp. 367?378. The translation has been compared and collated with that of Langles (Paris, 1814), appended to his Edition of the Voyages of Sindbad. The story is exceedingly clever and well deserves translation.

[FN#259] It is regretable that this formula has not been preserved throughout The Nights: it affords, I have noticed, a pleasing break to the long course of narrative.

[FN#260] Arab. "Banat-al-hawa" lit. daughters of love, usually meaning an Anonyma, a fille de joie; but here the girl is of good repute, and the offensive term must be modified to a gay, frolicsome la.s.s.

[FN#261] Arab. "Jabhat," the lintel opposed to the threshold.

[FN#262] Arab. "Ghatti," still the popular term said to a child showing its nakedness, or a lady of pleasure who insults a man by displaying any part of her person.

[FN#263] She is compared with a flas.h.i.+ng blade (her face) now drawn from its sheath (her hair) then hidden by it.

[FN#264] The "Muajjalah" or money paid down before consummation was about 25; and the "Mu'ajjalah" or coin to be paid contingent on divorce was about 75. In the Calc. Edit ii. 371, both dowers are 35.

[FN#265] All the blemishes which justify returning a slave to the slave-dealer.

[FN#266] Media: see vol. ii. 94. The "Daylamite prison" was one of many in Baghdad.

[FN#267] See vol. v. 199. I may remark that the practice of bathing after copulation was kept up by both s.e.xes in ancient Rome. The custom may have originated in days when human senses were more acute. I have seen an Arab horse object to be mounted by the master when the latter had not washed after sleeping with a woman.

[FN#268] On the morning after a happy night the bridegroom still offers coffee and Halwa to friends.

[FN#269] i.e. More bewitching.

[FN#270] Arab. "Sharifi" more usually Ashrafi, the Port. Xerafim, a gold coin = 6s.?7s.

[FN#271] The oft-repeated Koranic quotation.

[FN#272] Arab. "'Irk": our phrase is "the apple of the eye."

[FN#273] Meaning that he was a Sayyid or a Sharif.

[FN#274] i.e. than a Jew or a Christian. So the Sultan, when appealed to by these religionists, who were as usual squabbling and fighting, answered, "What matter if the dog tear the hog or the hog tear the dog"?

[FN#275] The "Shari'at" forbidding divorce by force.

[FN#276] i.e. protect my honour.

[FN#277] For this proverb see vol. v. 138. 1 have remarked that "Shame" is not a pa.s.sion in Europe as in the East; the Western equivalent to the Arab. "Haya' 'would be the Latin "Pudor."

[FN#278] Arab. "Talakan bainan," here meaning a triple divorce before witnesses, making it irrevocable.

[FN#279] i.e. who had played him that trick.

[FN#280] The Bresl. Edit. (vol. xii. pp. 50-116, Nights dcccclviii- dcccclxv.) ent.i.tles it "Tale of Abu al-Hasan the Damascene and his son Sidi Nur al-Din ' Ali." Sidi means simply, "my lord," but here becomes part of the name, a practice perpetuated in Zanzibar. See vol. v.283.

[FN#281] i.e. at the hours of canonical prayers and other suitable times he made an especial orison (du'a) for issue.