Thalaba the Destroyer Part 40

[j] They call the _Thermae_ of this country Hammams, from whence our Hummums.

This place, in riding over it, giveth back such a hollow sound, that we were afraid every moment of sinking thro' it. It is probable therefore that the ground below us was hollow: and may not the air then, which is pent up within these caverns, afford, as we may suppose, in escaping continually thro' these fountains, that mixture of shrill, murmuring and deep sounds, which, according to the direction of the winds and the motion of the external air, issue out along with the water? the Arabs, to quote their strength of imagination once more, affirm these sounds to be the music of the _Jenoune_, Fairies, who are supposed, in a particular manner, to make their abodes at this place, and to be the grand agents in all these extraordinary appearances.

There are other natural curiosities likewise at this place. For the chalky stone being dissolved into a fine impalpable powder and carried down afterwards with the stream, lodgeth itself upon the sides of the channel, nay sometimes upon the lips of the fountains themselves; or else embracing twigs, straws and other bodies in its way, immediately hardeneth and shoots into a bright fibrous substance, like the Asbestos, forming itself at the same time, into a variety of glittering figures and beautiful christalizations.

_Shaw._

[111] In the place where the Whang-ho rises, there are more than an hundred springs which sparkle like stars, whence it is called Hotun Nor, the Sea of Stars. These sources form two great lakes called Hala Nor, the black sea or lake; afterwards there appear 3 or 4 little rivers, which join'd form the Whang-ho, which has 8 or 9 branches. These sources of the river are called also Oton-tala. It is in Thibet.

_Gaubil. Astley's Collect. of Voy. and Travels._

The Whang ho, or as the Portugueze call it Hoam-ho, i. e. the yellow River, rises not far from the source of the Ganges in the Tartarian mountains west of China, and having run thro' it with a course of more than six hundred leagues, discharges itself into the eastern sea. It hath its name from a yellow mud which always stains its water, and which after rains composes a third part of its quant.i.ty. The watermen clear it for use by throwing in alum. The Chinese say its waters cannot become clear in a thousand years; whence it is a common proverb among them for any thing which is never likely to happen, when the yellow river shall run clear.

_Note to the Chinese Tale Hau Kiou Choann._

[112] Among the mountains of the _Beni Abbess_, four leagues to the S. E. of the _Welled Mansoure_, we pa.s.s thro' a narrow winding defile, which, for the s.p.a.ce of near half a mile, lyeth on each side under an exceeding high precipice, at every winding, the Rock or Stratum, that originally went across it and thereby separated one valley from another, is cut into the fas.h.i.+on of a door case six or seven feet wide, giving thereby the Arabs an occasion to call them _Beeban_, the Gates; whilst the Turks in consideration of their strength and ruggedness, know them by the additional appellation of _Dammer Cappy_, the Gates of Iron. Few persons pa.s.s them without horror, a handful of men being able to dispute the pa.s.sage with a whole Army. The rivulet of salt water which glides thro' this valley, might possibly first point out the way which art and necessity would afterwards improve.

_Shaw._

[113] In 1568 the Persian Sultan gave the Grand Seigneur two most stately pavilions made of one piece, the curtains being interlaced with gold and the supporters imbroidred with the same, also nine fair conopies to hang over the ports of their pavilions, things not used among the Christians.

_Knolles._

[114] The expences the Persians are at in their gardens is that wherein they make greatest ostentation of their wealth. Not that they much mind furnis.h.i.+ng of them with delightful flowers as we do in Europe; but these they slight as an excessive liberality of Nature by whom their common fields are strewed with an infinite number of tulips and other flowers; but they are rather desirous to have their gardens full of all sorts of fruit trees, and especially to dispose them into pleasant walks of a kind of plane or poplar, a tree not known in Europe, which the Persians call Tzinnar. These trees grow up to the height of the Pine, and have very broad leaves not much unlike those of the vine. Their fruit hath some resemblance to the chesnut, while the outer coat is about it, but there is no kernel within it, so that it is not to be eaten. The wood thereof is very brown and full of veins, and the Persians use it in doors and shutters for windows, which being rubbed with oil, look incomparably better than any thing made of wallnut tree, nay indeed than the root of it which is now[k] so very much esteemed.

_Amb. Travels._

[k] 1637.

[115] Major Scott informs us that scars and wounds by Persian writers are compared to the streaky tints of the tulip. The simile here employed is equally obvious and more suited to its place.

[116] "We pitched our tents among some little hills where there was a prodigious number of lillies of many colours, with which the ground was quite covered. None were white, they were mostly either of a rich violet with a red spot in the midst of each leaf, or of a fine black and these were the most esteemed. In form they were like our lillies, but much larger."

_Tavernier._

[117] This was an expression of Ariosto in one of his smaller poems, I believe in a Madrigal. I cannot now quote the line.

[118] The Thracians say that the nightingales which build their nests about the Sepulchre of Orpheus sing sweeter and louder than other nightingales.

_Pausanias._

Gongora has addressed this Bird with somewhat more than his usual extravagance of absurdity,

Con diferencia tal, con gracia tanta Aquel Ruisenor llora, que sospecho, Que tiene otros cien mil dentro del pecho, Que alternan su dolor por su garganta.

With such a grace that Nightingale bewails That I suspect, so exquisite his note, An hundred thousand other Nightingales Within him, warble sorrow thro' his throat.

[119] In the _Caherman Nameh_, the Dives having taken in war some of the Peris, imprisoned them in iron cages, which they hung from the highest trees they could find. There from time to time their companions visited them, with the most precious odours. These odours were the usual food of the Peris, and procured them also another advantage, for they prevented the Dives from approaching or molesting them. The Dives could not bear the perfumes, which rendered them gloomy and melancholy whenever they drew near the cage in which a Peri was suspended.

_D'Herbelot._

[120] Nuptials of Mohammed and Cadijah.--Dum autem ad nuptias celebrandas solemnissimum convivium pararetur, concussus est Angelis admirantibus, thronus Dei: atque ipse Deus majestate plenus praecepit Custodi Paradisi, ut puellas, & pueros ejus c.u.m festivis ornamentis educeret, & calices ad bibendum ordinatim disponeret: grandiores item puellas, & jam sororiantibus mammis praeditas, & juvenes illis coaevos, pretiosis vestibus indueret. Jussit proeterea Gabrielem vexillum laudis supra Meccanum Templum explicare. Tunc vero valles omnes & montes proe loet.i.tia gestire caeperunt, & tota Mecca nocte illa velut olla super ignem imposita efferbuit.--Eodem tempore proecepit Deus Gabrieli, ut super omnes mortales unguenta pretiosissima dispergeret, admirantibus omnibus subitum illum atque insolitum odorem, quem in gratiam novorum conjugum divinitus exhala.s.se universi cognovere.

_Maracci._

[121] Sclymus 2. received the Emba.s.sadors sitting upon a pallat which the Turks call _Mastabe_ used by them in their chambers to sleep and to feed upon, covered with carpets of silk, as was the whole floor of the chamber also.

_Knolles._

Among the presents that were exchanged between the Persian and Ottoman Sovereigns in 1568, were carpets of silk, of camel's hair, lesser ones of silk and gold, and some called _Teftich_; made of the finest lawn, and so large that seven men could scarcely carry one of them.

_Knolles._

In the beautiful story of Ali Beg it is said Cha Sefi when he examined the house of his father's favourite was much surprized at seeing it so badly furnished with plain skins and coa.r.s.e carpets, whereas the other n.o.bles in their houses trod only upon carpets of silk and gold.

_Tavernier._

[122] On the way from Macao to Canton in the rivers and channels there is taken a vast quant.i.ty of oysters, of whose sh.e.l.ls they make gla.s.s for the windows.

_Gemelli Careri._

In the Chinese Novel _Hau Kiou Choaan_, we read Shueyping-sin ordered her servants to hang up a curtain of mother of pearl across the hall.

She commanded the first table to be set for her guest without the curtain and two lighted tapers to be placed upon it. Afterwards she ordered a second table, but without any light, to be set for herself within the curtain, so that _she could see every thing thro' it_, unseen herself.

Master George Turbervile in his letters form Muscovy 1568, describes the Russian windows

They have no English gla.s.se; of slices of a rocke Hight Sluda they their windows make, that English gla.s.se doth mocke.

They cut it very thinne, and sow it with a thred In pretie order like to panes, to serve their present need.

No other gla.s.se, good faith, doth give a better light, And sure the rock is nothing rich, the cost is very slight.

_Hakluyt._

The Indians of Malabar use mother of pearl for window panes.

_Fra Paolino da San Batolomeo._