Supplemental Nights to The Book of the Thousand and One Nights - Sir Richard Francis Burton (great books of all time .TXT) 📗

quarters are closed at night with strong wooden doors, and the guards will not open them except by means of a silver key.

Mohammed Ali abolished this inconvenience, but fined and imprisoned all night-walkers who carried no lanterns. See Pilgrimage, vol. i. 173,

 

[FN#24] As Kazi of the quarter he was ex-officio guardian of the orphans and their property, and liable to severe punishment (unless he could pay for the luxury) in case of fraud or neglect.

 

[FN#25] Altogether six thousand dinars=�3000. This sentence is borrowed from the sequel and necessary to make the sense clear.

 

[FN#26] i.e. “I am going at once to complain of thee before the king unless thou give me due satisfaction by restoring the money and finding the thief.”

 

[FN#27] The Practice (of the Prophet) and the Holy Law (Koranic): see vols. v. 36, 167 and i. 169.

 

[FN#28] In the corrupt text “Who knew me not;” thus spoiling the point.

 

[FN#29] Arab. “Maut Ahmar”=violent or bloody death. For the various coloured deaths, see vol. vi. 250.

 

[FN#30] i.e. for lack of sleep.

 

[FN#31] i.e. of the Kazi.

 

[FN#32] Arab. “Mub�h,” in the theologic sense, an action which is not sinful (har�m) or quasisinful (makruh); vulgarly “permitted, allowed”; so Shahrazad “ceased to say her say permitted” (by Shahryar).

 

[FN#33] Arab. “Y� Khawand”; see vol. vii. 315.

 

[FN#34] i.e. we both make different statements equally credible, but without proof, and the case will go against me, because thou art the greater man.

 

[FN#35] Arab. “Irtiy�d”=seeking a place where to stale, soft and sloping, so that the urine spray may not defile the dress. All this in one word!

 

[FN#36] Arab. “Bah�r,” the red buphthalmus sylvester often used for such comparisons. In Algeria it is called ‘Ar�wah: see the Jardin Parfum�, p. 245, note 144.

 

[FN#37] i.e. parties.

 

[FN#38] i.e. amongst men.

 

[FN#39] Almost as neat as “o� sont les neiges d’autan?”

 

[FN#40] Arab. “�d�,” one transgressing, an enemy, a scoundrel.

 

[FN#41] It was probably stuck in the ground like an amphora.

 

[FN#42] i.e. hush up the matter.

 

[FN#43] In Egypt; the former being the Eastern of the Seven Provinces extending to the Pelusium branch, and the latter to the Canobic. The “Bar�ri” or deserts, i.e. grounds not watered by the Nile, lie scattered between the two and both are bounded South by the Kal�b�yah Province and Middle Egypt.

 

[FN#44] i.e. a man ready of wit and immediate of action, as opposed to his name Al-Atwash — one notable for levity of mind.

 

[FN#45] The negative is emphatic, “I certainly saw a Jew,” etc.

 

[FN#46] The “Irish bull” is in the text; justified by—

 

They hand-in-hand, with wand’ring steps and slow Through Eden took their solitary way, [FN#47] As we should say, “There are good pickings to be had out of this job.” Even in the last generation a Jew or a Christian intriguing with an Egyptian or Syrian Moslemah would be offered the choice of death or Al-Islam. The Wali dared not break open the door because he was not sure of his game.

 

[FN#48] The Jew rose seemingly to fetch his valuables and ran away, thus leaving the Wali no proof that he had been there in Moslem law which demands ocular testimony, rejects circumstantial evidence and ignores such partial witnesses as the policeman who accompanied his Chief. This I have before explained.

 

[FN#49] Arab. “Raba’,” lit.=spring-quarters. See Marba’, iii. 79.

 

[FN#50] Arab. “Ni’am,” an exception to the Abb� Sicard’s rule.

“La consonne N est l’expression naturelle du doute chez toutes les nations, par ce que le son que rend la touche nasale, quand l’homme incertain examine s’il fera ce qu’on lui demande; ainsi NE ON, NE OT, NE EC, NE IL, d’o� l’on a fait non, not, nec, nil.

 

[FN#51] For this “Hal�wat al-Mift�h,” or sweetmeat of the key-money, the French denier a Dieu, Old English “God’s penny,”

see vol. vii. 212, and Pilgrimage i. 62.

 

[FN#52] Showing that car. cop. had taken place. Here we find the irregular use of the inn, perpetuated in not a few of the monster hotels throughout Europe.

 

[FN#53] For its rules and right performance see vol. vi. 199.

 

[FN#54] i.e. the “Basil(issa),” mostly a servile name, see vol.

i. 19.

 

[FN#55] Arab. “La’alla,” used to express the hope or expectation of some event of possible occurrence; thus distinguished from “Layta”—Would heaven! utinam! O si! etc.— expressing desire or volition.

 

[FN#56] Arab. “Bal�t,” in Cairo the flat slabs of limestone and sandstone brought from the Turah quarries, which supplied stone for the J�zah Pyramids.

 

[FN#57] Arab. “Y� Mu’arras!” here=O fool and disreputable; see vol. i. 338.

 

[FN#58] These unfortunates in hot climates enjoy nothing so much as throwing off the clothes which burn their feverish skins: see Pilgrimage iii. 385. Hence the boys of Eastern cities, who are perfect imps and flibbertigibbets, always raise the cry “Majn�n”

when they see a man naked whose sanctity does not account for his nudity.

 

[FN#59] Arab. “Daur al-K�‘ah”=the round opening made in the ceiling for light and ventilation.

 

[FN#60] Arab. “La-nakhsifanna” with the emphatic termination called by grammarians “N�n al-taakid”—the N of injunction. Here it is the reduplicated form, the Nun al-Sak�lah or heavy N. The addition of L� (not) e.g. “L� yazrabanna”=let him certainly not strike answers to the intensive or corroborative negative of the Greek effected by two negations or even more. In Arabic as in Latin and English two negatives make an affirmative.

 

[FN#61] Parturition and death in warm climates, especially the damp-hot like Egypt are easy compared with both processes in the temperates of Europe. This is noticed by every traveller. Hence probably Easterns have never studied the artificial Euthanasia which is now appearing in literature. See p. 143 “My Path to Atheism,” by Annie Besant, London: Freethought Publishing Company, 28, Stonecutter Street, E. C., 1877, based upon the Utopia of the highly religious Thomas Moore. Also “Essay on Euthanasia,” by P. D. Williams, Jun., and Mr. Tollemache in the “Nineteenth Century.”

 

[FN#62] i.e. he whose turn it is to sit on the bench outside the police office in readiness for emergencies.

 

[FN#63] Arab. “‘Ud�l” (plur. of ‘�dil), gen. men of good repute, qualified as witnesses in the law court, see vol. iv. 271. It is also used (as below) for the Kazi’s Assessors.

 

[FN#64] About �80.

 

[FN#65] Arab. “Kit�b”=book, written bond. This officiousness of the neighbours is thoroughly justified by Moslem custom; and the same scene would take place in this our day. Like the Hind�‘s, but in a minor degree, the Moslem’s neighbours form a volunteer police which oversees his every action. In the case of the Hind�

this is required by the exigencies of caste, an admirable institution much bedevilled by ignorant Mlenchbas, and if “dynamiting” become the fashion in England, as it threatens to become, we shall be obliged to establish “Vigilance Committees”

which will be as inquisitorial as caste [FN#66] e.g. writing The contract of A. with B., daughter of Such-an-one, etc.

 

[FN#67] Arab. “Hujjat,” which may also mean an excuse.

 

[FN#68] The last clause is supplied by Mr. Payne to stop a gap in the broken text.

 

[FN#69] The text idiotically says “To the King.”

 

[FN#70] In the text “Nahnu”=we, for I, a common vulgarism in Egypt and Syria.

 

[FN#71] This clause has required extensive trimming; the text making the Notary write out the contract (which was already written) in the woman’s house.

 

[FN#72] Arab. “Husn tadb�r”=lit. “beauty of his contrivance.”

Husn, like pulcher, beau and bello, is applied to moral intellectual qualities as well as to physical and material. Hence the {Greek} or old gentleman which in Romaic becomes Calogero, a monk.

 

[FN#73] i.e. that some one told me the following tale.

 

[FN#74] Arab. “Mutawall�”: see vol. i. 259.

 

[FN#75] i.e. his Moslem neighbours.

 

[FN#76] In the text is a fearful confusion of genders.

 

[FN#77] Her object was to sue him for the loss of the pledge and to demand fabulous damages.

 

[FN#78] Arab. “Ya’tamid�na hud�-hum”=purpose the right direction, a skit at the devotees of her age and sex; and an impudent comment upon the Prefect’s address “O she-devil!”

 

[FN#79] The trick has often been played in modern times at fairs, shows, etc. Witness the old joe Miller of the “Moving Multitude.”

 

[FN#80] Apparently meaning the forbidden pleasures of wine and wassail, loose talk and tales of women’s wiles, a favourite subject with the lewder sort of Moslem.

 

[FN#81] i.e. women’s tricks.

 

[FN#82] The “Turkoman” in the text first comes in afterwards.

 

[FN#83] Arab. “K�sid,” the old Anglo-lndian “Cossid”; see vol.

vii. 340.

 

[FN#84] Being a merchant he wore dagger and sword, a safe practice as it deters attack and far better than carrying hidden weapons, derringers and revolvers which, originating in the United States, have now been adopted by the most civilised nations in Europe.

 

[FN#85] I have noted (vol. ii. 186, iv. 175) the easy expiation of perjury amongst Moslems, an ugly blot in their moral code.

 

[FN#86] i.e. Enter in the name of Allah.

 

[FN#87] i.e. Damn your soul for leading me into this danger!

 

[FN#88] Arab. “Saff Kamar�y�t min al-Zuj�j.” The Kamar�yah is derived by Lane (Introd. M.E.) from Kamar=moon; by Baron Von Hammer from Khum�rawayh, second of the Banu-Tul�n dynasty, at the end of the ixth century A.D., when stained glass was introduced into Egypt. N.B.—It must date from many centuries before. The Kamariyah are coloured glass windows about 2 feet high by 18

inches wide, placed in a row along the upper part of the Mashrab�yah or projecting lattice-window, and are formed of small panes of brightly-stained glass set in rims of gypsum-plaster, the whole framed in wood. Here the allusion is to the “Mamrak” or dome-shaped skylight crowning the room. See vol. viii. 156.

 

[FN#89] i.e. easily arrested them.

 

[FN#90] The reader will not forget the half-penitent Captain of Bandits in Gil Blas.

 

[FN#91] Arab. “Abt�l”=champions, athletes, etc., plur. of Batal, a brave: so Batalat=a virago. As the root Batala=it was vain, the form “Batt�l” may mean either a hero or a bad lot: see vol. viii.

335; x. 72,73.

 

[FN#92] Arab. “Fity�n;” plur. of Fat�; see vol. i, 67.

 

[FN#93] This was in popular parlance “adding insult to injury:”

the blackening their faces was a promise of Hell-fire.

 

[FN#94] Arab. “Shayyan li ‘ll�h!” lit.=(Give me some) Thing for (the love of) Allah. The answer in Egypt. is “Allah ya’t�k:”=Allah will give it thee (not I), or, “Yaftah ‘Allah,”=

Allah open (to thee the door of subsistence): in Marocco “Sir f�

h�lik” (pron. Sirf h�k)= Go about thy business. In all cities there is a formula which suffices the asker; but the Ghash�m (Johny Raw) who ignores it, is pestered only the more by his protestations that “he left his purse at home,” etc.

 

[FN#95] i.e. engaged her for a revel and paid her in advance.

 

[FN#96] Arab. “Ras�lah”=a (she) partner, to accompany her on the lute.

 

[FN#97] Suggesting that they are all thieves who had undergone legal mutilation.

 

[FN#98] Arab. “Nuzhat-�:” see vol. ii. 81.

 

[FN#99] Arab. “Muhattak�t;” usually “with torn veils” (fem.

plur.) here “without veils,” metaphor. meaning in disgrace, in dishonour.

 

[FN#100] For this reedy Poa, see vol. ii. 18.

 

[FN#101] I have repeatedly noticed that singing and all music are, in religious parlance, “Makruh,” blameable though not actually damnable; and that the first step after “getting religion” is to forswear them.

 

[FN#102] i.e. to find the