The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, vol 15 - Sir Richard Francis Burton (world best books to read txt) 📗

only instance where in the MS.

the aorist is preceded by the preposition “bi,” a construction now so common in the popular dialects. Strange as it may appear at first sight, it has a deep foundation in the grammatical sentiment, if I may say so, of the Arabic language, which always ascribed a more or less nominal character to the aorist. Hence its inflection by Raf’ (u), Nasb (a) and Jazm (absence of final vowel), corresponding to the nominative, accusative and oblique case of the noun. Moreover in the old language itself already another preposition (“li”) was joined to the aorist. The less surprising, therefore, can it be to find that the use of a preposition in connection with it has so largely increased in the modern idiom, where it serves to mark this semi-nominal character of the aorist, which otherwise would be lost in consequence of the loss of the vowel terminations. This interesting subject deserves a fuller development, but I must reserve it for another opportunity—insh� ‘ll�h!—ST.]

 

[FN#577] [Again “yastanit” = he listened attentively; comp. note p. 24.—ST.]

 

[FN#578] In text “Zarb al-Akl�m.”

 

[FN#579] Vol. iii. 247-261. This violation of the Harem is very common in Egypt.

 

[FN#580] Arab. “Fad�wi,” here again = a blackguard, see Suppl.

vol. iv. 220.

 

[FN#581] The Irishman says, Sleep with both feet in one stocking.

 

[FN#582] Arab. or rather Egypt. “B�b�j,” from “B�b�g,” from the Pers. “Pay-p�sh” = foot-clothing, vulg. “P�p�sh.” To beat with shoe, slipper, or pipe-stick is most insulting; the idea, I believe, being that these articles are not made, like the rod and the whip, for coporal chastisement, and are therefore used by way of slight. We find the phrase “he slippered the merchant” in old diaries, e.g. Sir William Ridges, 1683, Hakluyts, mdccclxxvii.

 

[FN#583] Arab. “Sarm�jah” = sandals, slippers, shoes, esp. those worn by slaves.

 

[FN#584] Suggesting carnal need.

 

[FN#585] The young man being grown up did not live in his father’s house.

 

[FN#586] Arab. “Tartara.” The lexicons give only the sigs.

“chattering” and so forth. Prob. it is an emphatic reduplication of “Tarra” = sprouting, pushing forward.

 

[FN#587] The youth plays upon the bride’s curiosity, a favourite topic in Arab. and all Eastern folklore.

 

[FN#588] There is a confusion in the text easily rectified by the sequel. The facetia suggests the tale of the Schildburgers, who on a fine summer’s day carried the darkness out of the house in their caps and emptied it into the sunshine which they bore to the dark room.

 

[FN#589] A kindly phrase popularly addressed to the returning traveller whether long absent or not.

 

[FN#590] In the text “Ham�kah.”

 

[FN#591] Arab. “Adi” which has occurred before.

 

[FN#592] This “little orgie,” as moderns would call it, strongly suggests the Egyptian origin of the tale.

 

[FN#593] MS. vol. vi. 262-271. Arab. ” ‘Ad�m al-Zauk” which the old Latin dictionaries translate “destitutus experienti�” and “expers desiderii,” and it is = to our deficient in taste, manners, etc. The term is explained in vol. ix. 266. Here it evidently denotes what we call “practical joking,” a dangerous form of fun, as much affected by Egyptians as by the Hibernians.

 

[FN#594] In text “Wak�lah” = an inn: vol. i. 266.

 

[FN#595] ” ‘Ausaj,” for which the dictionaries give only a thorny plant, a bramble.

 

[FN#596] The grand old Eastern or Desert-gate of Cairo: see vol.

vi. 234.

 

[FN#597] Arab. “Thak�lah,” lit. = heaviness, dullness, stupidity.

 

[FN#598] This is a mere shot: the original has “Ba�thar�n.”

 

[FN#599] Arab. “Mayzah” = the large hall with a central fountain for ablution attached to every great Mosque.

 

[FN#600] In the text “Shashmah,” from Pers. “Chashmah” a fountain; applied in Egypt to the small privies with slab and hole; vol. i. 221.

 

[FN#601] [In Ar. “Unsak,” an expression principally used when drinking to one’s health, in which sense it occurs, for instance, in the Bresl. ed. of The Nights, i. 395, 7.-ST.]

 

[FN#602] Arab. “Mut�ti bi zahri-h”: our ancestors’ expression was not polite, but expressive and picturesque.

 

[FN#603] The normal pun: “F�tihah,” fem. of “f�tih” = an opener, a conqueror, is the first Koranic chapter, for which see iv. 36.

 

[FN#604] This appears to be a kind of padding introduced to fill up the Night. The loan of an ass is usually granted gratis in Fellah villages and Badawi camps. See Matth. xxi. 2, 3; Mark xi.

2-6, and Luke xix. 30-34.

 

[FN#605] i.e. O Moslem, opposed to Enemy of Allah = a non-Moslem.

In text Y� ‘Ib�d, plur. for sing.

 

[FN#606] Arab. “Kashshara” = grinned a ghastly smile; it also means laughing so as to show the teeth.

 

[FN#607] This tale follows “The Kazi of Baghdd, his Treacheous Brother and his Virtuous Wife,” which is nothing but a replica o “The Jewish Kazi and his Pious Wife” (vol. v. 256). Scott has translated it, after his fashion, in vol. vi. p. 396-408, and follows it up with “The sultan’s Story of Himself,” which ends his volume as it shall be the conclusion of mine.

 

[FN#608] In text, “Wa yaakhazu ‘l thal�tha arb�’ min m�li-hi wa salbi h�l�-hi.”

 

[FN#609] In text, “La-hu Dir�ah (for “Dir�yah” = prudence) f�

tadb�r� ‘l-Mul�k.”

 

[FN#610] In text, “Al-Sirru ‘l-il�hi,” i.e. the soul, which is “divin� particula aur�.”

 

[FN#611] In text, “Nuw�jiru ‘l-wuk�fat.” [I read “nuw�jiru (for nu�jiru”) ‘l-wuk�f�t,” taking the first word to be a verb corresponding to the preceding, “nab�‘u,” and the second a clerical error for “al-Mauk�f�t.” In this case the meaning would be: “and letting for hire such parts of my property as were inalienable.”—ST.]

 

[FN#612] Here the text has the normal enallage of persons, the third for the first, “the youth” for “I.” I leave it unaltered by way of specimen.

 

[FN#613] In text “‘Ar�s muhall�yah.”

 

[FN#614] He fainted thinking of the responsibilities of whoso should sit thereupon.

 

[FN#615] Here is a third enallage, the King returning to the first person, the oratio directa.

 

[FN#616] i.e. “by Allah;” for “Bi” (the particle proper of swearing) see viii. 310.

 

[FN#617] Here again is a fourth enallage; the scribe continuing the narrative.

 

[FN#618] i.e. well fed, sturdy and bonny.

 

[FN#619] “S�ra l�-hu Shan�n.” [The work in the text, which is exceedingly badly written, looks to me as if it were meant for “Th�niyan” = and he (the youth) became second to him (the Sultan), i.e. his alter ego.—ST.]

 

[FN#620] In text “Yatama’ash min-hu.” [A denominative of the 5th form from “Ma’�sh,” livelihood. It usually has the meaning of “earning one’s living,” but occurs in Makkari’s Life of Ibn al-Khat�b also in the sense of “feeding or glutting upon,”

although applied there not to victuals but to books.—ST.]

 

[FN#621] In text “S�ra yur�sh�-h.” [“Yur�sh�” and “yur�sh�,”

which had occured p. 304, are the 6th form of “rash�, yarsh�” =

he bestowed a gift (principally for the sake of bribery, hence “Rashwah” or “Rishwah” = a bribe), he treated kindly.—ST.]

 

[FN#622] “Markab Maus�kah,” from “Wask” = conceiving, being pregnant, etc.

 

[FN#623] “Mutawassi * al-Wisay�t al-T�mmah.” [“Mutawassi” has been met with before (see p. 303) and “Wis�yah” is the corresponding noun = he charged himself with (took upon himself) her complete charge, i.e. maintnance.—ST.]

 

[FN#624] [In Ar. “khall�-n� nak’ud,” a thoroughly modern expression. It reads like a passage from Spitta Bey’s Contes Arabes Modernes, where such phrases as: “khall�-n� niktib al-Kit�b,” let us write the marriage contract, “ma-ttkhallihsh (for “m� takhall�-hu shay”) yish�fak,” let him not see thee and the like are very frequent.—ST.]

 

[FN#625] “Fi Kashshi ‘l-Markab;” According to custome in the East all the ship’s crew had run on shore about their own business as soon as she cast anchor. This has happened to me on board an Egyptian man-of-war where, on arriving at Suez, I found myself the sum total of the crew.

 

[FN#626] In text, “J�lan ba’da J�l:” the latter word =

revolutions, change of days, tribe, people.

 

[FN#627] The d�noument is a replica of “The Tale of the King who lost kingdom and wife and wealth and Allah restored them to him”

(Suppl. Nights, vol. i. 221). That a Sultan should send his Ministers to keep watch over a ship’s cargo sounds passably ridiculous to a European reader, but a coffee-house audience in the East would have found it perfectly natural. Also, that three men, the Sultan and his sons, should live together for years without knowing anything of one another’s lives seems to us an absurdity; in the case of an Oriental such detail would never strike him even as impossible or even improbable.

 

[FN#628] Between Nights lxviii. and xci. (p. 401) the Nights are not numbered.

 

[FN#629] Here the numeration begins again.

 

[FN#630] In Ouseley he becomes a “King of Greece.”

 

[FN#631] The Arab. is “Ja’idi”: Scott has “Artizans or Sharpers”: Ouseley, “labourers.”

 

[FN#632] Ouseley has “Story of the first foolish Man.”

 

[FN#633] In the Latin Catalogue he is called Agricola, and by Scott the Husbandman.

 

[FN#634] In Ouseley he now becomes a King of Greece.

 

[FN#635] In Ouseley, “Bint-Ameen.”

 

[FN#636] In Arab. “Rujub al-Mutarmakh,” in the Lat. list “insipicus.”

 

[FN#637] In Ouseley “The Tailor, a story told by the Cauzee.”

 

[FN#638] In Scott “The Deformed Jester,” reading “Al-Ahdab” for “Al-Maskharat al-Azib.”

 

[FN#639] In text “Al-Jalab�,” whence Ouseley and Scott’s “Mahummud Julbee.”

 

[FN#640] Further notes illustrative of this and the succeeding volumes will be found in the Bibliography in Volume xvi. I frequently refer to tales by their numbers in the Table (Nights, vol. x., pp. 455-472).

 

[FN#641] Veckenstedt, Mythen, Sagen und Legenden der Zamaiten, ii. pp. 160,162.

 

[FN#642] Compare, too, Mr. Clouston’s “Book of Noodles,” chap.

v., “The Silly Son.”

 

[FN#643] Cf. “An Apology for the Character and Conduct of Shylock,” in a volume of Essays published by a Society of Gentlemen in Exeter (1796), pp. 552-573.

 

[FN#644] This incident shews that the story belongs to the Grateful Beasts’ class, though it is not said that Tiomberombi had conferred any benefit on the rats; it is only implied that he understood their language.

 

[FN#645] Veckenstedt, Mythen, Sagen und Legenden der Zamaiten, i.

pp. 163-166.

 

End of the Project Gutenberg Etext of Supplemental Nights, Volume 15 by Sir Richard F. Burton.