AUTHOR OF “POPULAR TALES AND FICTIONS: THEIR MIGRATIONS AND
TRANSFORMATIONS,” ETC.
_THE SLEEPER AND THE WAKER.—Vol. I. p. 1._
Few of the stories in the “Arabian Nights” which charmed our marvelling
boyhood were greater favourites than this one, under the title of “Abou
Hassan; or, the Sleeper Awakened.” What recked we in those days whence
it was derived?—the _story_—the story was the thing! As Sir R. F. Burton
observes in his first note, this is “the only one of the eleven added by
Galland, whose original has been discovered in Arabic;”[484] and it is
probable that Galland heard it recited in a coffee-house during his
residence in Constantinople. The plot of the Introduction to
Shakspeare’s comedy of “The Taming of the Shrew” is similar to the
adventure of Abú al-Hasan the Wag, and is generally believed to have
been adapted from a story entitled “The Waking Man’s Fortune” in
Edward’s collection of comic tales, 1570, which were retold somewhat
differently in Goulart’s “Admirable and Memorable Histories,” 1607; both
versions are reprinted in Mr. Hazlitt’s “Shakspeare Library,” vol. iv.,
part 1, pp. 403–414. In Percy’s “Reliques of Ancient English Poetry” we
find the adventure told in a ballad entitled “The Frolicksome Duke; or,
the Tinker’s Good Fortune,” from the Pepys collection: “whether it may
be thought to have suggested the hint to Shakspeare or is not rather of
later date,” says Percy, “the reader must determine”:
Now as fame does report, a young duke keeps a court,
One that pleases his fancy with frolicksome sport:
But amongst all the rest, here is one, I protest,
Which will make you to smile when you hear the true jest:
A poor tinker he found lying drunk on the ground,
As secure in a sleep as if laid in a swownd.
The duke said to his men, William, Richard, and Ben,
Take him home to my palace, we’ll sport with him then.
O’er a horse he was laid, and with care soon convey’d
To the palace, altho’ he was poorly arrai’d;
Then they stript off his cloaths, both his shirt, shoes, and hose,
And they put him in bed for to take his repose.
Having pull’d off his shirt, which was all over durt,
They did give him clean holland, this was no great hurt:
On a bed of soft down, like a lord of renown,
They did lay him to sleep the drink out of his crown.
In the morning when day, then admiring[485] he lay,
For to see the rich chamber both gaudy and gay.
Now he lay something late, in his rich bed of state,
Till at last knights and squires they on him did wait;
And the chamberling bare, then did likewise declare,
He desired to know what apparel he’d ware:
The poor tinker amaz’d, on the gentleman gaz’d,
And admired how he to this honour was rais’d.
Tho’ he seem’d something mute, yet he chose a rich suit,
Which he straitways put on without longer dispute;
With a star on his side, which the tinker offt ey’d,
And it seem’d for to swell him no little with pride;
For he said to himself, Where is Joan my sweet wife?
Sure she never did see me so fine in her life.
From a convenient place, the right duke his good grace
Did observe his behaviour in every case.
To a garden of state, on the tinker they wait,
Trumpets sounding before him: thought he this is great:
Where an hour or two, pleasant walks he did view,
With commanders and squires in scarlet and blew.
A fine dinner was drest, both for him and his guests,
He was placed at the table above all the rest,
In a rich chair, or bed, lin’d with fine crimson red,
With a rich golden canopy over his head:
As he sat at his meat, the musick play’d sweet,
With the choicest of singing his joys to compleat.
While the tinker did dine, he had plenty of wine.
Rich canary with sherry and tent superfine,
Like a right honest soul, faith, he took off his bowl,
Till at last he began for to tumble and roul
From his chair to the floor, where he sleeping did snore,
Being seven times drunker than ever before.
Then the duke did ordain, they should strip him amain,
And restore him his old leather garments again:
’Twas a point next the worst, yet perform it they must,
And they carry’d him strait, where they found him at first;
Then he slept all the night, as indeed well he might,
But when he did waken, his joys took their flight.
For his glory to him so pleasant did seem,
That he thought it to be but a meer golden dream;
Till at length he was brought to the duke, where he sought
For a pardon as fearing he had set him at nought;
But his highness he said, Thou’rt a jolly bold blade,
Such a frolick before I think never was plaid.
Then his highness bespoke him a new suit and cloak,
Which he gave for the sake of this frolicksome joak;
Nay, and five hundred pound, with ten acres of ground,
Thou shalt never, said he, range the counteries round,
Crying old brass to mend, for I’ll be thy good friend,
Nay, and Joan thy sweet wife shall my duchess attend.
Then the tinker reply’d, What! must Joan my sweet bride
Be a lady in chariots of pleasure to ride?
Must we have gold and land ev’ry day at command?
Then I shall be a squire I well understand:
Well I thank your good grace, and your love I embrace,
I was never before in so happy a case.
The same story is also cited in the “Anatomy of Melancholy,” part 2,
sec. 2, memb. 4, from Ludovicus Vives in Epist.[486] and Pont. Heuter in
Rerum Burgund., as follows:
“It is reported of Philippus Bonus, that good Duke of Burgundy, that the
said duke, at the marriage of Eleonora, sister to the King of Portugal,
at Bruges in Flanders, which was solemnized in the deep of winter, when
as by reason of the unseasonable (!) weather he could neither hawk nor
hunt, and was now tyred with cards, dice, &c., and such other domestical
sports, or to see ladies dance, with some of his courtiers, he would in
the evening walk disguised all about the town. It so fortuned as he was
walking late one night, he found a country fellow dead drunk, snorting
on a bulk; he caused his followers to bring him to his palace, and there
stripping him of his old clothes, and attiring him after the court
fashion, when he waked, he and they were all ready to attend upon his
excellency, persuading him that he was some great duke. The poor fellow,
admiring how he came there, was served in state all the day long; after
supper he saw them dance, heard musick, and the rest of those court-like
pleasures; but late at night, when he was well tipled, and again fast
asleep they put on his old robes, and so conveyed him to the place where
they first found him. Now the fellow had not made them so good sport the
day before, as he did when he returned to himself; all the jest was to
see how he looked upon it. In conclusion, after some little admiration,
the poor man told his friends he had seen a vision, constantly beleeved
it, would not otherwise be perswaded; and so the jest ended.”
I do not think that this is a story imported from the East: the
adventure is just as likely to have happened in Bruges as in Baghdád;
but the exquisite humour of the Arabian tale is wanting—even
Shakspeare’s Christopher Sly is not to be compared with honest Abú
al-Hasan the Wag.
* * * * *
This story of The Sleeper and the Waker recalls the similar device
practised by the Chief of the Assassins—that formidable, murderous
association, the terror of the Crusaders—on promising novices. Von
Hammer, in his “History of the Assassins,” end of Book iv., gives a
graphic description of the charming gardens into which the novices were
carried while insensible from hashish:
In the centre of the Persian as well as of the Assyrian territory of the
Assassins, that is to say, both at Alamut and Massiat, were situated, in
a space surrounded by walls, splendid gardens—true Eastern paradises.
There were flower-beds and thickets of fruit-trees, intersected by
canals, shady walks, and verdant glades, where the sparkling stream
bubbled at every step; bowers of roses and vineyards; luxurious halls
and porcelain kiosks, adorned with Persian carpets and Grecian stuffs,
where drinking-vessels of gold, silver, and crystal glittered on trays
of the same costly materials; charming maidens and handsome boys of
Muhammed’s Paradise, soft as the cushions on which they reposed, and
intoxicating as the wine which they presented. The music of the harp was
mingled with the songs of birds, and the melodious tones of the
songstress harmonized with the murmur of the brooks. Everything breathed
pleasure, rapture, and sensuality. A youth, who was deemed worthy by his
strength and resolution to be initiated into the Assassin service, was
invited to the table and conversation of the grand master, or grand
prior, he was then intoxicated with hashish and carried into the garden,
which on awaking he believed to be Paradise; everything around him, the
houris in particular, contributing to confirm the delusion. After he had
experienced as much of the pleasures of Paradise, which the Prophet has
promised to the faithful, as his strength would admit; after quaffing
enervating delight from the eyes of the houris and intoxicating wine
from the glittering goblets; he sank into the lethargy produced by
debility and the opiate, on awakening from which, after a few hours, he
again found himself by the side of his superior. The latter endeavoured
to convince him that corporeally he had not left his side, but that
spiritually he had been wrapped into Paradise and had there enjoyed a
foretaste of the bliss which awaits the faithful who devote their lives
to the service of the faith and the obedience of their chiefs.
_THE TEN WAZIRS; OR, THE HISTORY OF KING ÁZÁDBAKHT AND HIS SON.—Vol. I.
p. 55._
The precise date of the Persian original of this romance (“Bakhtyár
Náma”) has not been ascertained, but it was probably composed before the
beginning of the fifteenth century, since there exists in the Bodleian
Library a unique Turkí version, in the Uygur language and characters,
which was written in 1434. Only three of the tales have hitherto been
found in other Asiatic story-books. The Turkí version, according to M.
Jaubert, who gives an account of the MS. and a translation of one of the
tales in the _Journal Asiatique_, tome x. 1827, is characterised by
“great sobriety of ornament and extreme simplicity of style, and the
evident intention on the part of the translator to suppress all that may
not have appeared to him sufficiently probable, and all that might
justly be taxed with exaggeration;” and he adds that “apart from the
interest which the writing and phraseology of the work may possess for
those who study the history of languages, it is rather curious to see
how a Tátár translator sets to work to bring within the range of his
readers stories embellished in the original with descriptions and images
familiar, doubtless, to a learned and refined nation like the Persians,
but foreign to shepherds.”
At least three different versions are known to the Malays—different in
the frame, or leading story, if not in the subordinate tales. One of
those is described in the second volume of Newbold’s work on Malacca,
the frame of which is similar to the Persian original and its Arabian
derivative, excepting that the name of the king is Zádbokhtin and that
of the minister’s daughter (who is nameless in the Persian) is Mahrwat.
Two others are described in Van den Berg’s account of Malay, Arabic,
Javanese and other MSS. published at Batavia, 1877; p. 21, No. 132 is
entitled “The History of Ghulám, son of Zádbukhtán, King of Adán, in
Persia,” and the frame also corresponds with our version, with the
important difference that the robber-chief who had brought up Ghulám,
“learning that he had become a person of consequence, came to his
residence to visit him, but finding him imprisoned, he was much
concerned, and asked the king’s pardon on his behalf, telling him at the
same time how he had formerly found Ghulám in the jungle; from which the
king knew that Ghulám was his son.” The second version noticed by Van
den Berg (p. 32, No. 179), though similar in title to the Persian
original, “History of Prince Bakhtyár,” differs very materially in the
leading story, the outline of which is as follows: “This prince, when
his father was put to flight by a younger brother, who wished to
dethrone him, was born in a jungle, and abandoned by his parents. A
merchant named Idrís took charge of him and brought him up. Later on he
became one of the officers of state with his own father, who had in the
meanwhile found another kingdom, and decided with fairness, the cases
brought before him. He was, however, put in prison, on account of a
supposed attempt on the king’s life, and would have been put to death
had he not stayed the execution by telling various beautiful stories.
Even the king came repeatedly to listen to him. At one of these visits
Bakhtyár’s foster-father Idrís was present, and related to his adopted
son how he had found him in the jungle. The king, on hearing this,
perceived that it was his son who had been brought up by Idrís,
recognised Bakhtyár as such, and made over to him the kingdom.”—I have
little doubt that this romance is of Indian extraction.
_STORY OF KING DADBIN AND HIS WAZIRS. Vol. I. p. 94._
THIS agrees pretty closely with the Turkí version of the same story
(rendered into French by M. Jaubert), though in the latter the names of
the characters are the same as in the Persian, King Dádín and the Wazírs
Kámgár and Kárdár. In the Persian story, the damsel is tied hands and
feet and placed upon a camel, which is then turned into a dreary
wilderness. “Here she suffered from the intense heat and from thirst;
but she resigned herself to the will of Providence, conscious of her own
innocence. Just then the camel lay down, and on the spot a fountain of
delicious water suddenly sprang forth; the cords which bound her hands
and feet dropped off; she refreshed herself by a draught of the water,
and fervently returned thanks to Heaven for this blessing and her
wonderful preservation.” This two-fold miracle does not appear in the
Turkí and Arabian versions. It is not the cameleer of the King of
Persia, but of King Dádín, who meets with the pious damsel in the
wilderness. He takes her to his own house and one day relates his
adventure to King Dádín, who expresses a wish to see such a prodigy of
sanctity. The conclusion of the Persian story is quite dramatic: The
cameleer, having consented, returned at once to his house, accompanied
by the king, who waited at the door of the apartment where the daughter
of Kámgár was engaged in prayer. When she had concluded he approached,
and with astonishment recognised her. Having tenderly embraced her, he
wept, and entreated her forgiveness. This she readily granted, but
begged that he would conceal himself in the apartment while she should
converse with Kárdár, whom she sent for. When he arrived, and beheld her
with a thousand expressions of fondness, he inquired how she had
escaped, and told her that on the day the king banished her into the
wilderness, he had sent people to seek her and bring her to him. “How
much better would it have been,” he added, “had you followed my advice,
and agreed to my proposal of poisoning the king, who, I said, would one
day destroy you as he had done your father! But you rejected my advice,
and declared yourself ready to submit to whatever Providence should
decree. Hereafter you will pay more attention to my words. But now let
us not think of what is past. I am your slave, and you are dearer to me
than my own eyes.” So saying, he attempted to clasp the daughter of
Kámgár in his arms, when the king, who was concealed behind the
hangings, rushed furiously on him and put him to death. After this he
conducted the damsel to his palace, and constantly lamented his
precipitancy in having killed her father.—This tale seems to have been
taken from the Persian “Tútí Náma,” or Parrot-book, composed by
Nakhshabí about the year 1306;[487] it occurs in the 51st Night of the
India Office MS. 2573, under the title of “Story of the Daughter of the
Vazír Khássa, and how she found safety through the blessing of her
piety:” the name of the king is Bahram, and the Wazírs are called Khássa
and Khalássa.
_STORY OF AYLAN SHAH AND ABU TAMMÁM.—Vol I. p. 112._
The catastrophe of this story forms the subject of the Lady’s 37th tale
in the text of the Turkish “Forty Vezírs,” translated by Mr. E. J. W.
Gibb. This is how it goes:
In the palace of the world there was a king, and that king had three
vezírs, but there was rivalry between them. Two of them day and night
incited the king against the third, saying, “He is a traitor.” But the
king believed them not. At length they promised two pages much gold, and
instructed them thus: “When the king has lain down, ere he yet fall
asleep, do ye feign to think him asleep, and while talking with each
other, say at a fitting time, ‘I have heard from such a one that yon
vezír says this and that concerning the king, and that he hates him;
many people say that vezír is an enemy to our king.’” So they did this,
and when the king heard them, he said in his heart, “What those vezírs
said is then true; when the very pages have heard somewhat it must
indeed have some foundation. Till now, I believed not those vezírs, but
it is then true.” And the king executed that vezír. The other vezírs
were glad and gave the pages the gold they had promised. So they took it
and went to a private place, and while they were dividing it one of them
said, “I spake first; I want more.” The other said, “If I had not said
he was an enemy to our king, the king would not have killed him; I shall
take more.” And while they were quarrelling with one another the king
passed by there, and he listened attentively to their words, and when he
learned of the matter, he said, “Dost thou see, they have by a trick
made us kill that hapless vezír.” And he was repentant.
_STORY OF KING SULAYMAN SHAH AND HIS NIECE.
Vol. I. p. 131._
The Persian original has been very considerably amplified by the Arabian
translator. In the “Bakhtyár Náma” there is not a word about the two
brothers and their fair cousin, the attempted murder of the infant, and
the adventures of the fugitive young prince. This story has also been
taken from the “Tútí Náma” of Nakhshabí, Night the 50th of the India
Office MS. 2573, where, under the title of “Story of the Daughter of the
Kaysar of Roum, and her trouble by reason of her son,” it is told
somewhat as follows:
In former times there was a great king, whose army was numerous and
whose treasury was full to overflowing; but, having no enemy to contend
with, he neglected to pay his soldiers, in consequence of which they
were in a state of destitution and discontent. At length one day the
soldiers went to the prime minister and made their condition known to
him. The vazír promised that he would speedily devise a plan by which
they should have employment and money. Next morning he presented himself
before the king, and said that it was widely reported the Kaysar of Roum
had a daughter unsurpassed for beauty—one who was fit only for such a
great monarch as his Majesty; and suggested that it would be
advantageous if an alliance were formed between two such great
potentates. The notion pleased the king well, and he forthwith
despatched to Roum an ambassador with rich gifts, and requested the
Kaysar to grant him his daughter in marriage. But the Kaysar waxed wroth
at this, and refused to give his daughter to the king. When the
ambassador returned thus unsuccessful, the king, enraged at being made
of no account, resolved to make war upon the Kaysar; so, opening the
doors of his treasury, he distributed much money among his troops, and
then, “with a woe-bringing host, and a blood-drinking army, he trampled
Roum and the folk of Roum in the dust.” And when the Kaysar was become
powerless, he sent his daughter to the king, who married her according
to the law of Islam.
Now that princess had a son by a former husband, and the Kaysar had said
to her before she departed, “Beware that thou mention not thy son, for
my love for his society is great, and I cannot part with him.”[488] But
the princess was sick at heart for the absence of her son, and she was
ever pondering how she should speak to the king about him, and in what
manner she might contrive to bring him to her. It happened one day the
king gave her a string of pearls and a casket of jewels. She said, “With
my father is a slave who is well skilled in the science of jewels.” The
king replied, “If I should ask that slave of thy father, would he give
him to me?” “Nay,” said she, “for he holds him in the place of a son.
But if the king desire him, I will send a merchant to Roum, and I myself
will give him a token, and with pleasant wiles and fair speeches will
bring him hither.” Then the king sent for a clever merchant who knew
Arabic eloquently and the language of Roum, and gave him goods for
trading, and sent him to Roum with the object of procuring that slave.
But the daughter of the Kaysar said privily to the merchant, “That slave
is my son; I have, for a good reason, said to the king that he is a
slave; so thou must bring him as a slave, and let it be thy duty to take
care of him.” In due course the merchant brought the youth to the king’s
service; and when the king saw his fair face, and discovered in him many
pleasing and varied accomplishments, he treated him with distinction and
favour, and conferred on the merchant a robe of honour and gifts. His
mother saw him from afar, and was pleased with receiving a secret
salutation from him.
One day the king had gone to the chase, and the palace remained void of
rivals; so the mother called in her son, kissed his fair face, and told
him the tale of her great sorrow. A chamberlain became aware of the
secret, and another suspicion fell upon him, and he said to himself,
“The harem of the king is the sanctuary of security and the palace of
protection. If I speak not of this, I shall be guilty of treachery and
shall have wrought unfaithfulness.” When the king returned from the
chase, the chamberlain related to him what he had seen, and the king was
angry and said, “This woman hath deceived me with words and deeds, and
has brought hither her desire by craft and cunning. This conjecture must
be true, else why did she play such a trick? And why did she hatch such
a plot? And why did she send the merchant?” Then the king, enraged, went
into the harem, and the queen saw from his countenance that the
occurrence of the night before had become known to him, and she said,
“Be it not that I see the king angry?” He said, “How should I not be
angry? Thou, by craft, and trickery, and intrigue, and plotting, hast
brought thy desire from Roum—what wantonness is this that thou hast
done?” And then he thought to slay her, but he forebore, because of his
great love for her. But he ordered the chamberlain to carry the youth to
some obscure place, and straightway sever his head from his body. When
the poor mother saw this, she well-nigh fell on her face, and her soul
was near leaving her body. But she knew that sorrow would not avail, and
so she restrained herself.
And when the chamberlain took the youth into his own house, he said to
him, “O youth, knowest thou not that the harem of the king is the
sanctuary of security? What great treachery is this that thou hast
perpetrated?” The youth replied, “That queen is my mother, and I am her
true son. Because of her natural delicacy, she said not to the king that
she had a son by another husband. And when yearning came over her, she
contrived to bring me here from Roum; and while the king was engaged in
the chase, maternal love stirred in her, and she called me to her and
embraced me.” On hearing this, the chamberlain said to himself, “What is
passing in his mother’s breast? What I have not done I can yet do, and
it were better that I preserve this youth some days, for such a rose may
not be wounded through idle words, and such a bough may not be broken by
a breath. For some day the truth of the matter will be disclosed, and it
will become known to the king when repentance may be of no avail.” So he
went before the king and said, “That which was commanded have I
fulfilled.” On hearing this the king’s wrath was to some extent removed,
but his trust in the Kaysar’s daughter was departed; while she, poor
creature, was grieved and dazed at the loss of her son.
Now in the palace-harem there was an old woman, who said to the queen,
“How is it that I find thee sorrowful?” And the queen told the whole
story, concealing nothing. This old woman was a heroine in the field of
craft, and she answered, “Keep thy mind at ease; I will devise a
stratagem by which the heart of the king will be pleased with thee, and
every grief he has will vanish from his heart.” The queen said that, if
she did so, she should be amply rewarded. One day the old woman, seeing
the king alone, said to him, “Why is thy former aspect altered? And why
are traces of care and anxiety visible on thy countenance?” The king
then told her all. Then said the old woman, “I have an amulet of the
charms of Sulayman, in the Syriac language, and in the writing of the
jinn (genii). When the queen is asleep, do thou place it on her breast,
and whatever it may be, she will tell the truth of it. But take care,
fall not thou asleep, but listen well to what she says.” The king
wondered at this and said, “Give me that amulet, that the truth of this
matter may be learned.” So the old woman gave him the amulet, and then
went to the queen and explained what she had done, and said, “Do thou
feign to be asleep, and relate the whole of thy story faithfully.”
When a watch of the night was past, the king laid the amulet upon his
wife’s breast, and she thus began: “By a former husband I had a son, and
when my father gave me to this king, I was ashamed to say I had a tall
son. When my yearning passed all bounds, I brought him here by an
artifice. One day that the king was gone to the chase I called him into
the house, when, after the way of mothers, I took him in my arms and
kissed him. This reached the king’s ears; he unwittingly gave it another
construction, and cut off the head of that innocent boy, and withdrew
from me his own heart. Alike is my son lost to me and the king angry.”
When the king heard these words he kissed her and exclaimed, “O my life,
what an error is this thou hast committed! Thou hast brought calumny
upon thyself, and hast given such a son to the winds, and hast made me
ashamed!” Straightway he called the chamberlain, and said, “That boy
whom thou hast killed is the son of my beloved and the darling of my
beauty! Where is his grave, that we may make there a guest-house?” The
chamberlain said, “That youth is yet alive. When the king commanded his
death, I was about to kill him, but he said, ‘That queen is my mother.
Through modesty before the king, she revealed not the secret that she
has a tall son. Kill me not; it may be that some day the truth will
become known, and repentance profiteth not, and regret is useless.’” The
king commanded them to bring the youth; so they brought him forthwith.
And when the mother saw the face of her son, she thanked God and praised
the Most High, and became one of the Muslims, and from the sect of
unbelievers came into the faith of Islam. And the king favoured the
chamberlain in the highest degree, and they passed the rest of their
lives in comfort and ease.
_FIRUZ AND HIS WIFE.—Vol. I. p. 185._
This tale, as Sir R. F. Burton remarks, is a rechauffé of that of the
King and the Wazír’s Wife in the “Malice of Women,” or the Seven Wazírs
(vol. vi. 129); and at p. 308 we have yet another variant.[489] It
occurs in all the Eastern texts of the Book of Sindibád, and it is
commonly termed by students of that cycle of stories “The Lion’s Track,”
from the parabolical manner in which the husband justifies his conduct
before the king. I have cited some versions in the Appendix to my
edition of the Book of Sindibád (p. 256 ff.), and to these may be added
the following Venetian variant, from Crane’s “Italian Popular Tales,” as
an example of how a story becomes garbled in passing orally from one
generation unto another generation:
A king, averse from marriage, commanded his steward to remain single.
The latter, however, one day saw a beautiful girl named Vigna and
married her secretly. Although he kept her closely confined in her
chamber, the king became suspicious, and sent the steward on an embassy.
After his departure the king entered the apartment occupied by him, and
saw his wife asleep. He did not disturb her, but in leaving the room
accidentally dropped one of his gloves on the bed. When the husband
returned he found the glove, but kept a discreet silence, ceasing,
however, all demonstration of affection, believing his wife had been
unfaithful. The king, desirous to see again the beautiful woman, made a
feast and ordered the steward to bring his wife. He denied that he had
one, but brought her at last, and while every one else was talking gaily
at the feast she was silent. The king observed it, and asked the cause
of her silence, and she answered with a pun on her own name, “Vineyard I
was, and Vineyard I am. I was loved and no longer am. I know not for
what reason the Vineyard has lost its season.” Her husband, who heard
this, replied, “Vineyard thou wast, and Vineyard thou art: the Vineyard
lost its season, for the lion’s claw.” The king, who understood what he
meant, answered, “I entered the Vineyard; I touched the leaves; but I
swear by my crown that I have not tasted the fruit.” Then the steward
understood that his wife was innocent, and the two made peace, and
always after lived happy and contented.
* * * * *
So far as I am aware, this tale of “The Lion’s Track” is not popularly
known in any European country besides Italy; and it is not found in any
of the Western versions of the Book of Sindibád, generally known under
the title of the “History of the Seven Wise Masters;” how, then, did it
reach Venice, and become among the people “familiar in their mouths as
household words?” I answer, that the intimate commercial relations which
long existed between the Venetian Republic and Egypt and Syria are amply
sufficient to account for the currency of this and scores of other
Eastern tales in Italy. This is not one of those fictions introduced
into the south of Europe through the Ottomans, since Boccaccio has made
use of the first part of it in his “Decameron,” Day I. nov. 5; and it is
curious to observe that the garbled Venetian popular version has
preserved the chief characteristic of the Eastern story—the allegorical
reference to the king as a lion and his assuring the husband that the
lion had done no injury to his “Vineyard.”
_KING SHAH BAKHT AND HIS WAZIR AL-RAHWAN. Vol. I. p. 191._
While the frame-story of this interesting group is similar to that of
the Ten Wazírs (vol. i. p. 55), insomuch as in both a king’s favourite
is sentenced to death in consequence of the false accusations of his
enemies, and obtains a respite from day to day by relating stories to
the king, there is yet a very important difference: Like those of the
renowned Shahrazád, the stories which Al-Rahwan tells have no
particular, at least no uniform, “purpose,” his sole object being to
prolong his life by telling the king an entertaining story, promising,
when he has ended his recital, to relate one still “stranger” the next
night, if the king will spare his life another day. On the other hand,
Bakhtyár, while actuated by the same motive, appeals to the king’s
reason, by relating stories distinctly designed to exhibit the evils of
hasty judgments and precipitate conduct—in fact, to illustrate the
maxim,
Each order given by a reigning king,
Should after long reflection be expressed;
For it may be that endless woe will spring
From a command he paused not to digest.
And in this respect they are consistent with the circumstances of the
case, like the tales of the Book of Sindibád, from which the frame of
the Ten Wazírs was imitated, and in which the Wazírs relate stories
showing the depravity and profligacy of women and that no reliance
should be placed on their unsupported assertions, and to these the lady
opposes equally cogent stories setting forth the wickedness and perfidy
of men. Closely resembling the frame-story of the Ten Wazírs, however,
is that of a Tamil romance entitled “Alakeswara Kathá,” a copy of which,
written on palm leaves, was in the celebrated Mackenzie collection, of
which Dr. H. H. Wilson published a descriptive catalogue; it is “a story
of the Rájá of Alakepura and his four ministers, who, being falsely
accused of violating the sanctity of the inner apartments, vindicate
their innocence and disarm the king’s wrath by relating a number of
stories.” Judging by the specimen given by Wilson, the well-known tale
of the Lost Camel, it seems probable that the ministers’ stories, like
those of Bakhtyár, are suited to their own case and illustrate the truth
of the adage that “appearances are often deceptive.” Whether in the
Siamese collection “Nonthuk Pakkaranam” (referred to in vol. i. p. 191)
the stories related by the Princess Kankras to the King of Pataliput
(Palibothra), to save her father’s life, are similarly designed, does
not appear from Benfey’s notice of the work in his paper in “Orient und
Occident,” iii. 171 ff. He says that the title of the book, “Nonthuk
Pakkaranam,” is taken from the name of a wise ox, Nonthuk, that plays
the principal part in the longest of the tales, which are all apparently
translated from the Sanskrit, in which language the title would be
Nandaka Prakaranam, the History of Nandaka.
Most of the tales related by the wazír Al-Rahwan are not only in
themselves entertaining, but are of very considerable importance from
the story-comparer’s point of view, since in this group occur Eastern
forms of tales which were known in Italy in the 14th century, and some
had spread over Europe even earlier. The reader will have seen from Sir
R. F. Burton’s notes that not a few of the stories have their parallels
or analogues in countries far apart, and it is interesting to find four
of them which properly belong to the Eastern texts of the Book of
Sindibad, with the frame-story of which that of this group has so close
an affinity.
_THE ART OF ENLARGING PEARLS.—Vol. I. p. 197._
“Quoth she, I have a bangle; sell it and buy seed pearls with the price;
then round them and fashion them into great pearls.”
For want of a more suitable place, I shall here reproduce an account of
the “Method of making false pearls” (nothing else being meant in the
above passage), cited, from Postl. Com. Dict., in vol. xxvi. of “Rees’
Cyclopædia,” London, 1819:
“Take of thrice distilled vinegar two pounds, Venice turpentine one
pound, mix them together into a mass and put them into a cucurbit, fit a
head and receiver to it, and after you have luted the joints set it when
dry on a sand furnace, to distil the vinegar from it; do not give it too
much heat, lest the stuff swell up. After this put the vinegar into
another glass cucurbit in which there is a quantity of seed pearls
wrapped in a piece of thin silk, but so as not to touch the vinegar; put
a cover or head upon the cucurbit, lute it well and put it in bal.
Mariæ, where you may let it remain a fortnight. The heat of the balneum
will raise the fumes of the vinegar, and they will soften the pearls in
the silk and bring them to the consistence of a paste, which being done,
take them out and mould them to what bigness, form, and shape you
please. Your mould must be of fine silver, the inside gilt; you must
also refrain from touching the paste with your fingers, but use
silver-gilt utensils, with which fill your moulds. When they are
moulded, bore them through with a hog’s bristle or gold wire, and then
thread them again on gold wire, and put them into a glass, close it up,
and set them in the sun to dry. After they are thoroughly dry, put them
in a glass matrass into a stream of running water and leave them there
twenty days; by that time they will contract the natural hardness and
solidity of pearls. Then take them out of the matrass and hang them in
mercurial water, where they will moisten, swell, and assume their
Oriental beauty; after which shift them into a matrass hermetically
closed to prevent any water coming to them, and let it down into a well,
to continue there about eight days. Then draw the matrass up, and in
opening it you will find pearls exactly resembling Oriental ones.” (Here
follows a _recipe_ for making the mercurial water used in the process,
with which I need not occupy more space.)
A similar formula, “To make of small pearls a necklace of large ones,”
is given in the “Lady’s Magazine” for 1831, vol. iv., p. 119, which is
said to be extracted from a scarce old book. Thus, whatever mystery may
surround the art in Asiatic countries there is evidently none about it
in Europe. The process appears to be somewhat tedious and complicated,
but is doubtless profitable.
In Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius there is a curious passage about
pearl-making which has been generally considered as a mere “traveller’s
tale”: Apollonius relates that the inhabitants of the shores of the Red
Sea, after having calmed the water by means of oil, dived after the
shell-fish, enticed them with some bait to open their shells, and having
pricked the animals with a sharp-pointed instrument, received the liquor
that flowed from them in small holes made in an iron vessel, in which it
hardened into real pearls.—It is stated by several reputable writers
that the Chinese do likewise at the present day. And Sir R. F. Burton
informs me that when he was on the coast of Midian he found the Arabs
were in the habit of “growing” pearls by inserting a grain of sand into
the shells.
_THE SINGER AND THE DRUGGIST—Vol. I. p. 203._
The diverting adventures related in the first part of this tale should
be of peculiar interest to the student of Shakspeare as well as to those
engaged in tracing the genealogy of popular fictions. Jonathan Scott has
given—for reasons of his own—a meagre abstract of a similar tale which
occurs in the “Bahár-i-Dánish” (vol. iii. App., p. 291), as follows: