to meet, and agreed to be friends. But as Injustice brought many people
into trouble, Truth declared that she would have no more to do with her,
upon which Injustice grew angry, and put out the eyes of Truth. Truth
wandered about for a long time at random, and at last she came to a
walnut-tree, and climbed up it to rest awhile in safety from wild
beasts. During the night a wolf and a mouse came to the foot of the
tree, and held the following conversation. The wolf began, “I am very
comfortable in the land where I am now living, for there are so many
blind people there that I can steal almost any animal I like without
anybody seeing me. If the blind men knew that they had only to rub their
eyes with the moss which grows on the stones here in order to recover
their sight, I should soon get on badly with them.”
The mouse responded, “I live in a district where the people have no
water, and are obliged to fetch it from a great distance. When they are
away from home I can enjoy as much of their provisions as I like;
indeed, I can heap together as large a store as I please without being
disturbed. If the people knew that they had only to cut down a great oak
tree, and a great lime tree which grow near their houses, in order to
find water, I should soon be badly off.”
As soon as the wolf and the mouse were gone, Truth came down from her
tree, and groped about until she found a moss-covered stone, when she
rubbed her eyes with the moss. She recovered her sight immediately, and
then went her way till she came to the country where most of the people
where blind. Truth demanded that the blind people should pay her a fixed
sum of money, when she would tell them of a remedy by which they could
recover their sight. The blind men gave her the money, and Truth
supplied them with the remedy which had cured herself.
After this, Truth proceeded further till she came to the district where
the people had no water. She told them that if they would give her a
carriage and horses, she would tell them where to find water. The people
were glad to agree to her proposal.
When Truth had received the carriage and horses, she showed the people
the oak and the lime tree, which they felled by her directions, when
water immediately flowed from under the roots in great abundance.
As Truth drove away she met Injustice, who had fallen into poverty, and
was wandering from one country to another in rags. Truth knew her
immediately, and asked her to take a seat in her carriage. Injustice
then recognised her, and asked her how she had received the light of her
eyes, and how she had come by such a fine carriage. Truth told her
everything, including what she had heard from the wolf and the mouse.
Injustice then persuaded her to put out her eyes, for she wanted to be
rich, and to have a fine carriage too; and then Truth told her to
descend. Truth herself drove away, and seldom shows herself to men.
Injustice wandered about the country till she found the walnut tree, up
which she climbed. When evening came, the wolf and the mouse met under
the tree again to talk. Both were now in trouble, for the wolf could not
steal an animal without being seen and pursued by the people, and the
mouse could no longer eat meat or collect stores without being
disturbed, for the people were no longer obliged to leave their home for
a long time to fetch water. Both the wolf and the mouse suspected that
some one had overheard their late conversation, so they looked up in
search of the listener, and discovered Injustice in the tree. The
animals supposed that it was she who had betrayed them, and said in
anger, “May our curse be upon you that you may remain for ever blind,
for you have deprived us of our means of living.”
After thus speaking, the animals ran away, but Injustice has ever since
remained blind, and does harm to everybody who chances to come in her
way.
_II.—NOTES ON THE STORIES CONTAINED IN VOL. V. OF “SUPPLEMENTAL
NIGHTS.”_
BY W. F. KIRBY.
_HISTORY OF THE KINGS SON OF SIND AND THE LADY FATIMAH (pp. 1–18)._
P. 5.—This mixture of seeds, &c., is a very common incident in
folk-tales.
P. 10.—Compare the well-known incident in John xviii. 1–11, which
passage, by the way, is considered to be an interpolation taken from the
lost Gospel of the Hebrews.
_HISTORY OF THE LOVERS OF SYRIA (pp. 21–36)._
P. 26.—Divination by the flight or song of birds is so universal that it
is ridiculous of Kreutzwald (the compiler of the Kalevipoeg) to quote
the fact of the son of Kalev applying to birds and beasts for advice as
being intended by the composers as a hint that he was deficient in
intelligence.
In Bulwer Lytton’s story of the Fallen Star (Pilgrims of the Rhine, ch.
xix.) he makes the imposter Morven determine the succession to the
chieftainship by means of a trained hawk.
P. 36, _note 2_.—Scott may possibly refer to the tradition that the
souls of the dead are stored up in the trumpet of Israfil, when he
speaks of the “receiving angel.”
_NIGHT ADVENTURE OF HARUN AL-RASHID AND THE YOUTH MANJAB (pp. 61–105)._
P. 102.—In the Danish ballads we frequently find heroes appealing to
their mothers or nurses in cases of difficulty. Compare “Habor and
Signild,” and “Knight Stig’s Wedding,” in Prior’s Danish Ballads, i. p.
216 and ii. p. 339
_HISTORY OF AL-HAJJAJ BIN YUSUF AND THE YOUNG SAYYID (pp. 39–60)._
P. 43, _note 1_.—I doubt if the story-teller intended to represent
Al-Hajjaj as ignorant. The story rather implies that he was merely
catechising the youth, in order to entangle him in his talk.
P. 46.—Compare the story of the Sandal-wood Merchant and the Sharpers
(Nights, vi. p. 206) in which the Merchant is required to drink up the
sea [or rather, perhaps, river], and requires his adversary to hold the
mouth of the sea for him with his hand.
P. 52, _note 3_.—It is well known that children should not be allowed to
sleep with aged persons, as the latter absorb their vitality.
_STORY OF THE DARWAYSH AND THE BARBER’S BOY AND THE GREEDY SULTAN (pp.
105–114)._
This story belongs to the large category known to students of folk-lore
as the Sage and his Pupil; and of this again there are three main
groups:
1. Those in which (as in the present instance) the two remain on
friendly terms.
2. Those in which the sage is outwitted and destroyed by his pupil
(_e.g._, Cazotte’s story of the Maugraby; or Spitta Bey’s tales, No. 1).
3. Those in which the pupil attempts to outwit or to destroy the sage,
and is himself outwitted or destroyed (_e.g._, The Lady’s Fifth Story,
in Gibb’s Forty Vezirs, pp. 76–80; and his App. B. note v., p. 413).
_THE LOVES OF AL-HAYFA AND YUSUF (pp. 121–210.)_
P. 149, _note 1_.—I believe that a sudden attack of this kind is always
speedily fatal.
_THE GOODWIFE OF CAIRO AND HER FOUR GALLANTS (pp. 251–294)._
P. 255, _note_.—It may be worth while to note that Swedenborg asserts
that it is unlawful in Heaven for any person _to look at the back of the
head_ of another, as by so doing he interrupts the divine influx. The
foundation of this idea is perhaps the desire to avoid mesmeric action
upon the cerebellum.
_TALE OF MOHSIN AND MUSA (pp. 319–332)._
The notes on the story of Abu Niyyat and Abu Niyyateen (_antea_, pp.
511–512) will apply still better to the present story.
_THE MERCHANT’S DAUGHTER, AND THE PRINCE OF AL-IRAK (pp. 371–437)._
Pp. 422–430.—The case of Tobias and Sara (Tobit, chaps, iii.–viii.) was
very similar: but in this instance the demon Asmodeus was driven away by
fumigating with the liver and heart of a fish.
FOOTNOTES:
-----
Footnote 1:
In the same volume (ii. 161) we also find an “Introductory Chapter of
the Arabian Tales,” translated from an original manuscript by Jonathan
Scott, Esq.; neither MS. nor translation having any merit. In pp. 34,
35 (ibid.) are noticed the “Contents of a Fragment of the Arabian
Nights procured in India by James Anderson, Esq., a copy of which”
(made by his friend Scott) “is now in the possession of Jonathan
Scott, Esq.” (See Scott, vol. vi. p. 451.) For a short but sufficient
notice of this fragment cf. the Appendix (vol. x. p. 497) to my
Thousand Nights and a Night, the able and conscientious work of Mr. W.
F. Kirby. “The Labourer and the Flying Chain” (No. x.) and “The King’s
Son who escaped death by the ingenuity of his Father’s seven Viziers”
(No. xi.) have been translated or rather abridged by Scott in his
“Tales, Anecdotes and Letters” before alluded to, a vol. of pp. 446
containing scraps from the Persian “Tohfat al-Majális” and
“Hazliyát’Abbíd Zahkání” (Facetiæ of ’Abbíd the Jester), with letters
from Aurangzeb and other such padding much affected by the home public
in the Early XIX^{th} Century.
Footnote 2:
So called from Herr Uri, a Hungarian scholar who first catalogued “The
Contents.”
Footnote 3:
W. M. MS. iv. 165–189: (Scott, vi. 238–245) “Story of the Prince of
Sind, and Fatima, daughter of Amir Bin Naomaun”: Gauttier (vi.
342–348) _Histoire du Prince de Sind et de Fatime_.
Sind is so called from Sindhu, the Indus (in Pers. Sindáb), is the
general name of the riverine valley: in early days it was a great
station of the so-called Aryan race, as they were migrating eastwards
into India Proper, and it contains many Holy Places dating from the
era of the Puránás. The Moslems soon made acquaintance with it, and
the country was conquered and annexed by Mohammed bin Kásim, sent to
attack it by the famous or infamous Hajjáj bin Yúsuf the Thakafite,
lieutenant of Al-’Irák under the Ommiade Abd al-Malik bin Marwán. For
details, see my “Sind Re-visited”: vol. i. chapt. viii.
Footnote 4:
[In MS. “shakhat,” a modern word which occurs in Spitta Bey’s “Contes
Arabes Modernes,” spelt with the palatal instead of the dental, and is
translated there by “injurier.”—ST.]
Footnote 5:
In the text “Sahríj”; hence the “Chafariz” (fountain) of Portugal,
which I derived (Highlands of the Brazil, i. 46) from “Sakáríj.” It is
a “Moghrabin” word = _fonte_, a fountain, preserved in the Brazil and
derided in the mother country, where a New World village is described
as
——Chafariz,
Joam Antam e a Matriz:
which may be roughly rendered
——Parish church,
Pump on the Green and Johnny Birch.
Footnote 6:
[Here I suppose the scribe dropped a word, as “yahtáj,” or the like,
and the sentence should read: it requires, etc.—ST.]
Footnote 7:
In text “Sárayah,” for “Saráyah,” Serai, Government House: vol. ix.
52.
Footnote 8:
A manner of metonymy, meaning that he rested his cheek upon his right
hand.
Footnote 9:
For the sig. of this phrase = words suggested by the circumstances,
see vol. i. 121.
Footnote 10:
Mr. Charles M. Doughty (“Arabia Deserta,” i. 223), speaks of the
Badawin who “sit beating the time away, and for pastime limning with
their driving-sticks (the Bákúr) in the idle land.”
Footnote 11:
In text “Lam yanúb al-Wáhidu min-hum nisf haffán.” [I cannot explain
this sentence satisfactory to myself, but by inserting “illá” after
“min-hum.” Further I would read “nassaf” = libavit, delibavit,
degustavit (Dozy, Suppl. s. v.) and “Hifán,” pl. of “Hafnah” =
handful, mouthful, small quantity, translating accordingly: “and none
took his turn without sipping a few laps.”—ST.]
Footnote 12:
“Tarajjama”: vol. iv. 242. I shall always translate it by “he
deprecated” scil. evil to the person addressed.
Footnote 13:
[The text, as I read it, has: “In wahadtu (read wajadtu) fí házih
al-Sá’áh shayyan naakul-hu wa namút bi-hi nartáh min házá al-Taab
wa’l-mashakkah la-akultu-hu” = if I could find at this hour a
something (_i.e._ in the way of poison) which I might eat and die
thereby and rest from this toil and trouble, I would certainly eat it,
etc.—ST.]
Footnote 14:
See vol. i. 311 for this “tom-tom” as Anglo-Indians call it.
Footnote 15:
_i.e._ Whereinto the happy man was able to go, which he could not
whilst the spell was upon the hoard.
Footnote 16:
Here ends this tale, a most lame and impotent conclusion, in the W. M.
MS. iv. 189. Scott (p. 244–5) copied by Gauttier (vi. 348) has, “His
father received him with rapture, and the prince having made an
apology to the sultana (!) for his former rude behaviour, she received
his excuses, and having no child of her own readily adopted him as her
son; so that the royal family lived henceforth in the utmost harmony,
till the death of the sultan and sultana, when the prince succeeded to
the empire.”
Footnote 17:
W. M. MS. iv. 189: Scott (vi. 246–258) “Story of the Lovers of Syria;
or, the Heroine:” Gauttier (iv. 348–354) _Histoire des Amans de
Syrie_.
Footnote 18:
Scott (vi. 246) comments upon the text:—“The master of the ship having
weighed anchor, hoisted sail and departed: the lady in vain entreating
him to wait the return of her beloved, or send her on shore, for he
was captivated with her beauty. Finding herself thus ensnared, as she
was a woman of strong mind ... she assumed a satisfied air; and as the
only way to preserve her honour, received the addresses of the
treacherous master with pretended complacency, and consented to
receive him as a husband at the first port at which the ship might
touch.”
Footnote 19:
The captain, the skipper, not the owner: see vols. i. 127; vi. 12; the
fem. (which we shall presently find) is “Ra’isah.”
Footnote 20:
Scott (p. 247) has:—“At length the vessel anchored near a city, to
which the captain went to make preparations for his marriage; but the
lady, while he was on shore, addressed the ship’s crew, setting forth
with such force his treacherous conduct to herself, and offering such
rewards if they would convey her to her lover at the port they had
left, that the honest sailors were moved in her favour, agreed to obey
her as their mistress, and hoisting sail, left the master to shift for
himself.”
Footnote 21:
In text “Kamrah,” = the chief cabin, from the Gr. καμάρα = vault;
Pers. Kamar; Lat. “Camera” or “Camara”; Germ. “Kammer.” It is still
the popular term in Egypt for the “cuddy,” which is derived from Pers.
“Kadah” = a room.
Footnote 22:
Scott makes the doughty damsel (p. 249), “relate to them her own
adventures, and assure them that when she should have rejoined her
lover, they should, if they chose it, be honourably restored to their
homes; but in the mean time she hoped they would contentedly share her
fortunes.”
Footnote 23:
In text “Fidáwi,” see “Fidá’i” and “Fidawíyah,” vol. iv. 281.
Footnote 24:
[In the text “Al-Kázánát,” pl. of “Kázán,” which occurs in Spitta
Bey’s tales under the form “Kazán” on account of the accent. It is the
Turkish “Kazghán,” vulgarly pronounced “Kazan,” and takes in Persian
generally the form “Kazkán.” In Night 652 it will be met again in the
sense of crucibles.—ST.]
Footnote 25:
In text “Banj al-tayyár,” _i.e._ volatile: as we should say, that
which flies fastest to the brain.
Footnote 26:
This marvellous bird, the “Ter-il-bas” (Tayr Táús?), is a particular
kind of peacock which is introduced with a monstrous amount of
nonsense about “Dagon and his son Bil-il-Sanan” and made to determine
elections by alighting upon the head of one of the candidates in
Chavis and Cazotte, “History of Yamalladdin (Jamál al-Din), Prince of
Great Katay” (Khátá = Cathay = China). See Heron, iv. 159.
Footnote 27:
Lit. “hath given it to him.”
Footnote 28:
Arab. “Jiház,” the Egypt. “Gaház,” which is the Scotch “tocher,” and
must not be confounded with the “Mahr” = dowry, settled by the husband
upon the wife. Usually it consists of sundry articles of dress and
ornament, furniture (matting and bedding, carpets, divans, cushions
and kitchen utensils), to which the Badawi add “Girbahs”
(water-skins), querns, and pestles with mortars. These are usually
carried by camels from the bride’s house to the bridegroom’s: they are
the wife’s property, and if divorced she takes them away with her and
the husband has no control over the married woman’s capital, interest
or gains. For other details see Lane M.E. chapt. vi. and Herklots
chapt. xiv. sec. 7.
Footnote 29:
[Arab. “Shuwár” = trousseau, whence the verb “shawwara binta-hu” = he
gave a marriage outfit to his daughter. See Dozy Suppl. s.v. and
Arnold’s Chrestom. 157, 1.—ST.]
Footnote 30:
Arab. “Ghashím,” see vol. ii. 330. It is a favourite word in Egypt
extending to Badawi-land, and especially in Cairo, where it is looked
upon as slighting if not insulting.
Footnote 31:
The whole of the scene is a replica of the marriage between Kamar
al-Zamán and that notable blackguard the Lady Budúr (vol. iii. 211),
where also we find the pigeon slaughtered (p. 289). I have mentioned
that the blood of this bird is supposed throughout the East, where the
use of the microscope is unknown, and the corpuscules are never
studied, most to resemble the results of a bursten hymen, and that it
is the most used to deceive the expert eyes of midwives and old
matrons. See note to vol. iii. p. 280.
Footnote 32:
Scott (p. 254) makes his heroine “erect a most magnificent
caravanserai, furnished with baths hot and cold, and every convenience
for the weary traveller.” Compare this device with the public and
royal banquet (p. 212) contrived by the slave-girl sultaness, the
charming Zumurrud or Smaragdine in the tale of Ali Shár, vol. iv. 187.
Footnote 33:
In text “Shakhs,” see vol. iii. 26; viii. 159.
Footnote 34:
This assemblage of the dramatis personæ at the end of the scene,
highly artistic and equally improbable, reminds us of the ending of
King Omar bin al-Nu’uman (vol. iii. 112).
Footnote 35:
The King and the Minister could not have recognised the portrait as
neither had seen the original.
Footnote 36:
In text “Ishtalaka” = he surmised, discovered (a secret).
Footnote 37:
In the Arab. “she knew them,” but the careless story-teller forgets
the first part of his own story.
Footnote 38:
Story-telling being servile work.
Footnote 39:
[In the MS. “istanatú lá-ha.” The translation in the text presupposes
the reading “istanattú” as the 10th form of “natt” = he jumped, he
leaped. I am inclined to take it for the 8th form of “sanat,” which
according to Dozy stands in its 2nd form “sannat” for “sannat,” a
transposition of the classical “nassat” = he listened to. The same
word with the same meaning of “listening attentively,” recurs in the
next line in the singular, applying to the captain and the following
pronoun “la-há” refers in both passages to “Hikáyah,” tale, not to the
lady-sultan who reveals herself only later, when she has concluded her
narrative.—ST.]
Footnote 40:
Here the converse is probably meant, as we have before seen.
Footnote 41:
Scott ends (p. 258) “Years of unusual happiness passed over the heads
of the fortunate adventurers of this history, until death, the
destroyer of all things, conducted them to a grave which must one day
be the resting-place for ages of us all, till the receiving (?) angel
shall sound his trumpet.”
Footnote 42:
Scott (vi. 259–267), “Story of Hyjauje, the tyrannical Governor of
Coufeh, and the Young Syed.” For the difference between the “Sayyid”
(descendant of Hasan) and the “Sharíf,” derived from Husayn, see vol.
v. 259. Being of the Holy House the youth can truly deny that he
belongs to any place or race, as will be seen in the sequel.
Footnote 43:
This masterful administrator of the Caliphate under the early Ommiades
is noticed in vols. iv. 3, and vii. 97. The succession to the Prophet
began—as mostly happens in the proceedings of elective governments,
republics, and so forth—with the choice of a nobody, “Abubakr the
Veridical,” a Meccan merchant, whose chief claim was the glamour of
the Apostolate. A more notable personage, and seen under the same
artificial light, was “’Omar the Justiciary,” also a trader of Meccah,
who was murdered for an act of injustice. In Osman nepotism and
corruption so prevailed, while distance began to dim the Apostolic
glories, that the blood-thirsty turbulence of the Arab was aroused and
caused the death of the third Caliph by what we should call in modern
phrase “lynching.” Ali succeeded, if indeed we can say that he
succeeded at all, to an already divided empire. He was the only one of
the four who could be described as a man of genius, and therefore he
had a host of enemies: he was a poet, a sage, a moralist and even a
grammarian; brave as a lion, strong as a bull, a successful and
experienced captain, yet a complete failure as a King. A mere child in
mundane matters, he ever acted in a worldly sense as he should have
avoided acting, and hence, after a short and disastrous reign, he also
was killed. His two sons, Hasan and Husayn, inherited all the defects
and few of the merits of their sire: Hasan was a _pauvre diable_,
whose chief characteristic was addiction to marriage, and by poetical
justice one of his wives murdered him. Husayn was of stronger mould,
but he fought against the impossible; for his rival was Mu’áwiyah, the
Cavour of the Age, the longest-headed man in Arabia, and against
Yezíd, who, like Italy of the present day, flourished and prospered by
the artful game which the far-seeing politician, his father, had
bequeathed to his house—the Ommiade. The fourth of this dynasty, ’Abd
al-Malik bin Marwán, “the Father of Flies,” and his successor,
Al-Walid, were happy in being served thoroughly and unscrupulously by
Al-Hajjáj, the ablest of lieutenants, whose speciality it was to take
in hand a revolted province, such as Al-Hijáz, Al-Irák, or Khorásán,
and to slaughter it into submission; besides deaths in battle he is
computed to have slain 120,000 men. He was an unflinching preacher of
the Divine Right of Kings and would observe that the Lord says, “Obey
Allah an ye can” (conditional), but as regards royal government
“Hearing and obeying” (absolute); _ergo_, all opposition was to be cut
down and uprooted. However, despite his most brilliant qualities, his
learning, his high and knightly sense of honour, his insight and his
foresight (_e.g._ in building Wásit), he won an immortality of infamy:
he was hated by his contemporaries, he is the subject of silly tale
and offensive legend (_e.g._, that he was born without anus, which
required opening with instruments, and he was suckled by Satan’s
orders on blood), and he is still execrated as the tyrant, _per
excellentiam_, and the oppressor of the Holy Family—the children and
grand-children of the Apostle.
The traditional hatred of Al-Hajjaj was envenomed by the accession of
the Abbasides, and this dynasty, the better to distinguish itself from
the Ommiades, affected love for the Holy Family, especially Ali and
his descendants, and a fanatical hatred against their oppressors. The
following table from Ibn Khaldún (Introduct. xxii.) shows that the
Caliphs were cousins, which may account for their venomous family
feud.
’Abd Manaf.
|
+-----------------+-------------------+
| |
Hashim. Abd Shams.
| |
Abd al-Muttalib. Umayyah.
| |
+-------------------+---------------+ +-----+--------+
| | | | |
Al-Abbas. Abdullah. Abu Talib. Harb. Abu ’l-Aus.
| | | | |
Abdullah. Mohammed. | Abu Sufyan. Al-Hakim.
| | | | |
Ali. Fatimah married Ali. Mu’awiyah. Marwan.
| | (1st Ommiade.)
| +------+-----+
| | |
Mohammed. Al-Hasan. Al-Husayn.
|
Al-Saffáh.
(1st Abbaside.)
Footnote 44:
[The word here translated “invited guest” reads in the MS. “Mad’úr.”
In this form it is no dictionary word, but under the root “D’r” I find
in the Muhít: “wa ’l-’ámatu takúlu fulánun da’irun ya’ní ghalízun
jáfin” = the common people say such a one is “da’ir,” _i.e._, rude,
churlish. “Mad’úr” may be a synonym and rendered accordingly: as
though thou wert a boor or clown.—ST.]
Footnote 45:
A neat specimen of the figure anachronism. Al-Hajjaj died in A.H. 95
(= A.D. 714), and Cairo was built in A.H. 358 (= A.D. 968).
Footnote 46:
Perfectly true even in the present day. The city was famed for
intelligence and sanguinary fanaticism; and no stranger in disguise
could pass through it without detection. This ended with the massacre
of 1840, which brought a new era into the Moslem East. The men are, as
a rule, fine-looking, but they seem to be all show: we had a corps of
them in the old Básh-Buzuks, who, after a month or two in camp, seemed
to have passed suddenly from youth into old age.
Footnote 47:
In text “Yasta’amilúna al-Mrd,” which may have a number of meanings,
_e.g._ “work frowardness” (Maradd), or “work the fruit of the tree
Arák” (Marad = wild capparis) and so forth. I have chosen the word
mainly because “Murd” rhymes to “Burd.” The people of Al-Yaman are
still deep in the Sotadic Zone and practice; this they owe partly to a
long colonization of the “’Ajam,” or Persians. See my Terminal Essay,
§ “Pederasty,” p. 205.
Footnote 48:
“Burd,” plur. of “Burdah” = mantle or woollen plaid of striped stuff:
vol. vii. 95. They are still woven in Arabia, but they are mostly
white.
Footnote 49:
So in Tabari (vol. iii. 127) Al-Hajjáj sees a man of haughty mien (Abd
al-Rahmán bin Abdullah), and exclaims, “_Regarde comme il est
orgueilleux: par Dieu, j’aurais envie de lui couper la tête!_”
Footnote 50: