voyaging and commercing, I said in myself, “Sufficeth me that hath
befallen me;” and I spent my time in solace and pleasure. One day as I
sat at home there came a knock at the door, and when the porter opened a
page entered and said, “The Caliph biddeth thee to him.” I went with him
to the King’s majesty and kissed ground and saluted him; whereupon he
welcomed me and entreated me with honour and said, “O Sindbad, I have an
occasion for thee: wilt thou do it?” So I kissed his hand and asked him,
saying, “O my lord, what occasion hath the master for the slave?”;
whereto he answered me, “I am minded that thou travel to the King of
Sarandib and carry to him our writ and our gift, for that he hath sent
to us a present and a letter.” I trembled at these words and rejoined,
“By Allah the Omnipotent, O my lord, I have taken a loathing to wayfare,
and when I hear the words ‘Voyage’ or ‘Travel,’ my limbs tremble for
what hath befallen me of hardships and horrors. Indeed I have no desire
whatever for this; more by token as I have bound myself by oath not to
quit Baghdad.” Then I informed the Caliph of all I had passed through
from first to last, and he marvelled with exceeding marvel and said, “By
the Almighty, O Sindbad, from ages of old such mishaps as happened to
thee were never known to happen to any, and thou dost only right never
even to talk of travel. For our sake, however, thou wilt go this time
and carry our present and our letter to him of Sarandib; and
Inshallah—by God’s leave!—thou shalt return quickly; and on this wise we
shall be under no obligation to the said King.” I replied that I heard
and obeyed, being unable to oppose his command, so he gave me the gifts
and the missive with money to pay my way and I kissed hands and left the
presence. Then I dropped down from Baghdad to the Gulf, and with other
merchants embarked, and our ship sailed before a fair wind many days and
nights till, by Allah’s aid, we reached the island of Sarandib. As soon
as we had made fast we landed and I took the present and the letter;
and, going in with them to the King, kissed ground before him. When he
saw me, he said, “Well come, O Sindbad! By Allah Omnipotent we were
longing to see thee, and glory be to God who hath again shown us thy
face!” Then taking me by the hand he made me sit by his side, rejoicing,
and he welcomed me with familiar kindness again and entreated me as a
friend. After this he began to converse with me and courteously
addressed me and asked, “What was the cause of thy coming to us, O
Sindbad?” So after kissing his hand and thanking him I answered, “O my
lord, I have brought thee a present from my master, the Caliph Harun
Al-Rashid;” and offered him the present and the letter which he read and
at which he rejoiced with passing joy. The present consisted of a mare
worth ten thousand ducats, bearing a golden saddle set with jewels; a
book; a sumptuous suit of clothes and an hundred different kinds of
white Cairene cloths and silks of Suez,[98] Cufa and Alexandria; Greek
carpets and an hundred maunds[99] weight of linen and raw silk. Moreover
there was a wondrous rarety, a marvellous cup of crystal middlemost of
which was the figure of a lion faced by a kneeling man grasping a bow
with arrow drawn to the very head, together with the food-tray[100] of
Sulayman the son of David (on whom be peace!). The missive ran as
follows:—Peace from King Al-Rashid, the aided of Allah (who hath
vouchsafed to him and his forefathers noble rank and wide-spread glory),
be on the fortunate Sultan. But after. Thy letter came to our hands and
we rejoiced thereat; and we have sent the book entituled “Delight of the
Intelligent and for Friends the Rare Present,”[101] together with sundry
curiosities suitable for Kings; so do thou favour us by accepting them:
and peace be with thee! Then the King lavished upon me much wealth and
entreated me with all honour; so I prayed for him and thanked him for
his munificence. Some days after I craved his leave to depart, but could
not obtain it except by great pressing, whereupon I farewelled him and
fared forth from his city, with merchants and other companions,
homewards-bound without any desire for travel or trade. We continued
voyaging and coasting along many islands; but, when we were half-way, we
were surrounded by a number of canoes, wherein were men like devils
armed with bows and arrows, swords and daggers; habited in mail-coats
and other armoury. They fell upon us and wounded and slew all who
opposed them; then, having captured the ship and her contents, carried
us to an island, where they sold us at the meanest price. Now I was
bought by a wealthy man who, taking me to his house, gave me meat and
drink and clothing and treated me in the friendliest manner; so I was
heartened and I rested a little. One day he asked me, “Dost thou know
any art or craft?” and I answered him, “O my lord, I am a merchant and
know nothing but trade and traffic.” “Dost thou know,” rejoined he, “how
to use bow and arrow?” “Yes,” replied I, “I know that much.” Thereupon
he brought me a bow and arrows and mounted me behind him upon an
elephant: then he set out as night was well nigh over and, passing
through a forest of huge growths, came to a tall and sturdy tree up
which he made me climb. Then he gave me the bow and arrows, saying, “Sit
here now, and when the elephants troop hither in early morning, shoot at
them; belike thou wilt hit one; and, if he fall, come and tell me.” With
this he left me. I hid myself in the tree being in sore terror and
trembled till the sun arose; and, when the elephants appeared and
wandered about among the trees, I shot my arrows at them and continued
till I had shot down one of them. In the evening I reported my success
to my master who was delighted in me and entreated me with high honour;
and next morning he removed the slain elephant. In this wise I
continued, every morning shooting an elephant which my master would
remove till, one day, as I was perched in hiding on the tree there came
on suddenly and unexpectedly an innumerable host of elephants whose
screaming and trumpeting were such that I imagined the earth trembled
under them. All surrounded my tree, whose circumference was some fifty
cubits,[102] and one enormous monster came up to it and winding his
trunk round the bole haled it up by the roots, and dashed it to the
ground. I fell down fainting amongst the beasts when the monster
elephant wound his trunk about me and, setting me on his back, went off
with me, the others accompanying us. He carried me still unconscious
till he reached the place for which he was making, when he rolled me off
his back and presently went his ways followed by the others. So I rested
a little; and, when my terror had subsided, I looked about me and I
found myself among the bones of elephants, whereby I concluded that this
was their burial-place, and that the monster elephant had led me thither
on account of the tusks.[103] So I arose and walked a whole day and
night till I arrived at the house of my master, who saw my colour
changed by stress of affright and famine. He rejoiced in my return and
said to me, “By Allah, thou hast made my heart sore! I went when thou
wast missing and found the tree torn up, and thought that the elephants
had slain thee. Tell me how it was with thee.” I acquainted him with all
that had betided me; whereat he wondered greatly, and rejoiced and at
last asked me, “Dost thou know the place?”; whereto I answered, “Yes, O
my master!” So we mounted an elephant and fared until we came to the
spot; and, when my master beheld the heaps of tusks, he rejoiced
greatly; then carrying away as many as he wanted he returned with me
home. After this, he entreated me with increased favour and said, “O my
son, thou hast shown us the way to great gain, wherefore Allah requite
thee! Thou art freed for the Almighty’s sake and before His face! The
elephants used to destroy many of us on account of our hunting them for
their ivories and scrivellos; but Allah hath preserved thee from them,
and thou hast profited us by the heaps to which thou hast led us.” “O my
master,” replied I, “God free thy neck from the fire! And do thou grant
me, O my master, thy gracious leave to return to my own country.” “Yes,”
quoth he, “thou shalt have that permission. But we have a yearly fair,
when merchants come to us from various quarters to buy up these ivories.
The time is drawing near; and, when they shall have done their business,
I will send thee under their charge and will give thee wherewithal to
reach thy home.” So I blessed and thanked him and remained with him,
treated with respect and honour, for some days, when the merchants came
as he had foretold, and bought and sold and bartered; and when they had
made their preparations to return, my master came to me and said, “Rise
and get thee ready to travel with the traders en route to thy country.”
They had bought a number of tusks which they had bound together in loads
and were embarking them when my master sent me with them, paying for my
passage and settling all my debts; besides which he gave me a large
present in goods. We set out and voyaged from island to island till we
had crossed the sea and landed on the shores of the Persian Gulf, when
the merchants brought out and sold their stores: I also sold what I had
at a high profit; and I bought some of the prettiest things in the place
for presents and beautiful rareties and everything else I wanted. I
likewise bought for myself a beast and we fared forth and crossed the
deserts from country to country till I reached Baghdad. Here I went in
to the Caliph and, after saluting him and kissing hands, informed him of
all that had befallen me; whereupon he rejoiced in my safety and thanked
Almighty Allah; and he bade my story be written in letters of gold. I
then entered my house and met my family and brethren: and such is the
end of the history that happened to me during my seven voyages. Praise
be to Allah, the One, the Creator, the Maker of all things in Heaven and
Earth!——Now when Shahrazad had ended her story of the two Sindbads,
Dinarzad exclaimed, “O my sister, how pleasant is thy tale and how
tasteful! How sweet and how grateful!” She replied, “And what is this
compared with that I could tell thee to-morrow night?” Quoth the King,
“What may it be?” And she said:—It is a tale touching
-----
Footnote 1:
Lane (vol. iii. 1) calls our old friend “Es-Sindibád of the Sea,” and
Benfey derives the name from the Sanskrit “Siddhapati” = lord of
sages. The etymology (in Heb. Sandabar and in Greek Syntipas) is still
uncertain, although the term often occurs in Arab stories; and some
look upon it as a mere corruption of “Bidpai” (Bidyápati). The
derivation offered by Hole (Remarks on the Arabian Nights’
Entertainments, by Richard Hole, LL.D. London, Cadell, 1797) from the
Persian ábád (a region) is impossible. It is, however, not a little
curious that this purely Persian word (= a “habitation”) should be
found in Indian names as early as Alexander’s day, _e.g._ the “Dachina
bades” of the Periplus is “Dakhshin-ábád,” the Sanskr. being
“Dakshinapatha.”
Footnote 2:
A porter like the famous Armenians of Constantinople. Some edits call
him “Al-Hindibád.”
Footnote 3:
Arab. “Karawán” (Charadrius œdicnemus, Linn.): its shrill note is
admired by Egyptians and hated by sportsmen.
Footnote 4:
This ejaculation, still popular, averts the evil eye. In describing
Sindbad the Seaman the Arab writer seems to repeat what one reads of
Marco Polo returned to Venice.
Footnote 5:
Our old friend must not be confounded with the eponym of the
“Sindibád-námah;” the Persian book of Sindbad the Sage. See Night
dlxxviii.
Footnote 6:
The first and second are from Eccles. chapts. vii. 1, and ix. 4. The
Bul. Edit. reads for the third, “The grave is better than the palace.”
None are from Solomon, but Easterns do not “verify quotations.”
Footnote 7:
Arab. “Kánún”; a furnace, a brasier before noticed (vol. v., p. 272);
here a pot full of charcoal sunk in the ground, or a little hearth of
clay shaped like a horse-shoe and opening down wind.
Footnote 8:
These fish-islands are common in the Classics, _e.g._ the Pristis of
Pliny (xvii. 4), which Olaus Magnus transfers to the Baltic (xxi. 6)
and makes timid as the whales of Nearchus. C. J. Solinus (_Plinii
Simia_) says, “Indica maria balænas habent ultra spatia quatuor
jugerum.” See also Bochart’s Hierozoicon (i. 50) for Job’s Leviathan
(xli. 16–17). Hence Boiardo (Orl. Innam, lib. iv.) borrowed his
magical whale and Milton (P.L. i.) his Leviathan deemed an island. A
basking whale would readily suggest the Kraken and Cetus of Olaus
Magnus (xxi. 25). Al-Kazwíni’s famous treatise on the “Wonders of the
World” (Ajáib al-Makhlúkát) tells the same tale of the “Sulahfah”
tortoise, the colossochelys, for which see Night dl.
Footnote 9:
Sindbad does not say that he was a shipwrecked man, being a model in
the matter of “travellers’ tales,” _i.e._ he always tells the truth
when an untruth would not serve him.
Footnote 10:
Lane (iii. 83) would make this a corruption of the Hindu “Maharáj” =
great Rajah: but it is the name of the great autumnal fête of the
Guebres; a term composed of two good old Persian words “Mihr” (the
sun, whence “Mithras”) and “ján” = life. As will presently appear, in
the days of the Just King Anushirwán, the Persians possessed Southern
Arabia and East Africa south of Cape Guardafui (Jird Háfún.) On the
other hand, supposing the word to be a corruption of Maharaj, Sindbad
may allude to the famous Narsinga kingdom in Mid-south India whose
capital was Vijayanagar; or to any great Indian Rajah even he of
Kachch (Cutch), famous in Moslem story as the Balhará (Ballaba Rais,
who founded the Ballabhi era; or the Zamorin of Camoens, the Samdry
Rajah of Malabar). For Mahrage, or Mihrage, see Renaudot’s “Two
Mohammedan Travellers of the Ninth Century.” In the account of Ceylon
by Wolf (English Transl. p. 168) it adjoins the “Ilhas de Cavalos” (of
wild horses) to which the Dutch merchants sent their brood-mares. Sir
W. Jones (Description of Asia, chapt. ii.) makes the Arabian island
Soborma or Mahráj = Borneo.
Footnote 11:
Arab. “Sáis”; the well-known Anglo-Indian word for a groom or rather a
“horsekeeper.”
Footnote 12:
Arab. “Darakah”; whence our word.
Footnote 13:
The myth of mares being impregnated by the wind was known to the
Classics of Europe; and the “sea-stallion” may have arisen from the
Arab practice of picketing mare asses to be covered by the wild ass.
Colonel J. D. Watson of the Bombay Army suggests to me that Sindbad
was wrecked at the mouth of the Ran of Kachch (Cutch) and was carried
in a boat to one of the Islands there formed during the rains and
where the wild ass (_Equus Onager_, Khar-gadh, in Pers. Gor-khar)
still breeds. This would explain the “stallions of the sea” and we
find traces of the ass blood in the true Kathiawár horse, with his dun
colour, barred legs and dorsal stripe.
Footnote 14:
The second or warrior caste (Kshatriya), popularly supposed to have
been annihilated by Battle-axe Ráma (Parashu Ráma); but several tribes
of Rajputs and other races claim the honourable genealogy. Colonel
Watson would explain the word by “Shakháyát” or noble Káthis
(Kathiawar-men), or by “Shikári,” the professional hunter here acting
as stable-groom.
Footnote 15:
In Bul. Edit. “Kábil.” Lane (iii. 88) supposes it to be the “Bartail”
of Al-Kazwini near Borneo and quotes the Spaniard B. L. de Argensola
(History of the Moluccas) who places near Banda a desert island,
Poelsatton, infamous for cries, whistlings, roarings and dreadful
apparitions, suggesting that it was peopled by devils (Stevens, vol.
i., p. 168).
Footnote 16:
Some texts substitute for this last phrase, “And the sailors say that
Al-Dajjál is there.” He is a manner of Moslem Antichrist, the Man of
Sin per excellentiam, who will come in the latter days and lay waste
the earth, leading 70,000 Jews, till encountered and slain by Jesus at
the gate of Lud. Sale’s Essay, sect. 4.
Footnote 17:
Also from Al-Kazwini: it is an exaggerated description of the whale
still common off the East African Coast. My crew was dreadfully
frightened by one between Berberah and Aden. Nearchus scared away the
whales in the Persian Gulf by trumpets (Strabo, lib. xv.). The
owl-faced fish is unknown to me: it may perhaps be a seal or a
manatee. Hole says that Father Martini, the Jesuit (seventeenth
century), placed in the Canton Seas, an “animal with the head of a
bird and the tail of a fish,”—a parrot-beak?
Footnote 18:
The captain or master (not owner) of a ship.
Footnote 19:
The kindly Moslem feeling, shown to a namesake, however humble.
Footnote 20:
A popular phrase to express utter desolation.
Footnote 21:
The literature of all peoples contains this physiological perversion.
Birds do not sing hymns; the song of the male is simply to call the
female and when the pairing-season ends all are dumb.
Footnote 22:
The older “roc.” The word is Persian, with many meanings, _e.g._ a
cheek (Lalla “Rookh”); a “rook” (hero) at chess; a rhinoceros, etc.
The fable world-wide of the _wundervogel_ is, as usual, founded upon
fact: man remembers and combines but does not create. The Egyptian
Bennu (Ti-bennu = phœnix) may have been a reminiscence of gigantic
pterodactyls and other winged monsters. From the Nile the legend
fabled by these Oriental “putters out or five for one” overspread the
world and gave birth to the Eorosh of the Zend, whence the Pers.
“Símurgh” (= the “thirty-fowl-like”), the “Bar Yuchre” of the Rabbis,
the “Garuda” of the Hindus; the “Anká” (“longneck”) of the Arabs; the
Hathilinga bird, of Buddhagosha’s Parables, which had the strength of
five elephants; the Kerkes of the Turks; the Gryps of the Greeks; the
Russian “Norka”; the sacred dragon of the Chinese; the Japanese
“Pheng” and “Kirni”; the “wise and ancient Bird” which sits upon the
ash-tree Yggdrasil, and the dragons, griffins, basilisks, etc. of the
Middle Ages. A second basis wanting only a superstructure of
exaggeration (M. Polo’s Ruch had wing-feathers twelve paces long)
would be the huge birds but lately killed out. Sindbad may allude to
the Æpyornus of Madagascar, a gigantic ostrich whose egg contains 2.35
gallons. The late Herr Hildebrand discovered on the African coast,
facing Madagascar, traces of another huge bird. Bochart (Hierozoicon
ii. 854) notices the Avium Avis Ruch and taking the _pulli_ was
followed by lapidation on the part of the parent bird. A Persian
illustration in Lane (iii. 90) shows the Rukh carrying off three
elephants in beak and pounces with the proportions of a hawk and field
mice: and the Rukh hawking at an elephant is a favourite Persian
subject. It is possible that the “Twelve Knights of the Round Table”
were the twelve Rukhs of Persian story. We need not go, with Faber, to
the Cherubim which guarded the Paradise-gate. The curious reader will
consult Dr. H. H. Wilson’s Essays, edited by my learned correspondent,
Dr. Rost, Librarian of the India House, vol. i. pp. 192–3.
Footnote 23:
It is not easy to explain this passage unless it be a garbled allusion
to the steel-plate of the diamond-cutter. Nor can we account for the
wide diffusion of this tale of perils unless to enhance the value of
the gem. Diamonds occur in alluvial lands mostly open and
comparatively level, as in India, the Brazil and the Cape. Archbishop
Epiphanius of Salamis (ob. A.D. 403) tells this story about the
jacinth or ruby (Epiphanii Opera, a Petaio, Coloniæ 1682); and it was
transferred to the diamond by Marco Polo (iii. 29, “of Eagles bring up
diamonds”) and Nicolò de Conti, whose “mountain Albenigaras” must be
Vijayanagar in the kingdom of Golconda. Major Rennel places the famous
mines of Pauna or Purna in a mountain-tract of more than 200 miles
square to the south-west of the Jumna. Al-Kazwini locates the “Chaos”
in the “Valley of the Moon amongst the mountains of Serendib”
(Ceylon); the Chinese tell the same tale in the campaigns of Hulaku;
and it is known in Armenia. Col. Yule (M. P. ii. 349) suggests that
all these are ramifications of the legend told by Herodotus concerning
the Arabs and their cinnamon (iii. 3). But whence did Herodotus borrow
the tale?
Footnote 24:
Sindbad correctly describes the primitive way of extracting camphor, a
drug unknown to the Greeks and Romans, introduced by the Arabs and
ruined in reputation by M. Raspail. The best Laurus Camphora grows in
the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra and Borneo: although Marsden (Marco Polo)
declares that the tree is not found South of the Equator. In the Calc.
Edit. of two hundred Nights the camphor-island (or peninsula) is
called “Al-Ríhah” which is the Arab name for Jericho-town.
Footnote 25:
In Bul. Edit. Kazkazan: Calc. Karkaddan and others Karkand and
Karkadan; the word being Persian, Karg or Kargadan; the καρτάζυνον of
Ælian (Hist. Anim. xvi. 21). The length of the horn (greatly
exaggerated) shows that the white species is meant; and it supplies
only walking-sticks. Cups are made of the black horn (a bundle of
fibres) which, like Venetian glass, sweat at the touch of poison. A
section of the horn is supposed to show white lines in the figure of a
man, and sundry likenesses of birds; but these I never saw. The
rhinoceros gives splendid sport and the African is perhaps the most
dangerous of noble game. It has served to explain away and abolish the
unicorn among the Scientists of Europe. But Central Africa with one
voice assures us that a horse-like animal with a single erectile horn
on the forehead exists. The late Dr. Baikic, of Niger fame, thoroughly
believed in it and those curious on the subject will read about Abu
Karn (Father of a Horn) in Preface (pp. xvi.-xviii.) of the Voyage au
Darfour, by Mohammed ibn Omar al-Tounsy (Al-Tunisi), Paris, Duprat,
1845.
Footnote 26:
Ibn al-Wardi mentions an “Isle of Apes” in the Sea of China and
Al-Idrísi places it two days’ sail from Sukutra (Dwipa Sukhatra,
Socotra). It is a popular error to explain the Homeric and Herodotean
legend of the Pygmies by anthropoid apes. The Pygmy fable (Pygmæi
Spithamai = 1 cubit = 3 spans) was, as usual, based upon fact, as the
explorations of late years have proved: the dwarfs are homunculi of
various tribes, the Akka, Doko, Tiki-Tiki, Wambilikimo (“two-cubit
men”), the stunted race that share the central regions of
Intertropical Africa with the abnormally tall peoples who speak
dialects of the Great South African tongue, miscalled the “Bantu.”
Hole makes the Pygmies “monkeys,” a word we have borrowed from the
Italians (monichio à mono = ape) and quotes Ptolemy, Νῆσοι τῶν Σατυρῶν
(Ape-islands) East of Sunda.
Footnote 27:
A kind of barge (Arab. Bárijah, plur. Bawárij) used on the Nile of
sub-pyriform shape when seen in bird’s eye. Lane translates “ears like
two mortars” from the Calc. Edit.
Footnote 28:
This giant is distinctly Polyphemus; but the East had giants and
cyclopes of her own (Hierozoicon ii. 845). The Ajáib al-Hind (chapt.
cxxii.) makes Polyphemus copulate with the sheep. Sir John Mandeville
(if such person ever existed) mentions men fifty feet high in the
Indian Islands; and Al-Kazwini and Al-Idrisi transfer them to the Sea
of China, a Botany Bay for monsters in general.
Footnote 29:
Fire is forbidden as a punishment amongst Moslems, the idea being that
it should be reserved for the next world. Hence the sailors fear the
roasting more than the eating: with ours it would probably be the
reverse. The Persian insult “Pidar-sokhtah” = (son of a) burnt father,
is well known. I have noted the advisability of burning the Moslem’s
corpse under certain circumstances: otherwise the murderer may come to
be canonised.
Footnote 30:
Arab. “Mastabah” = the bench or form of masonry before noticed. In
olden Europe benches were much more used than chairs, these being
articles of luxury. So King Horne “sett him abenche;” and hence our
“King’s Bench” (Court).
Footnote 31:
This is from the Bresl. Edit. vol. iv. 32: the Calc. Edit. gives only
an abstract and in the Bul. Edit. the Ogre returned “accompanied by a
female, greater than he and more hideous.” We cannot accept Mistress
Polyphemus.
Footnote 32:
This is from Al-Kazwini, who makes the serpent “wind itself round a
tree or a rock, and thus break to pieces the bones of the breast in
its belly.”
Footnote 33:
“Like a closet,” in the Calc. Edit. The serpent is an exaggeration of
the python which grows to an enormous size. Monstrous Ophidia are
mentioned in sober history, _e.g._ that which delayed the army of
Regulus. Dr. de Lacerda, a sober and sensible Brazilian traveller,
mentions his servants sitting down upon a tree-trunk in the Captaincy
of Sam Paulo (Brazil), which began to move and proved to be a huge
snake. F. M. Pinto (the Sindbad of Portugal though not so respectable)
when in Sumatra takes refuge in a tree from “tigers, crocodiles,
copped adders and serpents which slay men with their breath.” Father
Lobo in Tigre (chapt. x.) was nearly killed by the poison-breath of a
huge snake, and healed himself with a bezoar carried _ad hoc_. Maffæus
makes the breath of crocodiles suavissimus, but that of the Malabar
serpents and vipers “adeo teter ac noxius ut afflatu ipso necare
perhibeantur.”
Footnote 34:
Arab. “Aurat”: the word has been borrowed by the Hindostani jargon,
and means a woman, a wife.
Footnote 35:
So in Al-Idrísi and Langlès: the Bres. Edit. has “Al-Kalásitah”; and
Al-Kazwini “Al-Salámit.” The latter notes in it a petrifying spring
which Camoens (The Lus. x. 104), places in Sunda, _i.e._ Java-Minor of
M. Polo. Some read Salabat-Timor, one of the Moluccas famed for
sanders, cloves, cinnamon, etc. (Purchas ii. 1784.)
Footnote 36:
Evidently the hippopotamus (Pliny, viii. 25; ix. 3 and xxiii. 11). It
can hardly be the Mulaccan Tapir, as shields are not made of the hide.
Hole suggests the buffalo which found its way to Egypt from India
_viâ_ Persia; but this would not be a speciosum miraculum.
Footnote 37:
The ass-headed fish is from Pliny (ix. cap. 3): all those tales are
founded upon the manatee (whose dorsal protuberance may have suggested
the camel), the seal and the dugong or sea-calf. I have noticed
(Zanzibar i. 205) legends of ichthyological marvels current on the
East African seaboard; and even the monsters of the Scottish waters
are not all known: witness the mysterious “brigdie.” See Bochart De
Cetis i. 7; and Purchas iii. 930.
Footnote 38:
The colossal tortoise is noticed by Ælian (De Nat. Animal. xvi. 17),
by Strabo (Lib. xv.), by Pliny (ix. 10) and Diodorus Siculus (iv. 1)
who had heard of a tribe of Chelonophagi. Ælian makes them 16 cubits
long near Taprobane and serving as house-roofs; and others turn the
shell into boats and coracles. A colossochelys was first found on the
Scwalik Hills by Dr. Falconer and Major (afterwards Sir Proby)
Cantley. In 1867 M. Emile Blanchard exhibited to the Académie des
Sciences a monster crab from Japan 1.20 metres long (or 2.50 including
legs); and other travellers have reported 4 metres. These crustacea
seem never to cease growing and attain great dimensions under
favourable circumstances, _i.e._ when not troubled by man.
Footnote 39:
Lane suggests (iii. 97), and with some probability, that the “bird”
was a nautilus; but the wild traditions concerning the barnacle-goose
may perhaps have been the base of the fable. The albatross also was
long supposed never to touch land. Possibly the barnacle, like the
barometz or Tartarean lamb, may be a survivor of the day when the
animal and vegetable kingdoms had not yet branched off into different
directions.
Footnote 40:
Arab. “Zahwah,” also meaning a luncheon. The five daily prayers made
all Moslems take strict account of time, and their nomenclature of its
division is extensive.
Footnote 41:
This is the “insane herb.” Davis, who visited Sumatra in 1599 (Purchas
i. 120) speaks “of a kind of seed, whereof a little being eaten,
maketh a man to turn foole, all things seeming to him to be
metamorphosed.” Linschoten’s “Dutroa” was a poppy-like bud containing
small kernels like melons which stamped and administered as a drink
make a man “as if he were foolish, or out of his wits.” This is Father
Lobo’s “Vanguini” of the Cafres, called by the Portuguese _dutro_
(_Datura Stramonium_) still used by dishonest confectioners. It may be
Dampier’s Ganga (Ganjah) or Bang (Bhang) which he justly describes as
acting differently “according to different constitutions; for some it
stupefies, others it makes sleepy, others merry and some quite mad.”
(Harris, Collect. ii. 900). Dr. Fryer also mentions Duty, Bung and
Post, the Poust of Bernier, an infusion of poppy-seed.
Footnote 42:
Arab. “Ghul,” here an ogre, a cannibal. I cannot but regard the “Ghul
of the waste” as an embodiment of the natural fear and horror which a
man feels when he faces a really dangerous desert. As regards
cannibalism, Al-Islam’s religion of common sense freely allows it when
necessary to save life, and unlike our mawkish modern sensibility,
never blames those who
Alimentis talibus usi
Produxere animos.
Footnote 43:
For Cannibals, see the Massagetæ of Herod (i.), the Padæi of India
(iii.), and the Essedones near Mæotis (iv.); Strabo (lib. iv.) of the
Luci; Pomponius Mela (iii. 7) and St. Jerome (ad Jovinum) of Scoti. M.
Polo locates them in Dragvia, a kingdom of Sumatra (iii. 17), and in
Angaman (the Andamanian Isles?), possibly the ten Maniolai which
Ptolemy (vii.), confusing with the Nicobars, places on the Eastern
side of the Bay of Bengal; and thence derives the Heraklian stone
(magnet) which attracts the iron of ships (See Serapion, De Magnete,
fol. 6, Edit. of 1479, and Brown’s Vulgar Errors, p. 74, 6th Edit.).
Mandeville finds his cannibals in Lamaray (Sumatra) and Barthema in
the “Isle of Gyava” (Java). Ibn Al-Wardi and Al-Kazwini notice them in
the Isle Saksar, in the Sea of the Zanj (Zanzibar): the name is
corrupted Persian “Sag-Sar” (Dogs’-heads) hence the dog-descended race
of Camoens in Pegu (The Lus. x. 122). The Bresl. Edit. (iv. 52) calls
them “Khawárij” = certain sectarians in Eastern Arabia. Needless to
say that cocoa-nut oil would have no stupefying effect unless mixed
with opium or datura, hemp or henbane.
Footnote 44:
Black pepper is produced in the Goanese but we must go south to find
the “Bilád al-Filfil” (home of pepper) _i.e._ Malabar. The exorbitant
prices demanded by Venice for this spice led directly to the discovery
of The Cape route by the Portuguese; as the “Grains of Paradise”
(Amomum Granum Paradisi) induced the English to explore the West
African Coast.
Footnote 45:
Arab. “Kazdír.” Sansk. “Kastír.” Gr. “Kassiteron.” Lat. “Cassiteros,”
evidently derived from one root. The Heb. is “Badih,” a substitute, an
alloy. “Tanakah” is the vulg. Arab. word, a congener of the Assyrian
“Anaku,” and “Kala i” is the corrupt Arab. term used in India.
Footnote 46:
Our Arabian Ulysses had probably left a Penelope or two at home and
finds a Calypso in this Ogygia. His modesty at the mention of
womankind is notable.
Footnote 47:
These are the commonplaces of Moslem consolation on such occasions:
the artistic part is their contrast with the unfortunate widower’s
prospect.
Footnote 48:
Lit. “a margin of stone, like the curb-stone of a well.”
Footnote 49:
I am not aware that this vivisepulture of the widower is the custom of
any race but the fable would be readily suggested by the Sati
(Suttee)-rite of the Hindus. Simple vivisepulture was and is practised
by many people.
Footnote 50:
Because she was weaker than a man. The Bresl. Edit. however, has “a
gugglet of water and five scones.”
Footnote 51: