书城公版Volume Eight
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第123章

[283]Arab.'Zimmi'which Lane (ii.474) aptly translates a 'tributary.'The Koran (chaps.ix.) orders Unbelievers to Islamize or to 'pay tribute by right of subjection'(lit.an yadin=out of hand,an expression much debated).The least tribute is one dinar per annum which goes to the poor-rate.and for this the Kafir enjoys protection and almost all the civil rights of Moslems.As it is a question of 'loaves and fishes'there is much to say on the subject; 'loaves and fishes'being the main base and foundation of all religious establishments.

[284]This tetrastich has before occurred,so I quote Lane (ii.444).

[285]In Night xxxv.the same occurs with a difference.

[286]The old rite,I repeat,has lost amongst all but the noblest of Arab tribes the whole of its significance; and the traveller must be careful how he trusts to the phrase 'Nahnu malihin'we are bound together by the salt.

[287]Arab.'Alama'= Ala-ma = upon what ? wherefore ?

[288]Arab.'Mauz'; hence the Linnean name Musa (paradisiaca,etc.).The word is explained by Sale (Koran,chaps.xxxvii.146) as 'a small tree or shrub;'and he would identify it with Jonah's gourd.

[289]Lane (ii.446) 'bald wolf or empowered fate,'reading (with Mac.) Kaza for Kattan (cat).

[290]i.e.'the Orthodox in the Faith.'Rashid is a proper name,witness that scourge of Syria,Rashid Pasha.Born in 1830,of the Haji Nazir Agha family,Darrah-Beys of Macedonian Draina,he was educated in Paris where he learned the usual-hatred of Europeans: he entered the Egyptian service in 1851,and,presently exchanging it for the Turkish,became in due time Wali (Governor-General) of Syria which he plundered most shamelessly.

Recalled in 1872,he eventually entered the Ministry and on June 15.1876,he was shot down,with other villains like himself,by gallant Captain Hasan,the Circassian (Yarham-hu 'llah !).

[291]Quoted from a piece of verse,of which more presently.

[292]This tetrastich has occurred before (Night cxciii.).I quote Lane (ii.449),who quotes Dryden's Spanish Friar,'There is a pleasure sure in being mad Which none but madmen know.'

[293]Lane (ii.449) gives a tradition of the Prophet,'Whoso is in love,and acteth chastely,and concealeth (his passion) and dieth,dieth a martyr.'Sakar is No.5 Hell for Magi Guebres,Parsis,etc.,it is used in the comic Persian curse,'Fi'n-nari wa Sakar al-jadd w'al-pidar'=ln Hell and Sakar his grandfather and his father.

[294]Arab.'Sifr': I have warned readers that whistling is considered a kind of devilish speech by the Arabs,especially the Badawin,and that the traveller must avoid it.It savours of idolatry: in the Koran we find (chaps.viii.35),'Their prayer at the House of God (Ka'abah) is none other than whistling and hand-clapping;'and tradition says that they whistled through their fingers.Besides many of the Jinn have only round holes by way of mouths and their speech is whistling a kind of bird language like sibilant English.

[295]Arab.'Kil wa kal'=lit.'it was said and he said;'a popular phrase for chit chat,tittle-tattle,prattle and prate,etc.

[296]Arab.'Hadis.'comparing it with a tradition of the Prophet.

[297]Arab.'Mikashshah,'the thick part of a midrib of a palm-frond soaked for some days in water and beaten out till the fibres separate.It makes an exceedingly hard,although not a lasting broom.

[298]Persian,'the youth,the brave;'Sansk.Yuvan: and Lat.

Juvenis.The Kurd,in tales,is generally a sturdy thief; and in real-life is little better.

[299]Arab.'Ya Shatir ;'lit.O clever one (in a bad sense).

[300]Lane (ii.453) has it.'that I may dress thy hair''etc.

This is Bowdlerising with a witness.

[301]The sign of respect when a personage dismounts.(Pilgrimage i.77.)

[302]So the Hindus speak of 'the defilement of separation'as if it were an impurity.

[303]Lane (i.605) gives a long and instructive note on these public royal-banquets which were expected from the lieges by Moslem subjects.The hanging-penalty is,perhaps,a tattle exaggerated;

but we find the same excess in the priestly Gesta Romanorum.

[304]Had he eaten it he would have become her guest.Amongst the older Badawin it was sufficient to spit upon a man (in entreaty) to claim his protection: so the horse-thieves when caught were placed in a hole in the ground covered over with matting to prevent this happening.Similarly Saladin (Salah al-Din) the chivalrous would not order a cup of water for the robber,Reynald de Chatillon,before putting him to death [305]Arab.'Kishk'properly 'Kashk'=wheat-meal-coarsely ground and eaten with milk or broth.It is de rigueur with the Egyptian Copts on the 'Friday of Sorrow'(Good Friday): and Lane gives the recipe for making it (M.E.chaps.xxvi.)

[306]In those days distinctive of Moslems.

[307]The euphemism has before been noticed: the Moslem reader would not like to pronounce the words 'I am a Nazarene.'The same formula occurs a little lower down to save the reciter or reader from saying 'Be my wife divorced,'etc.

[308]Arab,'Hajj,'a favourite Egyptianism.We are wrong to write Hajji which an Eastern would pronounce Haj-ji.

[309]This is Cairene 'chaff.'

[310]Whose shell fits very tight.

[311]His hand was like a raven's because he ate with thumb and two fingers and it came up with the rice about it like a camel's hoof in dirty ground.This refers to the proverb (Burckhardt,756),'He comes down a crow-claw (small) and comes up a camel-hoof (huge and round).'

[312]Easterns have a superstitious belief in the powers of food: I knew a learned man who never sat down to eat without a ceremonious salam to his meat.

[313]Lane (ii.464),uses the vile Turkish corruption 'Rustum,'which,like its fellow 'Rustem,'would make a Persian shudder.

[314]Arab.'Darrij'i.e.let them slide (Americanice).