The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, vol 10 by Sir Richard Francis Burton (essential reading TXT) 📖

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Wa shuj�n� wa furkat� ‘an hab�b�

 

O to whom now of my desire complaining sore shall I * Bewail my parting from my fere compell�d thus to fly (vol. v. 44).

 

Mujtass, the only ‘Ar�z (majz�ah sah�hah, i.e. shortened by one foot and perfect) with equal Zarb (Mac. N. ii. 367): - - U - | U U - - |

Rudd� ‘alayya hab�b�

 

- - U - | - U - - |

L� hajatan l� bi-m�lin

 

To me restore my dear * I want not wealth untold (vol. v. 55).

 

As an instance of the Munsarih, I give the second occurring in The Nights, because it affords me an opportunity to show the student how useful a knowledge of the laws of Prosody frequently proves for ascertaining the correct reading of a text. Mac. N. i.

33 we find the line:

- U U - | - U U - | - U U - |

Arba’atun m� ‘jtama’at kattu iz�.

 

This would be Rajaz with the licence Mufta’ilun for Mustaf’ilun.

But the following lines of the fragment evince, that the metre is Munsarih; hence, a clerical error must lurk somewhere in the second foot. In fact, on page 833 of the same volume, we find the piece repeated, and here the first couplet reads - U U - | - U - U | - U U - |

Arba’atun m� ‘jtama’na kattu siw�

 

U - U - | - U - U | - U U - |

Al� az� mujhat� wa safki dam�

 

Four things which ne’er conjoin unless it be * To storm my vitals and to shed my blood (vol. iii. 237).

 

The Mut�karib, the last of the metres employed in The Nights, has gained a truly historical importance by the part which it plays in Persian literature. In the form of trimetrical double-lines, with a several rhyme for each couplet, it has become the “Nibelungen”-stanza of the Persian epos: Firdaus�‘s immortal “Book of Kings” and Niz�mi’s Iskander-n�mah are written in it, not to mention a host of Masnawis in which Sufic mysticism combats Mohammedan orthodoxy. On account of its warlike and heroical character, therefore, I choose for an example the knightly Jamrak�n’s challenge to the single fight in which he conquers his scarcely less valiant adversary Kaurajan, Mac. N. iii. 296:

 

U - - | U - U | U - - | U - - |

An� ‘l-Jamrak�nu kawiyyn ‘l-jan�ni U - - | U - U | U - - | U - - |

Jam�‘u ‘l-faw�risi takhsh� kit�l�.

 

Here the third syllable of the second foot in each line is shortened by licence, and the final Kasrah of the first line, standing in pause, is long, the metre being the full form of the Mutak�rib as exhibited p. 246, iii. E. 1. If we suppress the Kasrah of al-Jan�ni, which is also allowable in pause, and make the second line to rhyme with the first, saying, for instance: U - - | U - U | U - - | U -

An� ‘l-Jamrak�nu kawiyyu ‘l-jan�n U - - | U - - | U - - | U -

La-yaksh� kit�l� shij�‘u ‘l-zam�n, we obtain the powerful and melodious metre in which the Sh�hn�mah sings of Rustam’s lofty deeds, of the tender love of R�dabah and the tragic downfall of Siyawush

 

Shall I confess that in writing the foregoing pages it has been my ambition to become a conqueror, in a modest way, myself: to conquer, I mean, the prejudice frequently entertained, and shared even by my accomplished countryman, R�ckert, that Arabic Prosody is a clumsy and repulsive doctrine. I have tried to show that it springs naturally from the character of the language, and, intimately connected, as it is, with the grammatical system of the Arabs, it appears to me quite worthy of the acumen of a people, to whom, amongst other things, we owe the invention of Algebra, the stepping-stone of our whole modern system of Mathematics I cannot refrain, therefore, from concluding with a little anecdote anent al-Khal�l, which Ibn Khallik�n tells in the following words. His son went one day into the room where his father was, and on finding him scanning a piece of poetry by the rules of Prosody he ran out and told the people that his father had lost his wits. They went in immediately and related to al-Khal�l what they had heard, on which he addressed his son in these terms:

 

“Had you known what I was saying, you would have excused me, and had you known what you said, I should have blamed you But you did not understand me, so you blamed me, and I knew that you were ignorant, so I pardoned you.”

 

L’Envoi.

 

Here end, to my sorrow, the labours of a quarter-century, and here I must perforce say with the “poets’ Poet,”

 

“Behold! I see the haven nigh at hand, To which I mean my wearie course to bend; Vere the main shete, and bear up with the land The which afore is fairly to be ken’d.”

 

Nothing of importance now indeed remains for me but briefly to estimate the character of my work and to take cordial leave of my readers, thanking them for the interest they have accorded to these volumes and for enabling me thus successfully to complete the decade.

 

Without pudor malus or over-diffidence I would claim to have fulfilled the promise contained in my Foreword. The anthropological notes and notelets, which not only illustrate and read between the lines of the text, but assist the student of Moslem life and of Arabo-Egyptian manners, customs and language in a multitude of matters shunned by books, form a repertory of Eastern knowledge in its esoteric phase, sexual as well as social.

 

To assert that such lore is unnecessary is to state, as every traveller knows, an “absurdum.” Few phenomena are more startling than the vision of a venerable infant, who has lived half his long life in the midst of the wildest anthropological vagaries and monstrosities, and yet who absolutely ignores all that India or Burmah enacts under his very eyes. This is crass ignorance, not the naive innocence of Saint Francis who, seeing a man and a maid in a dark corner, raised his hands to Heaven and thanked the Lord that there was still in the world so much of Christian Charity.

 

Against such lack of knowledge my notes are a protest; and I may claim success despite the difficulty of the task. A traveller familiar with Syria and Palestine, Herr Landberg, writes, “La plume refuserait son service, la langue serait insuffisante, si celui qui connait la vie de tous les jours des Orientaux, surtout des classes �l�vees, voulait la devoiler. L’Europe est bien loin d’en avoir la moindre id�e.”

 

In this matter I have done my best, at a time too when the hapless English traveller is expected to write like a young lady for young ladies, and never to notice what underlies the most superficial stratum. And I also maintain that the free treatment of topics usually taboo’d and held to be “alekta”—unknown and unfitted for publicity—will be a national benefit to an “Empire of Opinion,” whose very basis and buttresses are a thorough knowledge by the rulers of the ruled. Men have been crowned with gold in the Capitol for lesser services rendered to the Respublica.

 

That the work contains errors, shortcomings and many a lapsus, I am the first and foremost to declare. Yet in justice to myself I must also notice that the macul� are few and far between; even the most unfriendly and interested critics have failed to point out an abnormal number of slips. And before pronouncing the “Vos plaudite!” or, as Easterns more politely say, “I implore that my poor name may be raised aloft on the tongue of praise,” let me invoke the fair field and courteous favour which the Persian poet expected from his readers.

 

(Veil it, an fault thou find, nor jibe nor jeer:—

None may be found of faults and failings clear!) RICHARD F. BURTON.

 

Athen�um Club, September 30, �86.

 

Appendix

 

Memorandum

 

I make no apology for the number and extent of bibliographical and other lists given in this Appendix: they may cumber the book but they are necessary to complete my design. This has been to supply throughout the ten volumes the young Arabist and student of Orientalism and Anthropology with such assistance as I can render him; and it is my conviction that if with the aid of this version he will master the original text of the “Thousand Nights and a Night,” he will find himself at home amongst educated men in Egypt and Syria, Najd and Mesopotamia, and be able to converse with them like a gentleman; not, as too often happens in Anglo-India, like a “Ghor�w�l�” (groom). With this object he will learn by heart what instinct and inclination suggest of the proverbs and instances, the verses, the jeux d’esprit and especially the Koranic citations scattered about the text; and my indices will enable him to hunt up the tale or the verses which he may require for quotation wven when writing an ordinary letter to a “native” correspondent. Thus he will be spared the wasted labour of wading through volumes in order to pick up a line.

 

The following is the list of indices:—

 

Appendix I.

 

I. Index to the Tales in the ten Volumes.

II. Alphabetical Table of the Notes (Anthropological, etc.) prepared by F. Steingass, Ph.D.

III. Alphabetical Table of First Lines (metrical portion) in English and Arabic, prepared by Dr. Steingass.

IV. Tables of Contents of the various Arabic texts.

A. The Unfinished Calcutta Edition (1814-18).

B. The Breslau Text (1825-43) from Mr. Payne’s Version.

C. The MacNaghten or Turner-Macan Text (A.D. 1839-42) and the Bulak Edition (A.H. 1251 = A.D. 1835-36), from Mr.

Payne’s Version.

D. The same with Mr. Lane’s and my Version.

 

Appendix II.

 

Contributions to the Bibliography of the Thousand and One Nights, and their Imitations, with a Table shewing the contents of the principal editions and translations of The Nights. By W. F.

Kirby, Author of “Ed-Dimiryaht, and Oriental Romance”; “The New Arabian Nights,” $c.

 

Appendix I

 

Index I

 

Index to the Tales and Proper Names.

 

N.B.—The Roman numerals denote the volume {page numbers have been omitted}

 

Abdullah the Fisherman and Abdullah the Merman, ix.

Abdullah bin Fazl and his brothers, ix.

Abdullah bin Ma’amar with the Man of Bassorah and his slavegirl, v.

Abd al-Rahman the Moor’s story of the Rukh, v.

Abu Hasan al-Ziyadi and the Khorasan Man, iv.

Abu Hasan, how he brake Wind, v.

Abu Isa and Kurrat al-Aye, The Loves of, v.

Abu Ja’afar the Leper, Abu al-Hasan al-Durraj and, v.

Abu Kir the Dyer and Abu Sir the Barber, ix.

Abu al-Aswad and his squinting slavegirl, v.

Abu al Husn and his slavegirl Tawaddud, v.

Abu al Hasan al-Durraj and Abu Ja’afar the Leper, v.

Abu al Hasan of Khorasan, ix.

Abu Mohammed highs Lazybones, iv.

Abu Nowas, Harun al-Rashid with the damsel and, iv.

Abu Nowas and the Three Boys, v.

Abu Sir the Barber, Abu Kir the Dyer and, ix.

Abu Suwayd and the handsome old woman, v.

Abu Yusuf with Harun al-Rashid and his Wazir Ja’afar, The Imam, iv.

Abu Yusuf with Al-Rashid and Zubaydah, The Imam, iv.

Adam, The Birds and Beasts and the Son of, iii.

Adi bin Zayd and the Princess Hind, v.

Ajib, The History of Gharib and his brother, vi.

Ala al-Din Abu al-Shamat, iv.

Alexandria (The Sharper of) and the Master of Police, iv.

Ali bin Bakkar and Shams al-Nahar, iii.

Ali of Cairo, The Adventures of Mercury,