[FN#165] In the days of the Caliph Al-Mustakfi bi ’llah (A.H. 333=944) the youth of Baghdad studied swimming and it is said that they could swim holding chafing-dishes upon which were cooking-pots and keep afloat till the meat was dressed. The story is that of “The Washerman and his Son who were drowned in the Nile,” of the Book of Sindibad.
[FN#166] Her going to the bath suggested that she was fresh from coition..
[FN#167] Taken from the life of the Egyptian Mameluke Sultan (No. viii, regn. A.H, 825= A.D. 1421) who would not suffer his subjects to prostrate themselves or kiss the ground before him. See D’Herbelot for details.
[FN#168] This nauseous Joe Miller has often been told in the hospitals of London and Paris. It is as old as the Hitopadesa.
[FN#169] Koran iv. 81, “All is from Allah;” but the evil which befals mankind, though ordered by Allah, is yet the consequence of their own wickedness (I add, which wickedness was created by Allah).
[FN#170] The Bresl. Edit. (xii. 266) says “bathing.”
[FN#171] This tale is much like that told in the Fifth Night (vol. i. 54). It is the story of the Prince and the Lamia in the Book of Sindibad wherein it is given with Persian rhetoric and diffuseness.
[FN#172] Arab. “Wa’ar"= rocky, hilly,
tree-less ground unfit for riding. I have noted
that the three Heb. words “Year” (e.g.
Kiryath-Yearin=City of forest), “Choresh”
(now Hirsh, a scrub), and “Pardes” ({Greek
letters} a chase, a hunting-park opposed to
, an orchard) are preserved
in Arabic and are intelligible
in Palestine. (Unexplored Syria, i. 207.)
[FN#173] The privy and the bath are favourite haunts of the Jinns.
[FN#174] Arab history is full of petty wars caused by trifles. In Egypt the clans Sa’ad and Haram and in Syria the Kays and Yaman (which remain to the present day) were as pugnacious as Highland Caterans. The tale bears some likeness to the accumulative nursery rhymes in “The House that Jack Built,” and “The Old Woman and the Crooked Sixpence;” which find their indirect original in an allegorical Talmudic hymn.
[FN#175] This is “The Story of the Old Man who sent his Young Wife to the Market to buy Rice,” told with Persian reflections in the “Book of Sindibad.”
[FN#176] Koran xii. 28. The words were spoken by Potiphar to Joseph.