[FN#272] This reminds us of the Bir Al-Khatim (Well of the Signet) at Al-Medinah; in which Caliph Osman during his sixth year dropped from his finger the silver ring belonging to the founder of Al-Islam, engraved in three lines with “Mohammed / Apostle (of) / Allah /.”  It had served to sign the letters sent to neighboring kings and had descended to the first three successors (Pilgrimage ii. 219).  Mohammed owned three seal-rings, the golden one he destroyed himself; and the third, which was of carnelian, was buried with other objects by his heirs.  The late Subhi Pasha used to declare that the latter had been brought to him with early Moslem coins by an Arab, and when he died he left it to the Sultan.

[FN#273] Mr. Payne quotes Al-Tabari’s version of this anecdote.  “El-Mehdi had presented his son Haroun with a ruby ring, worth a hundred thousand dinars, and the latter being one day with his brother (the then reigning Khalif), El Hadi saw the ring on his finger and desired it.  So, when Haroun went out from him, he sent after him, to seek the ring of him.  The Khalif’s messenger overtook Er Reshid on the bridge over the Tigris and acquainted him with his errand; whereupon the prince, enraged at the demand, pulled off the ring and threw it into the river.  When El Hadi died and Er Rashid succeeded to the throne, he went with his suite to the bridge in question and bade his Vizier Yehya ben Khalid send for divers and cause them to make search for the ring.  It had then been five months in the water and no one believed it would be found.  However, the divers plunged into the river and found the ring in the very place where he had thrown it in, whereat Haroun rejoiced with an exceeding joy, regarding it as a presage of fair fortune.”

[FN#274] Not historically correct.  Al-Rashid made Yahya, father of Ja’afar, his Wazir; and the minister’s two sons, Fazl and Ja’afar, acted as his lieutenants for seventeen years from A.D. 786 till the destruction of the Barmecides in A.D. 803.  The tale-teller quotes Ja’afar because he was the most famous of the house.

[FN#275] Perhaps after marrying Ja’afar to his sister.  But the endearing name was usually addressed to Ja’afar’s elder brother Fazl, who was the Caliph’s foster-brother.

[FN#276] Read seventeen:  all these minor inaccuracies tend to invalidate the main statement.

[FN#277] Arab.  “Yar’ad” which may mean “thundereth.”  The dark saying apparently means, Do good whilst thou art in power and thereby strengthen thyself.

[FN#278] The lady seems to have made the first advances and Bin Abu Hajilah quotes a sixaine in which she amorously addresses her spouse.  See D’Herbelot, s.v.  Abbassa.

[FN#279] The tale-teller passes with a very light hand over the horrors of a massacre which terrified and scandalised the then civilised world, and which still haunt Moslem history.  The Caliph, like the eking, can do no wrong; and, as Viceregent of Allah upon Earth, what would be deadly crime and mortal sin in others becomes in his case an ordinance from above.  These actions are superhuman events and fatal which man must not judge nor feel any sentiment concerning them save one of mysterious respect.  For the slaughter of the Barmecides, see my Terminal Essay, vol. x.