So far as I am aware, this tale of “The Lion’s Track” is not popularly known in any European country besides Italy; and it is not found in any of the Western versions of the Book of Sindibad, generally known under the title of the “History of the Seven Wise Masters,” how, then, did it reach Venice, and become among the people “familiar in their mouths as household words?” I answer, that the intimate commercial relations which long existed between the Venetian Republic and Egypt and Syria are amply sufficient to account for the currency of this and scores of other Eastern tales in Italy.  This is not one of those fictions introduced into the south of Europe through the Ottomans, since Boccaccio has made use of the first part of it in his “Decameron,” Day I. nov. 5; and it is curious to observe that the garbled Venetian popular version has preserved the chief characteristic of the Eastern story—­the allegorical reference to the king as a lion and his assuring the husband that the lion had done no injury to his “Vineyard.”

   King Shah Bakht and his wazir al-Rahwan.—­Vol.  XI. p. 127.

While the frame-story of this interesting group is similar to that of the Ten Wazirs (vol. i. p. 37), insomuch as in both a king’s favourite is sentenced to death in consequence of the false accusations of his enemies, and obtains a respite from day to day by relating stories to the king, there is yet a very important difference:  Like those of the renowned Shahrazad, the stories which Al-Rahwan tells have no particular, at least no uniform, “purpose,” his sole object being to prolong his life by telling the king an entertaining story, promising, when he has ended his recital, to relate one still “stranger” the next night, if the king will spare his life another day.  On the other hand, Bakhtyar, while actuated by the same motive, appeals to the king’s reason, by relating stories distinctly designed to exhibit the evils of hasty judgements and precipitate conduct—­in fact, to illustrate the maxim,

     Each order given by a reigning king,
          Should after long reflection be expressed;
     For it may be that endless woe will spring
          From a command he paused not to digest.

And in this respect they are consistent with the circumstances of the case, like the tales of the Book of Sindibad, from which the frame of the Ten Wazirs was imitated, and in which the Wazirs relate stories showing the depravity and profligacy of women and that no reliance should be placed on their unsupported assertions, and to these the lady opposes equally cogent stories setting forth the wickedness and perfidy of men.  Closely resembling the frame-story of the Ten Wazirs, however, is that of a Tamil romance entitled, “Alakeswara Katha,” a copy of which, written on palm leaves, was in the celebrated Mackenzie collection, of which Dr. H. H. Wilson published a descriptive catalogue;