A man, although poor, will not expose his son;
          But however rich, will not preserve his daughter.

See the commentators’ descriptions of the Wa’d al-Banat or burial of Mauudat (living daughters), the barbarous custom of the pagan Arabs (Koran, chaps.  Xvi.  And lxxxi.) one of the many abominations, like the murderous vow of Jephtha, to which Al-Islam put a summary stop. (Ibn Khallikan, iii. 609-606) For such outcast children reported to be monsters, see pp. 402-412 of Mr. Clouston’s “Asiatic and European versions of four of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales,” printed by the Chaucer Society.

[FN#354] Hind.  Chhuchhundar (Sorex coerulescens) which occurs repeatedly in verse; e.g., when speaking of low men advanced to high degree, the people say:—­

          Chhuchhundar-ke sir-par Chambeli-ka tel. 
          The Jasmine-oil on the musk-rat’s head.

In Galland the Sultanah is brought to bed of un morceau de bois; and his Indian translator is more consequent, Hahn, as has been seen, also has the mouse but Hahn could hardly have reached Hindostan.

[FN#355] This title of Shahinshah was first assumed by Ardashir, the great Persian conqueror, after slaying the King of Ispahan, Ardawan. (Tabari ii. 73.)

[FN#356] This imprisonment of the good Queen reminds home readers of the “Cage of Clapham” wherein a woman with child was imprisoned in A.D. 1700, and which was noted by Sir George Grove as still in existence about 1830.

[FN#357] Arab.  Ayyam al-Nifas = the period of forty days after labour during which, according to Moslem law, a woman may not cohabit with her husband.

[FN#358] A clarum et venerabile nomen in Persia; meaning one of the Spirits that preside over beasts of burden; also a king in general, the P.N. of an ancient sovereign, etc.

[FN#359] This is the older pronunciation of the mod. (Khusrau) “Parviz”; and I owe an apology to Mr. C.J.  Lyall (Ancient Arabian Poetry) for terming his “Khusrau Parvez” an “ugly Indianism” (The Academy, No. 100).  As he says (Ibid. vol. x. 85), “the Indians did not invent for Persian words the sounds e and o, called majhul (i.e. ‘not known in Arabic’) by the Arabs, but received them at a time when these wounds were universally used in Persia.  The substitution by Persians of i and u for e and o is quite modern.”

[FN#360] i.e.  Fairy-born, the {Greek} (Parysatis) of the Greeks which some miswrite {Greek}.

[FN#361] In Arab.  Usually shortened to “Hazar” (bird of a thousand tales = the Thousand), generally called “’Andalib:”  Galland has Bulbulhezer and some of his translators debase it to Bulbulkezer.  See vol. v. 148, and the Hazar-dastan of Kazwini (De Sacy, Chrest. iii. 413).  These rarities represent the Rukh’s egg in “Alaeddin.”