Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London.
[1]. It gives me great pleasure to find, that, while I have been attempting to preserve memorials of the manners and customs of the most polished modern Arab people, one of my learned friends (M. Fulgence Fresnel) has been occupied, with eminent success, in rescuing from oblivion many interesting notices of the history of the early Arabs, and that another (Mr. [now, Sir Gardner] Wilkinson) has been preparing to impart to us an account of the private life, manners, etc., of the Ancient Egyptians. [The very high and just commendation which the works of these two authors (published since the above was written) have obtained from eminent critics renders it needless for me to add my humble testimony to their merits.]
[2]. Among the memoirs in “the great French work” on Egypt, is one entitled “Essai sur les mœurs des habitans modernes de l’Egypte;” but its author appears to me to have fallen into an error of considerable magnitude, in applying to the Egyptians in general, observations which were, in truth, for the most part descriptive of the manners and customs of their naturalized rulers, the Memlooks. It is probable that the Egyptians in some degree imitated, when they were able to do so, the habits and customs of this class: I may however, venture to affirm, that the essay here alluded to does not convey a true notion of their present moral and social state. Its author, moreover, shows himself to have been often extremely careless both in his observations and inquiries: this is particularly evident in his singular misstatement of the correspondence of French and Mohammadan hours, and in the first two pages (in the 8vo. edition) of the section on public fêtes. He has given many just philosophical observations; but these occupy too large a proportion of a memoir scarcely exceeding one-third of the extent of the present work. To show that these remarks are not made in an invidious spirit, I most willingly express my high admiration of other parts of “the great work” (especially the contributions of M. Jomard), relating to subjects which have alike employed my mind and pen, and upon which I shall probably publish my observations.—Burckhardt’s “Arabic Proverbs,” and their illustrations, convey many notions of remarkable customs and traits of character of the modern Egyptians; but are very far from composing a complete exposition, or in every case, a true one; for national proverbs are bad tests of the morality of a people.—There is one work[work], however, which presents most admirable pictures of the manners and customs of the Arabs, and particularly of those of the Egyptians: it is “The Thousand and One Nights,” or Arabian Nights’ Entertainments: if the English reader had possessed a close translation of it with sufficient illustrative notes, I might almost have spared myself the labour of the present undertaking.—[This remark, respecting “The Thousand and One Nights,” was, I believe, the cause of my being employed, since the publication of the first edition of the present work, to translate those admirable tales, and to illustrate them by explanatory notes.]
[3]. Thus commonly pronounced, for Esh-Shaaránee.
[4]. He professes to have had more than thirty wives in the course of his life; but, in saying so, I believe he greatly exaggerates.
[5]. It is a common belief among the Egyptians, that every European traveller who visits their country is an emissary from his King; and it is difficult to convince them that this is not the case: so strange to them is the idea of a man’s incurring great trouble and expense for the purpose of acquiring the knowledge of foreign countries and nations.
[6]. Kur-án, chap, iv., ver. 96.
[7]. Kur-án, chap. lvi., ver 78.