[ [3] Allusion is here made, not to the well-known species of sumach, called the poison-oak, or toxicodendron, but to the upas, or poison-tree of Java; whether it be real or imaginary, this is no proper place for inquiry.
[ [4] This appellation is here used not ironically, nor with malignity; but it is taken merely to designate a morosely devout people, with peculiar austerity of manners.
[ [5] As the author’s purpose in this Tale may be mistaken, he wishes to observe, that conduct like that of the lady’s here described must be meritorious or censurable just as the motives to it are pure or selfish; that these motives may in a great measure be concealed from the mind of the agent; and that we often take credit to our virtue for actions which spring originally from our tempers, inclinations, or our indifference. It cannot therefore be improper, much less immoral, to give an instance of such self-deception.
[ [6] The ditches of a fen so near the ocean are lined with irregular patches of a coarse and stained lava; a muddy sediment rests on the horse-tail and other perennial herbs, which in part conceal the shallowness of the stream; a fat-leaved pale-flowering scurvy-grass appears early in the year, and the razor-edged bull-rush in the summer and autumn. The fen itself has a dark and saline herbage; there are rushes and arrow-head, and in a few patches the flakes of the cotton-grass are seen, but more commonly the sea-aster, the dullest of that numerous and hardy genus; a thrift, blue in flower, but withering and remaining withered till the winter scatters it; the saltwort, both simple and shrubby; a few kinds of grass changed by their soil and atmosphere, and low plants of two or three denominations undistinguished in a general view of the scenery;—such is the vegetation of the fen when it is at a small distance from the ocean; and in this case there arise from it effluvia strong and peculiar, half-saline, half-putrid, which would be considered by most people as offensive, and by some as dangerous; but there are others to whom singularity of taste or association of ideas has rendered it agreeable and pleasant.
[ [7] Fasil was a rebel chief, and Michael the general of the royal army in Abyssinia, when Mr. Bruce visited that country. In all other respects their characters were nearly similar. They are both represented as cruel and treacherous; and even the apparently strong distinction of loyal and rebellious is in a great measure set aside, when we are informed that Fasil was an open enemy, and Michael an insolent and ambitious controller of the royal person and family.
[ [8] The sovereign here meant is the Haroun Alraschid, or Harun al Rashid, who died early in the ninth century; he is often the hearer, and sometimes the hero, of a tale in the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments.
Transcriber's Notes:
Antiquated spellings have been preserved.
Typographical errors have been silently corrected but other variations in spelling and punctuation remain unaltered.