"Captain Burton has begun to issue the volumes of his subscription translation of the 'Arabian Nights,' and its fortunate possessors will now be able to realize the full flavour of Oriental feeling. They will now have the great storehouse of Eastern folklore opened to them, and Captain Burton's minute acquaintance with Eastern life makes his comments invaluable. In this respect, as well as in the freeness of the translation, the version will be distinguished from its many predecessors. Captain Burton's preface, it may be observed, bears traces of soreness at official neglect. Indeed it seems curious that his services could not have been utilized in the Soudan, when the want of competent Arabic scholars was so severely felt."
Daily Exchange, September 19th, 1883.
"The first volume of Captain Burton's 'Thousand Nights and a Night,' printed at Benares by the Kamashastra Society, for private subscribers only, has been delivered to the latter. If the other nine portions equal the first, English literature will be the richer by a work the like of which is rare. The English is strong and vitally idiomatic. It is the English of Shakespeare and Jeremy Taylor, the English of Robert Browning, with a curiously varied admixture of modern colloquial phraseology. I confess that I was not prepared, familiar as I was with Captain Burton's other work, to find so perfect a command of clear and vigorous style on the part of the great traveller and Oriental scholar. I must say that the tone of the work is singularly robust and healthy. What a treasurehouse Captain Burton has opened! Until he turned the key we knew little or nothing of the 'Nights,' and the notes which he has added to the work have a value that is simply unique."
Standard, September 12th.
"The first volume of Captain Burton's long-expected edition of the 'Arabian Nights' was issued yesterday to those who are in a position to avail themselves of the wealth of learning contained in this monumental labour of the famous Eastern traveller. The book is printed for subscribers only, and is sold at a price which is not likely to be paid by any save the scholars and students for whose instruction it is intended.
"Moreover, no previous editor—not even Lane himself—had a tithe of Captain Burton's acquaintance with the manners and customs of the Moslem East. Hence, not unfrequently, they made ludicrous blunders, and in no instance did they supply anything like the explanatory notes which have added so greatly to the value of this issue of 'Alf Laylah wa Laylah.'
"On the other hand, apart from the language, the general tone of the 'Nights' is exceptionally high and pure. The devotional fervour, as Captain Burton justly claims, often rises to the boiling point of fanaticism, and the pathos is sweet and deep, genuine and tender, simple and true. Its life—strong, splendid, and multitudinous—is everywhere flavoured with that unaffected pessimism and constitutional melancholy which strikes deepest root under the brightest skies. The Kazi administers poetical justice with exemplary impartiality; and so healthy is the morale that at times we descry vistas of a transcendental morality—the morality of Socrates and Plato.
"In no other work is Eastern life so vividly pourtrayed. This work, illuminated with notes so full of learning, should give the nation an opportunity for wiping away that reproach of neglect which Captain Burton seems to feel more keenly than he cares to express."