[176] Káf is a range of mountains which, like a vast ring, enclose the Circumambient Ocean (Bahru-’l-Muhít) that surrounds the whole earth, which, according to the Muhammedan cosmography, is flat, not round. These mountains are composed of green chrysolite, the reflection of which causes the greenish (or blueish) tint of the sky. (See Mr. E. J. W. Gibb’s Ottoman Poems, note 6.)—“From Káf to Káf”: from end to end of the earth.—Bistán is the famous mountain on which Farhád chiselled figures.
[177] “Soul-expander”—“Vivifier.”
[178] “Victorious King.”
[179] Here we have a fairy island called “Paradise,” as we have before had a city of the same name, where the artful Dilbar resided—p. 244.
[180] A proud and wicked king of Yaman, called Shaddad, according to the Muhammedan legend, declared blasphemously: “There is no necessity for Paradise for me: I myself will make a Paradise of which no man can have beheld the like.” He sent his officers to find out a suitable spot for a garden, and they discovered such a place on the borders of Syria, where Shaddad, at an immense cost, caused a palace to be erected of gold and silver bricks in alternate courses, and adorned with the most precious stones. In the garden were placed trees of gold and silver, the fruit of which was amethysts, rubies, and other gems (see also ante, p. [166], note on Treasure-trees); and the ground was strewed with musk, ambergris, and saffron. They called this place the Rose Garden of Iram. When Shaddad was about to enter it, accompanied by a vast multitude of troops and attendants, he was met by the Angel of Death, who forthwith seized his impure soul, and then the lightnings of heaven destroyed all living creatures that were there, and the Rose Garden of Iram became hidden from the sight of men.—In the present romance the abode of the parents of Bakáwalí is called the Garden of Iram, to indicate its magnificence.
[181] One of the numerous legends told by Muslims regarding Solomon reappears in the Turkish story-book entitled Qirq vezír taríkhí, where we read that the sage Hebrew king despatched the símurgh—a fabulous bird, similar to the rukh (or roc) of Arabian fictions—to bring the sparrow to his court. But the sparrow, being then with his mate, refused to obey the prophet, or his messenger, and vaunted his prowess and strength, declaring that he was able to pull down Solomon’s palace. When the símurgh reported this to Solomon he replied: “There is no harm in one thus bragging in his own house, and before his wife.”—See Gibb’s Forty Vezírs, p. 97 ff.
[182] The mán has varied at different periods and in different parts of Persia and India; but our author means us to understand that the stone wielded by the demon was very ponderous—three or four hundred pounds’ weight at the least, which would doubtless be to him as a mere “pebble out of the brook”!
[183] “Adorner of Beauty”; the wife of Muzaffar Sháh.
[184] Yet we are told that he is “a little lower than the angels”; and if he was “created perfect,” he has “sought out many inventions”! It is amusing how Muslim writers exaggerate the “dignity” of man: generally he is the most contemptible creature on the face of the earth.
[185] Cf. Shakspeare: “tongues in trees,” etc. And the Persian poet Sa’dí: “The foliage of a newly-clothed tree, to the eye of a discerning man, displays a volume of the wondrous works of the Creator.”