[175]. Son of Ibrahim al-Mosili, a musician poet and favourite with the Caliphs Harun al-Rashid and Al-Maamun. He made his name immortal by being the first who reduced Arab harmony to systematic rules; and he wrote a biography of musicians referred to by Al-Hariri in the Séance of Singar.
[176]. This must not be confounded with the “pissing against the wall” of 1 Kings, xiv. 10, where watering against a wall denotes a man as opposed to a woman.
[177]. Arab. “Zambíl” or “Zimbíl,” a limp basket made of plaited palm-leaves and generally two handled. It is used for many purposes, from carrying poultry to carrying earth.
[178]. Here we have again the Syriac “Bakhkhun Bakhkhun” = well done! It is the Pers. Áferín and means “all praise be to him.”
[179]. Arab. “A Tufayli?” So the Arab. Prov. (ii. 838) “More intrusive than Tufayl” (prob. the P.N. of a notorious spunger). The Badawin call “Wárish” a man who sits down to meat unbidden and to drink Wághil; but townsfolk apply the latter to the “Wárish.”
[180]. Arab. “Artál” = rotoli, pounds; and
A pint is a pound
All the world round;
except in highly civilised lands where the pint has a curious power of shrinking.