[245]. Arab. “Sá’a,” a measure of corn, etc., to be given in alms. The Kamus makes it = four mudds (each being ⅓ lbs.); the people understand by it four times the measure of a man’s two open hands.
[246]. i.e. till thou restore my eye to me. This style of prothesis without apodosis is very common in Arabic and should be preserved in translation, as it adds a naiveté to the style. We find it in Genesis iii. 2, “And now lest he put forth his hand,” etc.
[247]. They were playing at Muráhanah, like children amongst us. It is also called “Hukm wa Rizá” = order and consent. The penalty is usually something ridiculous, but here it was villainous.
[248]. Every Moslem capital has a “Shaykh of the thieves” who holds regular levées and who will return stolen articles for a consideration; and this has lasted since the days of Diodorus Siculus (Pilgrimage i. 91).
[249]. This was not the condition; but I have left the text as it is characteristic of the writer’s inconsequence.
[250]. The idea would readily occur in Egypt where the pulex is still a plague although the Sultan is said to hold his court at Tiberias. “Male and female” says the rogue, otherwise it would be easy to fill a bushel with fleas. The insect was unknown to older India according to some and was introduced by strangers. This immigration is quite possible. In 1863 the jigger (P. penetrans) was not found in Western Africa; when I returned there in 1882 it had passed over from the Brazil and had become naturalised on the equatorial African seaboard. The Arabs call shrimps and prawns “sea-fleas” (bargúth al-bahr) showing an inland race. (See Pilgrimage i. 322.)
[251]. Submission to the Sultan and the tidings of his well-being should content every Eastern subject. But, as Oriental history shows, the form of government is a Despotism tempered by assassination. And under no rule is man socially freer and his condition contrasts strangely with the grinding social tyranny which characterises every mode of democracy or constitutionalism, i.e. political equality.
[252]. Here the text has “Markúb” = a shoe; elsewhere “Na’al” = a sandal, especially with wooden sole. In classical Arabia, however, “Na’al” may be a shoe, a horse-shoe (iron-plate, not rim like ours). The Bresl. Edit. has “Watá,” any foot gear.
[253]. Water-melons (batáyikh) says the Mac. Edit. a misprint for Aruz or rice. Water-melons are served up raw cut into square mouthfuls, to be eaten with rice and meat. They serve excellently well to keep the palate clean and cool.
[254]. The text recounts the whole story over again—more than European patience can bear.