[446]. Arab. “Baltiyah,” Sonnini’s “Bolti” and Nébuleux (because it is dozid-coloured when fried), the Labrus Niloticus from its labra or large fleshy lips. It lives on the “leaves of Paradise” hence the flesh is delicate and savoury and it is caught with the épervier or sweep-net in the Nile, canals and pools.
[447]. Arab. “Liyyah,” not a delicate comparison, but exceedingly apt besides rhyming to “Baltiyah.” The cauda of the “five-quarter sheep, whose tails are so broad and thick that there is as much flesh upon them as upon a quarter of their body,” must not be confounded with the lank appendage of Our English muttons. See i. 25, Dr. Burnell’s Linschoten (Hakluyt Soc. 1885).
[448]. A variant occurs in vol. iv. [191].
[449]. Arab. “Tars Daylami,” a small shield of bright metal.
[450]. Arab. “Kaukab al-durri,” see Pilgrimage ii. 82.
[451]. Arab. “Kusúf” applied to the moon; Khusúf being the solar eclipse.
[452]. “May Abú Lahab’s hands perish ... and his wife be a bearer of faggots!” Koran cxi. 184. The allusion is neat.
[453]. Alluding to the Angels who shoot down the Jinn. See vol. i. [224]. The index misprints “Shibáh.”
[454]. For a similar scene see Ali Shar and Zumurrud, vol. iv. [187].
[455]. i.e. of the girl whom as the sequel shows, her owner had promised not to sell without her consent. This was and is a common practice. See vol. iv. [192].