[534]. Arab. “Yá fulán,” O certain person! See vol. iii. [191].
[535]. Father of Harun al-Rashid A.H. 158–169 (= 775–785) third Abbaside who both in the Mac. and the Bul. Edits. is called “the fifth of the sons of Al-Abbas.” He was a good poet and a man of letters, also a fierce persecutor of the “Zindiks” (Al-Siyuti 278), a term especially applied to those who read the Zend books and adhered to Zoroastrianism, although afterwards applied to any heretic or atheist. He made many changes at Meccah and was the first who had a train of camels laden with snow for his refreshment along a measured road of 700 miles (Gibbon, chapt. lii.). He died of an accident when hunting: others say he was poisoned after leaving his throne to his sons Musa al-Hadi and Harun al-Rashid. The name means “Heaven-directed” and must not be confounded with the title of the twelfth Shi’ah Imám Mohammed Abu al-Kásim born at Sarramanrai A.H. 255 whom Sale (sect. iv.) calls “Mahdi or Director” and whose expected return has caused and will cause so much trouble in Al-Islam.
[536]. This speciosum miraculum must not be held a proof that the tale was written many years after the days of Al-Rashid. Miracles grow apace in the East and a few years suffice to mature them. The invasion of Abraha the Abyssinia took place during the year of Mohammed’s birth; and yet in an early chapter of the Koran (No. cv.) written perhaps forty-five years afterwards, the small-pox is turned into a puerile and extravagant miracle. I myself became the subject of a miracle in Sind which is duly chronicled in the family-annals of a certain Pir or religious teacher. See History of Sindh (p. 230) and Sind Revisited (i. 156).
[537]. In the texts, “Sixth.”
[538]. Arab. “Najis” = ceremonially impure especially the dog’s mouth like the cow’s mouth amongst the Hindus; and requiring after contact the Wuzu-ablution before the Moslem can pray.
[539]. Arab. “Akl al-hashamah” (hashamah = retinue; hishmah = reverence, bashfulness) which may also mean “decorously and respectfully,” according to the vowel-points.
[540]. i.e. as the Viceregent of Allah and Vicar of the Prophet.
[541]. For the superiority of mankind to the Jinn see vol. viii. [5]; 44.
[542]. According to Al-Siyuti, Harun Al-Rashid prayed every day a hundred bows.
[543]. As the sad end of his betrothed was still to be accounted for.