The next tale, sometimes called “The Two Wazírs” is notable for its regular and genuine drama-intrigue which, however, appears still more elaborate and perfected in other pieces. The richness of this Oriental plot-invention contrasts strongly with all European literatures except the Spaniard’s, whose taste for the theatre determined his direction, and the Italian, which in Boccaccio’s day had borrowed freely through Sicily from the East. And the remarkable deficiency lasted till the romantic movement dawned in France, when Victor Hugo and Alexander Dumas showed their marvellous powers of faultless fancy, boundless imagination and scenic luxuriance, “raising French Poetry from the dead and not mortally wounding French prose.”[[283]] The Two Wazirs is followed by the gem of the volume, The Adventure of the Hunchback-jester (i. [225]), also containing an admirable surprise and a fine development of character, while its “wild but natural simplicity” and its humour are so abounding that it has echoed through the world to the farthest West. It gave to Addison the Story of Alnaschar[[284]] and to Europe the term “Barmecide Feast,” from the “Tale of Shacabac” (vol. i. [343]). The adventures of the corpse were known in Europe long before Galland, as shown by three fabliaux in Barbazan. I have noticed that the Barber’s Tale of himself (i. [317]) is historical and I may add that it is told in detail by Al-Mas’udi (chapt. cxiv).
Follows the tale of Núr al-Dín Alí, and what Galland miscalls “The Fair Persian,” a brightly written historiette with not a few touches of true humour. Noteworthy are the Slaver’s address (vol. ii. [15]), the fine description of the Baghdad garden (vol. ii. [21]–24), the drinking-party (vol. ii. [25]), the Caliph’s frolic (vol. ii. [31]–37) and the happy end of the hero’s misfortunes (vol. ii. [44]). Its brightness is tempered by the gloomy tone of the tale which succeeds, and which has variants in the Bágh o Bahár, a Hindustani version of the Persian “Tale of the Four Darwayshes;” and in the Turkish Kirk Vezir or “Book of the Forty Vezirs.” Its dismal péripéties are relieved only by the witty indecency of Eunuch Bukhayt and the admirable humour of Eunuch Káfur, whose “half-lie” is known throughout the East. Here also the lover’s agonies are piled upon him for the purpose of unpiling at last: the Oriental tale-teller knows by experience that, as a rule, doleful endings “don’t pay.”
The next is the long romance of chivalry, “King Omar bin al-Nu’man” etc., which occupies an eighth of the whole repertory and the best part of two volumes. Mr. Lane omits it because “obscene and tedious,” showing the license with which he translated; and he was set right by a learned reviewer,[[285]] who truly declared that “the omission of half-a-dozen passages out of four hundred pages would fit it for printing in any language[[286]] and the charge of tediousness could hardly have been applied more unhappily.” The tale is interesting as a picture of mediæval Arab chivalry and has many other notable points; for instance, the lines (iii. [86]) beginning “Allah holds the kingship!” are a lesson to the manichæanism of Christian Europe. It relates the doings of three royal generations and has all the characteristics of Eastern art: it is a phantasmagoria of Holy Places, palaces and Harems; convents, castles and caverns, here restful with gentle landscapes (ii. [240]) and there bristling with furious battle-pictures (ii. [117], [221]–8, 249) and tales of princely prowess and knightly derring-do. The characters stand out well. King Nu’man is an old lecher who deserves his death; the ancient Dame Zát al-Dawáhí merits her title Lady of Calamities (to her foes); Princess Abrízah appears as a charming Amazon, doomed to a miserable and pathetic end; Zau al-Makán is a wise and pious royalty; Nuzhat al-Zamán, though a longsome talker, is a model sister; the Wazir Dandán, a sage and sagacious counsellor, contrasts with the Chamberlain, an ambitious miscreant; Kánmakán is the typical Arab knight, gentle and brave:—
Now managing the mouthes of stubborne steedes
Now practising the proof of warlike deedes;
And the kind-hearted, simple-minded Stoker serves as a foil to the villains, the kidnapping Badawi and Ghazbán the detestable negro. The fortunes of the family are interrupted by two episodes, both equally remarkable. Taj al-Mulúk[[287]] is the model lover whom no difficulties or dangers can daunt. In Azíz and Azízah (ii. [291]) we have the beau idéal of a loving woman: the writer’s object was to represent a “softy” who had the luck to win the love of a beautiful and clever cousin and the mad folly to break her heart. The poetical justice which he receives at the hands of women of quite another stamp leaves nothing to be desired. Finally the plot of “King Omar” is well worked out; and the gathering of all the actors upon the stage before the curtain drops may be improbable but it is highly artistic.
The long Crusading Romance is relieved by a sequence of sixteen fabliaux, partly historiettes of men and beasts and partly apologues proper—a subject already noticed. We have then (iii. [162]) the saddening and dreary love-tale of Ali bin Bakkár, a Persian youth and the Caliph’s concubine Shams al-Nahár. Here the end is made doleful enough by the deaths of the “two martyrs,” who are killed off, like Romeo and Juliet,[[288]] a lesson that the course of true Love is sometimes troubled and that men as well as women can die of the so-called “tender passion.” It is followed (iii. [212]) by the long tale of Kamar al-Zamán, or Moon of the Age, the first of that name, the “Camaralzaman” whom Galland introduced into the best European society. Like “The Ebony Horse” it seems to have been derived from a common source with “Peter of Provence” and “Cleomades and Claremond”; and we can hardly wonder at its wide diffusion: the tale is brimful of life, change, movement, containing as much character and incident as would fill a modern three-volumer and the Supernatural pleasantly jostles the Natural; Dahnash the Jinn and Maymúnah daughter of Al-Dimiryát,[[289]] a renowned King of the Jann, being as human in their jealousy about the virtue of their lovers as any children of Adam, and so their metamorphosis to fleas has all the effect of a surprise. The troupe is again drawn with a broad firm touch. Prince Charming, the hero, is weak and wilful, shifty and immoral, hasty and violent: his two spouses are rivals in abominations as his sons, Amjad and As’ad, are examples of a fraternal affection rarely found in half-brothers by sister-wives. There is at least one fine melodramatic situation (iii. [228]); and marvellous feats of indecency, a practical joke which would occur only to the canopic mind (iii. [300]–305), emphasise the recovery of her husband by that remarkable “blackguard,” the Lady Budúr. The interpolated tale of Ni’amah and Naomi (iv. [1]), a simple and pleasing narrative of youthful amours, contrasts well with the boiling passions of the incestuous and murderous Queens and serves as a pause before the grand dénoûement when the parted meet, the lost are found, the unwedded are wedded and all ends merrily as a xixth century novel.
The long tale of Alá al-Din, our old friend “Aladdin,” is wholly out of place in its present position (iv. [29]): it is a counterpart of Ali Núr al-Dín and Miriam the Girdle-girl (vol. ix. [1]); and the mention of the Shahbandar or Harbour-master (iv. [29]), the Kunsúl or Consul (p. [84]), the Kaptán (Capitano), the use of cannon at sea and the choice of Genoa-city (p. [85]) prove that it belongs to the xvth or xvith century and should accompany Kamar al-Zamán II. and Ma’aruf at the end of The Nights. Despite the lutist Zubaydah being carried off by the Jinn, the Magic Couch, a modification of Solomon’s carpet, and the murder of the King who refused to islamize, it is evidently a European tale and I believe with Dr. Bacher that it is founded upon the legend of “Charlemagne’s” daughter Emma and his secretary Eginhardt, as has been noted in the counterpart (vol. ix. [1]).
This quasi-historical fiction is followed by a succession of fabliaux, novelle and historiettes which fill the rest of vol. iv. and the whole of vol. v. till we reach the terminal story, The Queen of the Serpents (vol. v. pp. [304]–329). It appears to me that most of them are historical and could easily be traced. Not a few are in Al-Mas’udi; for instance the grim Tale of Hatim of Tayy (vol. iv. [94]) is given bodily in “Meads of Gold” (iii. [327]); and the two adventures of Ibrahim al-Mahdi with the barber-surgeon (vol. iv. [103]) and the Merchant’s sister (vol. iv. [176]) are in his pages (vol. vii. pp. [68] and [18]). The City of Lubtayt (vol. iv. [99]) embodies the legend of Don Rodrigo, last of the Goths, and may have reached the ears of Washington Irving; Many-columned Iram (vol. iv. [113]) is held by all Moslems to be factual and sundry writers have recorded the tricks played by Al-Maamun with the Pyramids of Jízah which still show his handiwork.[[290]] The germ of Isaac of Mosul (vol. iv. [119]) is found in Al-Mas’udi who (vii. [65]) names “Burán” the poetess (Ibn Khall. i. 268); and Harun al-Rashid and the Slave-girl (vol. iv. [153]) is told by a host of writers. Ali the Persian is a rollicking tale of fun from some Iranian jest-book: Abu Mohammed hight Lazybones belongs to the cycle of “Sindbad the Seaman,” with a touch of Whittington and his Cat; and Zumurrud (“Smaragdine”) in Ali Shar (vol. iv. [187]) shows at her sale the impudence of Miriam the Girdle-girl and in bed the fescennine device of the Lady Budur. The “Ruined Man who became Rich,” etc. (vol. iv. [289]) is historical and Al-Mas’udi (vii. [281]) relates the coquetry of Mahbúbah the concubine (vol. iv. [291]): the historian also quotes four couplets, two identical with Nos. 1 and 2 in The Nights (vol. iv. [292]) and adding:—
Then see the slave who lords it o’er her lord ✿ In lover privacy and public site: