[81]. The MS. writes the word Khwájá for Khwájah (see vol. vi. 46). Here we are at once interested in the scapegrace who looked Excelsior. In fact the tale begins with a strong inducement to boyish vagabondage and scampish indolence; but the Moslem would see in it the hand of Destiny bringing good out of evil. Amongst other meanings of “Khwájah” it is a honorific title given by Khorásánis to their notables. In Arab. the similarity of the word to “Khuwáj” = hunger, has given rise to a host of conceits, more or less frigid (Ibn Khallikán, iii. 45).
[82]. Arab. “Wáhid min al-Tujjár,” the very vulgar style.
[83]. i.e. the Saturday (see vol. ii. 305) established as a God’s rest by the so-called “Mosaic” commandment No. iv. How it gradually passed out of observance, after so many centuries of most stringent application, I cannot discover: certainly the text in Cor. ii. 16–17 is insufficient to abolish or supersede an order given with such singular majesty and impressiveness by God and so strictly obeyed by man. The popular idea is that the Jewish Sabbath was done away with in Christ; and that sundry of the 1604 councils, e.g. Laodicea, anathematized those who kept it holy after such fashion. With the day the aim and object changed; and the early Fathers made it the “Feast of the Resurrection” which could not be kept too joyously. The “Sabbatismus” of our Sabbatarians, who return to the Israelitic practice and yet honour the wrong day, is heretical and vastly illogical; and the Sunday is better kept in France, Italy and other “Catholic” countries than in England and Scotland.
[84]. For “Mushayyadát” see vol. viii. 23.
[85]. All these words sárú, dakhalú, jalasú, &c. are in the plur. for the dual—popular and vulgar speech. It is so throughout the MS.
[86]. The Persians apply the Arab. word “Sahrá” = desert, to the waste grounds about a town.
[87]. Arab. Kashákísh from the quadril. √ kashkasha = he gathered fuel.
[88]. In text “Shayy bi-lásh” which would mean lit. a thing gratis or in vain.
[89]. In the text “Sabba raml” = cast in sand. It maybe a clerical error for “Zaraba raml” = he struck sand i.e. made geomantic figures.
[90]. Arab. Mauza’ = a place, an apartment, a saloon.