[FN#52] Arab. "Istikharah," before explained as praying for direction by omens of the rosary, opening the Koran and reading the first verse sighted, etc., etc. At Al-Medinah it is called Khirah and I have suggested (Pilgrimage, ii. 287) that it is a relic of the Azlam or Kidah (divining arrows) of paganism. But the superstition is not local: we have the Sortes Virgilianae (Virgil being a magician) as well as Coranicae.
[FN#53] Arab. "Wujud al-Habib," a pun, also meaning, "Wujud my beloved."
[FN#54] Arab. "Khilal," as an emblem of attenuation occurring in Al-Hariri (Ass. of Alexandria, etc.); also thin as a spindle (Maghzal), as a reed, and dry as a pair of shears. In the Ass. of Barka'id the toothpick is described as a beautiful girl. The use of this cleanly article was enjoined by Mohammed:—"Cleanse your mouths with toothpicks; for your mouths are the abode of the guardian angels; whose pens are the tongues, and whose ink is the spittle of men; and to whom naught is more unbearable than remains of food in the mouth." A mighty apparatus for a small matter; but in very hot lands cleanliness must rank before godliness.
[FN#55] The sense is ambiguous. Lane renders the verse:—"Thou resemblest it (rose) not of my portion" and gives two explanations "because HE is of my portion," or, "because HIS cheek cannot be rosy if MINE is not." Mr. Payne boldly translates
"If the rose ape his cheek, 'Now God forfend,' I say, 'That of my portion aught to pilfer thou shouldst try'."
[FN#56] Arab. "lif" (not "fibres which grow at the top of the trunk," Lane ii. 577); but the fibre of the fronds worked like the cocoa-nut fibre which forms the now well-known Indian "coir." This "lif" is also called "filfil" or "fulfil" which Dr. Jonathan Scott renders "pepper" (Lane i. 8) and it forms a clean succedaneum for one of the uncleanest articles of civilisation, the sponge. It is used in every Hammam and is (or should be) thrown away after use.
[FN#57] Arab. "Shinf;" a course sack, a "gunny-bag;" a net compared with such article.
[FN#58] The eunuch tells him that he is not a "Sandali"=one whose penis and testes are removed; and consequently the highest valued. There are many ways of making the castrato; in some (as here) only the penis is removed, in other the testes are bruised or cut off; but in all cases the animal passion remains, for in man, unlike other animals, the fons veneris is the brain. The story of Abelard proves this. Juvenal derided the idea of married eunuchs and yet almost all of these neutrals have wives with whom they practise the manifold plaisirs de la petite oie (masturbation, tribadism, irrumation, tete-beche, feuille-de- rose, etc.), till they induce the venereal orgasm. Such was the account once given to me by a eunuch's wife; and I need hardly say that she, like her confrerie, was to be pitied. At the critical moment she held up a little pillow for her husband to bite who otherwise would have torn her cheeks or breasts.
[FN#59] In real life the eunuch, as a rule, avoids all allusion to his misfortune, although the slave will often describe his being sold merrily enough.
[FN#60] The visits are in dreamland. The ringdove thanks the
Lord for her (his?) suffering in the holy martyrdom of love.