Whene'er you're in doubt, said a sage I once knew,
'Twixt two lines of conduct which course to pursue,
Ask a woman's advice, and whate'er she advise
Do the very reverse, and you're sure to be wise.
The Romance of the Ten Wazirs occurs in dislocated shape in the "Nouveaux Contes Arabes, ou Supplément aux Mille et une Nuits," etc., par M. l'Abbé * * * Paris, 1788. It is the "Story of Bohetzad (Bakht-zád=Luck-born, v.p.), and his Ten Viziers," in vol. iii., pp. 2-30 of the "Arabian Tales," etc., published by Dom Chavis and M. Cazotte, in 1785; a copy of the English translation by Robert Heron, Edinburgh, 1792, I owe to the kindness of Mr. Leonard Smithers of Sheffield. It appears also in vol. viii. of M. C. de Perceval's Edition of The Nights; in Gauttier's Edition (vol. vi.), and as the "Historia Decem Vizirorum et filii Regis Azad-bacht," text and translation by Gustav Knös, of Goettingen (1807). For the Turkish, Malay and other versions see (p. xxxviii. etc.) "The Bakhtiy?r N?ma," etc. Edited (from the Sir William. Ouseley version of 1801) by Mr. W. A. Clouston and privately printed, London, 1883. The notes are valuable but their worth is sadly injured by the want of an index. I am pleased to see that Mr. E. J. W. Gibb is publishing the "History of the Forty Vezirs; or, the Story of the Forty Morns and Eves," written in Turkish by "Sheykh-Zadah," evidently a nom de plume (for Ahmad al-Misri?), and translated from an Arabic MS. which probably dated about the xvth century.]
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[ In Chavis and Cazotte, the "kingdom of Dineroux (comprehending all Syria and the isles of the Indian Ocean) whose capital was Issessara." An article in the Edinburgh Review (July, 1886), calls the "Supplement" a "bare-faced forgery"; but evidently the writer should have "read up" his subject before writing.]
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[ The Persian form; in Arab. Sijistán, the classical Drangiana or province East of Fars=Persia proper. It is famed in legend as the feof of hero Rustam.]
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[ Arab. Ráwi=a professional tale-teller, which Mr. Payne justly holds to be a clerical error for "Rái, a beholder, one who seeth.">[
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[ In Persian the name would be Bahr-i-Jaur="luck" (or fortune, "bahr") of Jaur- (or Júr-) city.]