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[ The word here translated "invited guest" reads in the MS. "Mad'úr." In this form it is no dictionary word, but under the root "D'r" I find in the Muhít: "wa 'l-'ámatu takúlu fulánun da'irun ya'ní ghalízun jáfin" = the common people say such a one is "da'ir," i.e., rude, churlish. "Mad'úr" may be a synonym and rendered accordingly: as though thou wert a boor or clown.—ST]
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[ A neat specimen of the figure anachronism. Al-Hajjaj died in A.H. 95 (= A.D. 714), and Cairo was built in A.H. 358 (= A.D. 968).]
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[ Perfectly true even in the present day. The city was famed for intelligence and sanguinary fanaticism; and no stranger in disguise could pass through it without detection. This ended with the massacre of 1840, which brought a new era into the Moslem East. The men are, as a rule, fine-looking, but they seem to be all show: we had a corps of them in the old Básh-Buzuks, who, after a month or two in camp, seemed to have passed suddenly from youth into old age.]
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[ In text, "Yasta'amilúna al-Mrd," which may have a number of meanings, e.g. "work frowardness" (Maradd), or "work the fruit of the tree Arák" (Marad = wild capparis) and so forth. I have chosen the word mainly because "Murd" rhymes to "Burd." The people of Al-Yaman are still deep in the Sotadic Zone and practice; this they owe partly to a long colonization of the "'Ajam," or Persians. See my Terminal Essay, § "Pederasty," p. 205.]
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[ "Burd," plur. of "Burdah" = mantle or woollen plaid of striped stuff: vol. vii. 95. They are still woven in Arabia, but they are mostly white.]