[398]. [The root “Kart” is given in the dictionaries merely to introduce the word “karít” = complete, speaking of a year, &c., and “Takrít,” the name of a town in Mesopotamia, celebrated for its velvets and as the birth-place of Saladin. According to the first mentioned word I would take the signification of “Kart” to be “complement” which here may fitly be rendered by “remainder,” for that which with regard to the full contents of the dinner tray is their complement would of course be their remainder with regard to the viands that have been eaten.—St.]
[399]. For the “Zakát” = legal alms, which must not be less than two-and-a-half per cent., see vol. i. 339.
[400]. In text “Kazdír,” for which see vols. iv. 274 and vi. 39. Here it may allude to the canisters which make great show in the general store of a petty shopkeeper.
[401]. [The MS. reads “murafraf” (passive), from “Rafraf” = a shelf, arch, anything overhanging something else, therefore here applying either to the eye-brows as overhanging the eyes, or to the sockets, as forming a vault or cave for them. Perhaps it should be “murafrif” (active part), used of a bird, who spreads his wings and circles round his prey, ready to pounce upon it; hence with prying, hungry, greedy eyes.—St.]
[402]. Arab. “Niyyah” with the normal pun upon the name.
[403]. Arab. “’Ámil Rasad,” lit. acting as an observatory: but the style is broken as usual, and to judge from the third line below the sentence may signify “And I am acting as Talisman (to the Hoard).”
[404]. In the text “Ishári,” which may have many meanings: I take “a shot” at the most likely. In “The Tale of the Envier and the Envied” the counter-spell in a fumigation by means of some white hair plucked from a white spot, the size of a dirham, at the tail-end of a black tom-cat (vol. i. 124). According to the Welsh legend, “the Devil hates cocks”—I suppose since that fowl warned Peter of his fall.
[405]. In text “Yaum al-Ahad,” which begins the Moslem week: see vols. iii. 249 and vi. 190.
[406]. [In Ar. “Harj wa Laght.” The former is generally joined with “Marj” (Harj wa Marj) to express utter confusion, chaos, anarchy. “Laght” (also pronounced Laghat and written with the palatal “t”) has been mentioned supra p. 20 as a synonym of “Jalabah” = clamour, tumult, etc.—St.]
[407]. [In Ar. “yahjubu,” aor. of “hajaba” = he veiled, put out of sight, excluded, warded off. Amongst other significations the word is technically used of a nearer degree of relationship excluding entirely or partially a more distant one from inheritance.—St.]