[444]. “Sabt” = Sabbath, Saturday: vol. ii. 305, and passim.
[445]. i.e. “By Allah,” meaning “Be quick!”
[446]. For this well-nigh the sole equivalent amongst the Moslems of our “thank you,” see vol. iv. 6, and v. 171.
[447]. In Arab. “Ana ’l-Tabíb, al-Mudáwi.” In pop. parlance, the former is the scientific practitioner and the latter represents the man of the people who deals in simples, etc.
[448]. In text “Rákiba-há,” the technical term for demoniac insiliation or possession: the idea survives in our “succubi” and “incubi.” I look upon these visions often as the effects of pollutio nocturna. A modest woman for instance dreams of being possessed by some man other than her husband; she loves the latter and is faithful to him, and consequently she must explain the phenomena superstitiously and recur to diabolical agency. Of course it is the same with men, only they are at less trouble to excuse themselves.
[449]. The construction here, MS. p. 67, is very confused. [The speech of Muhsin seems to be elliptical. In Ar. it runs: “Li-anní izá, lam nukhullis-ha (or nukhlis-há, 2nd or 4th form) taktulní, wa aná iz lam tattafik ma’í anní izá khallastu-há tu’tí-há alayya”—which I believe to mean: “for if I do not deliver her, thou wilt kill me; so I (say) unless thou stipulate with me that when I have delivered her thou wilt give her to me in marriage——” supply: “well then I wash my hand of the whole business.” The Shaykh acts on the tit for tat principle in a style worthy of the “honest broker” himself.—St.]
[450]. In text “Yaum Sabt” again.
[451]. As has been said (vol. ii. 112) this is a sign of agitation. The tale has extended to remote Guernsey. A sorcier named Hilier Mouton discovers by his art that the King’s daughter who had long and beautiful tresses was dying because she had swallowed a hair which had twined round her præcordia. The cure was to cut a small square of bacon from just over the heart, and tie it to a silken thread which the Princess must swallow, when the hair would stick to it and come away with a jerk. See (p. 29.) “Folk-lore of Guernsey and Sark,” by Louise Lane-Clarke, printed by E. Le Lievre, Guernsey, 1880; and I have to thank for it a kind correspondent, Mr. A. Buchanan Brown, of La Coûture, p. 53, who informs us why the Guernsey lily is scentless, emblem of the maiden who sent it from fairy-land.
[452]. The text says only, “O my father, gift Shaykh Mohsin.”
[453]. Her especial “shame” would be her head and face: vol. vi. 30, 118.