The poet

The

"How much," said Abû Dulaf, "is the price of that sister? answered: "Ten thousand dirhems." Abû Dulaf gave him the money and said: "Recollect that the Obolla is a large river, with many estates situated on it, 592 "and that each of these sisters has another at her side; so, if thou openest "such a door as that, it will lead to a breach between us. Be content then "with what thou hast now got, and let this be a point agreed on."-The poet then offered up prayers for his welfare and withdrew. Abu Bakr Muhammad Ibn Hâshim, one of the Khalidites (vol. I. p. 557) imitated the idea of the first passage (here cited) in the following lines :

The poets are convinced that their hopes in thee are safe from the strokes of despair. Alchemy is a false science for all other mortals whom we know, but not for them. Thou givest them money in bags when they bring thee words on paper.

Abû Dulaf, having encountered some Kurds who were intercepting travellers in the province under his rule, struck one (camel-)rider through with his lance and the point entered into the body of another who was sitting behind him he thus killed them both at a stroke. Ibn an-Nattåh took this occasion for com

posing the following verses:

:

On the day of battle when his spear (1), which thou never seest blunted, pierced through two riders, people said: "Wonder not at that; were his lance a mile long, it "would pierce through a mile's length of riders!"

Abu Abd Allah Ahmad Ibn Abi Fatn Sâlih, a mawla to the Hashimide family, was dark complexioned, dwarfish, and very poor. His wife once said to him: “I see, my man! that the star of literature has set and that its arrow has missed "the mark; take then thy sword, spear, and bow, and go forth with the others "to the wars; God may perhaps grant thee a share of booty." In reply, he recited the following verses:

What can induce thee to advise such an extravagance to a man like me?-to oblige me to bear arms and hear warriors in armour order me to halt! Dost thou suppose me one of those men of death who from morn to eve aspire after destruction? When death approaches another, I observe it with horror; how then could I go and face it myself? Dost thou think that single combats with the foe are my passion, and that bosom contains the heart of Abû Dulaf (2) ?

Abû Dulaf heard of this, and sent him a thousand dinars.-The profusion of

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Abù Dulaf in his donations involved him in debt, and the circumstance having become public, one of these solicitors went into his presence and said :

O lord of gifts and donations! O thou of the open countenance and the open hand! I am told that thou art in debt; increase then its amount and discharge what I owe.

Abû Dulaf made him a present and discharged his debt. him one day and recited these lines:

A poet went in to

When God entrusted thy hand with the distribution of favours, he knew (that he would be well served). O Abû Dulaf! never have the two (recording angels) written no in the register of thy words, though often it be written in those of other mortals. Thou hast rivalled in beneficence the rapid winds (which bear rain to the regions of the earth); and when they cease to blow, thou ceasest not to give.

The poems composed in his praise are very numerous; he himself composed some good poetry, from which I should transcribe passages were it not my desire to avoid prolixity. He completed the building of the city of al-Karaj (in Persian Irak) which had been commenced by his father, and it became the residence of his tribe, family, and children. Whilst he was staying there, a poet (said by some to have been Mansûr Ibn Bâdân, and by others, Bakr Ibn an-Nattàh) recited to him a eulogy, but did not obtain a recompense equal to his expectations; he therefore departed, reciting this verse:

Let me go and travel over the deserts of the earth; for al-Karaj is not the whole world, neither is Kâsim (Abû Dulaf) the human race!

Similar to this are the following lines by another poet, but I am unable to state which of them copied the other :

If you resume your wonted generosity, it will be, as before, your obedient slave. If you will not, the earth is large; you are not all the human race, neither is Khorâsân the world.

I have since found these last verses in as-Samâni's Zail, in the article on Abù 'l-Hasan Ali Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ali al-Balkhi; he there says: "The following "lines were recited to me at Daurak (3) by the kâdi Ali Ibn Muhammad al"Balkhi; he gave them as the words of the emir Abû 'l-Hasan Ali Ibn al-Muntakhib, and he may have possibly heard them from the lips of that person."

Here he inserts the verses.-It is related that when Abû Dulaf returned from alKaraj, the emir Ali Ibn Isa Ibn Màhân prepared a repast on a most magnificent scale, and invited him to partake of it; but a poet, who then went to Ali's house and was refused admittance by the porter, awaited the passage of Abû Dulaf and handed him a palm-leaf, on which were inscribed these words:

If you meet him (Abú Dulaf) lingering carelessly, say: "You come from al-Karaj, "with one thousand horsemen, to a feast. After that, let not other men be reproached "for acts of baseness."

Abû Dulaf immediately returned, swearing that he would neither enter the house nor eat a morsel of that dinner. I have read in a compilation of anecdotes that the name of this poet was Abbâd Ibn al-Harish, and that the repast was given at Baghdad.—I read in another compilation that, when Abû Dulaf was suffering from the malady of which he died, his indisposition became so grave that the public were refused admittance into his presence. It happened, however, that, one day, feeling much better, he asked the chamberlain what applicants might be then at the palace-door, and was informed that ten sharifs (descendants of Muhammad) from Khorâsân had been waiting many days, without being able to enter. He immediately sat up on his bed and having sent for them, he received them with great politeness, and asked them the news of their country, what might be their private circumstances, and the motive of their visit. The replied that, being in narrow circumstances and hearing of his generous character, they had come to apply to him. On this, he ordered his treasurer to bring in one of the money-chests, and having taken out of it twenty bags, containing each one thousand pieces of gold, he gave two of them to each of his visitors, with an additional sum for their travelling expenses home. "Touch not "the bags," said he, "till you arrive in safety and join your families; here is 66 a sum to defray your journey. But, let each of you write for me a note, stat"ing that he is the son of such a one, the son of such a one, etc., the son of "Ali Ibn Abi Tâlib, by Fàtima, the daughter of the Apostle of God. Let him "then add these words: 'O Apostle of God! I was suffering from distress and "misery in my native town, and I went to Abû Dulaf al-Ijli who gave me two "thousand pieces of gold through respect for thee and through the desire "of conciliating thy favour, hoping thus to procure thy intercession.'"

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Each of the sharifs wrote out a note in these terms and delivered it to him. He then directed by his will that, when he died, the person who arranged his corpse for burial should place these papers in his winding-sheet, so that he might present them to the Apostle of God. Another proof of his respect to the family of Ali is given in a relation of what passed one day between him and his son: he happened to say that whosoever did not carry to the utmost pitch his attachment to the family of Ali was conceived in fornication; on which his son observed that, for himself, he did not hold such principles: "There is a good reason for that," said the father; "when thy mother con594ceived thee, I had not given her time to perform the istibra (4)." The authenticity of this anecdote is best known to God. A number of historical writers give the following narration as having been made by Dulaf, the son of Abû Dulaf: "I saw in a dream a person come towards me and say: "The emir requires thy presence.' I went with him and he took me into a deserted and miserable "house with blackened walls, roofless and without doors: he led me up a flight "of stairs and made me enter into a garret, of which the walls bore the marks of "fire, and the floor was strewed with ashes: I there beheld my father, quite "naked (5) and leaning his head on his knees; he said to me in an interrogative "tone: 'Dulaf?' and I replied 'Dulaf;' on which he repeated these verses:

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Tell our family, and conceal it not from them, what we have met with in the nar'row tomb (6). We have been questioned as to all our deeds; O pity my desolation and my sufferings !'

"He here said: Dost thou understand me?' and I answered Yes; and he "then recited as follows:

'If, after death, we were left (in peace), death would be a repose for all living beings; but when we die, we are raised up again and questioned respecting all we ever did.'

"Dost thou understand me?" I answered: Yes;' and awoke." Abú Dulaf died at Baghdad, A. H. 226 (A. D. 840-1); some say, A. H. 225.- Dulaf is a proper name, and, as it combines this quality to that of being formed, with some alteration, from another word, it belongs to the second declension (7). The word from which it is derived is dâlif (lente incedens).—We have already explained the word Ijli (vol. I. page 191).-Obolla is the name of an ancient town at four

parasangs from Basra; it is now included in the district of that city. It is, as we have said of Shib Bawwân and other places, in the life of Adud ad-Dawlat (vol. II. p. 484), an earthly paradise and one of the four most delightful spots in the world. Al-Karaj is a city of al-Jabal, between Ispahân and Hamadan.Al-Jabal is an extensive territory between Iråk and Khorasân; the common people call it Irak al-Ajam (the Irak of the Persians or Persian Irak). It contains some large cities, such as Hamadân, Ispahân, ar-Rai and Zanjân.

بطعنة not بطعنه I read (1)

(2) Literally: That my heart contains the breast of Abû Dalaf. A similar peculiarity of the Arabic idiom would allow us to say: My shoe cannot enter my foot, in place of my foot cannot enter my shoe.-See on this subject M. de Sacy's Chrestomathie, tom. II. p. 399.

(3) Daurak, the Dorak or Felahi of our maps, is a town of Persia, in the province of Khuzestân. It lies about seventy-five miles south of Shuster.

(4) When a man purchases a female slave, it is not lawful for him to cohabit with her till she has had her next ensuing monthly indisposition. The waiting for this term is called istibra (purification, or more exactly, waiting for purification). The end proposed in this regulation is, that it may be ascertained whether conception has not already taken place in the womb, in order that the issue may not be doubtful.-(Hamilton's Hedaya, vol. IV. p. 103.)

عریان The correct reading is (3)

(6) The word here rendered by tomb is barzakh. It signifies, the interval between this world and the next, or between death and the resurrection. See Sale's note on this word; Koran, surat 23, verse 102, and his preliminary discourse, sect. IV.

(7) See M. de Sacy's Grammaire arabe, tom. I. p. 408 of the second edition.

KABUS IBN WUSHMAGHIR.

Shams al-Maâli (the sun of exalted qualities) Abû 'l-Hasan Kâbûs al-Jîli, the son of Abu Tâhir Wushmaghîr (1), the son of Ziâr (2), the son of Wardan Shah, emir of Jurjân and Tabarestân, is spoken of in these terms by ath-Thaâlibi (v. II. page 129), in the Yatima: "I shall conclude this section by mentioning the greatest of princes, the star of the age, the source of justice and beneficence ; "one in whose person Almighty God hath united power and learning, the gift

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