1,751. i.e., either the nightingale or the dove.

1,752. “The eastern sultan”; i.e., the sun.

1,753. Mercury, the god of wisdom. Venus, the goddess of beauty and music.

1,754. “Shigūfa” et florem et vulvam significat.

For “the Fount of Life”, see Notes 274, 1,201, 1,562, and 1,698.

1,755. Kausar, supposed to be a river in paradise.

1,756. An epileptic was supposed to be possessed by a demon.

1,757. i.e., his attendance on her led only to his bewilderment and distress.

1,758. “An intimate,” maḥramī; i.e., one who has the right of admittance to the ḥaram.

1,759. “A willow”; most probably an aspen. (See Note 1,684.)

1,760. We should say, “with the eyes of a fawn or a gazelle.”

1,761. See Note 1,741.

1,762. See Note 1,758.

1,763. “The register of acts.” Jarīda-yi jahd (lit., “the account-book of efforts”) seems equivalent here simply to jarīda-yi kār, “the account-book of acts or transactions”; i.e., the book in which one might be supposed to register one’s transactions or undertakings with a view to what is due to oneself and to others.

1,764. Galia; i.e., galia moschata, a perfume composed of musk, ambergris, camphor, and oil of ben-nuts. Most of the ingredients of the perfume being dark in colour, down or hair on the face is compared with it. “Musky hair”; i.e., black hair.

1,765. In despite of bad, or Bad, the proper name of the man being taken from the appellative.

1,766. i.e., puellam stupravit.

1,767. By Kisrá (Chosroës) is often understood Nūshīrvān the Just, a Sāsānian king in whose reign Muḥammad was born; but it is a title applied to any one of the Sāsānian kings of Persia. It is said to be the Arabic form of the Persian Khusrau, but it is used by Firdausī as the name given by King Qubād to his son Nūshīrvān on the birth of the latter.

Kai-Kā’ūs was the name of a king of Persia of the Kayānian or second dynasty. Kai, king, is a title applied to any king of that dynasty.

1,768. Nard, the Persian backgammon.

1,769. “His good and bad”; i.e., his good and evil fortune.

1,770. Or, “with no thought of good,” both senses being admissible.

1,771. i.e., “O you, who will be beheaded.”

1,772. Mubashshir means “a bringer of good tidings”. It is slightly similar to Sharr (or Shar), “Bad,” his real name.

1,773. Lit., “he laboured to do nothing but buying (i.e., thinking of, or looking for) sandal-wood.”

1,774. The sandal-wood intended in this story is presumably the species santalam Freycinetianum, which is of a light yellow colour. By calling it free from colour, az rang khālī, the Author means possibly that it is of a semi-neutral tint.

In the second hemistich rang, “colour,” has probably any or all of the meanings “beauty, clearness, brilliancy, splendour, grandeur, power, advantage, capital”, the absence of which may be predicated of earth or dust, as mere earth or dust, without consideration of the productive power of the earth.

1,775. Gard, “dust,” means also “distress, trouble, affliction, worry”.

1,776. i.e., he kept her always in absolute retirement.

1,777. i.e., when the sky whitened itself, or dawn appeared, through the sun which was soon to rise.

1,778. The sign of the Fifth Clime is the sign ruled by Venus, i.e., Libra. In fact, Venus is assigned to the Fifth Clime, and not to the Seventh.

1,779. i.e., Venus, the minstrel of the sky, gave him honour.

“The five turns,” i.e., of music, is a reference to the music which was played five times a day before the palace of a king, prince, or governor.

1,780. “The Greeks” are the day. “The Ethiop van” is the night. The meaning is, “Until day and night, meeting in conflict, night conquered and succeeded day.”

1,781. “Sky-prepared collyrium” means “darkness in the sky”, collyrium being of a dark colour.

1,782. Ḥalvā. (See Note 1,459.)

1,783. “A honey-fount from cornelian”; i.e., sweet and eloquent words from her mouth.

1,784. Expresses her distracting fascination, without regard to the presence of lovers.

1,785. Joseph, the type of manly beauty.

1,786. Iram. (See Notes 90, 1,203, and 1,605.)

1,787. “Kausar’s stream,” one of the supposed rivers of Paradise.

1,788. “Life’s Water”; i.e., “the Water or Stream of Life.” (See Notes 274, 1,201, 1,562, 1,698.)

1,789. Beauty without flaw is supposed to be particularly subject to the influence of the evil eye.

1,790. i.e., its four walls served, as it were, as glass beads, supposed to ward off the effects of magic and the evil eye.

They were also as “an encompassing protecting line”, here called khaṭṭ-i pargār, but presumably equivalent to khaṭṭ-i ḥiṣār, “a circle drawn by a conjurer round himself or others for protection.”

It is possible to translate, “were raised on its four walls four beads of glass,” but I think the sense is not to be taken as literal.

1,791. It is implied in the first hemistich that the man by entering the garden brands it, i.e., impairs its beauty.

The sense of the second hemistich is that the man must expect to see a keeper in so fine a garden, and should therefore not break into it.

1,792. i.e., what I have suffered is through my own fault.

1,793. i.e., enjoy the sight of the festivities in the garden.

1,794. “His human nature”; i.e., his nature as a man endowed with a rational soul which distinguishes him from the lower animals.

1,795. A compliment to the beauties, by which they are likened to the ḥūrīs. (Cf. Note 1,192.)

1,796. i.e., the narrow beam of light at the aperture was as the source of a stream which widened out into the spacious waters composed, as it were, by the garden and by the beauties disporting themselves in it.

1,797. i.e., crowded with beauties of cypress-like form.

1,798. This and the preceding distich are apparently remarks of the Author’s.

1,799. “Other apples”; i.e., the apples of the garden.

1,800. i.e., they went under the water.