Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 9.djvu/297

 THE BOOK OF THE THOUSAND NIGHTS AND ONE NIGHT: ITS HISTORY AND CHARACTER.

I.

It is now a hundred and eighty years since M. Antoine Galland first introduced to the notice of European readers the most popular collection of narrative fiction in existence, by his translation, published in the year 1704, of an Arabic manuscript alleged to have been procured by him from Syria, which contained something less than a quarter of the tales that compose the work known as “The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night.” M. Galland was aware of the imperfection of the MS. used by him, and (unable to obtain a more perfect copy) he seems to have endeavoured to supply the place of the missing portions by incorporating in his translation a number of Persian, Turkish and Arabic tales, which had no connection with his original and for which it is generally supposed that he probably had recourse to various Oriental MSS. (as yet unidentified) contained in the Royal Libraries of Paris. These interpolated tales occupy more than a third part of the entire work known as the “Arabian Nights’ Entertainments” and comprise some of the most popular portions of the work, as will be seen from the following list of them.