Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 9.djvu/335

301 it to say that it seems to me, in the highest degree, improbable that the stories should (as is contended) have been composed by an Egyptian of the sixteenth century, (i.e. after the Turkish conquest in 1517), and that yet no mention, direct or indirect, should be found in them of any of the Memlouk Sultans or fainéant Khalifs or indeed of any sovereign of Egypt (Khalif or Sultan) later than the Eyoubite Saladin at the end of the twelfth century.

As for the contrary theory of the remote origin of the work, it is, I think, now pretty generally allowed that De Sacy satisfactorily disposed of Von Hammer’s arguments; but, since the date of the controversy, fresh evidence has been adduced in its support. This consists of a passage from the great work of the Arab historian of Spain, Aboulabbas Ahmed ben Mohammed el Meccari, entitled “Windwafts of Perfume from the branches of Andalusia (Spain) the Blooming” (A.D. 1628–9), to the following effect. I translate directly from the Arabic text as edited by the greatest (since De Sacy) of modern Arabic scholars, the late M. Dozy.

“Ibn Saïd (may God have mercy on him!) sets forth in his book El Muhella bi-s-shaar, quoting from El Curtubi, the story of the building of the Houdej in the Garden of Cairo, the which was of the magnificent pleasaunces of the Fatimite Khalifs, the rare of ordinance and surpassing,