PROGRESS AMONG THE ARABS. 43 



that we owe them these numerals, although they originated 

 in India. From Spain they quickly passed, together with 

 algebra, into Italy, where their advantage was at once re- 

 cognised in commercial computations. 



The Arabs, to speak of another order of facts, cultivated 

 eloquence, taught grammar, rhetoric, and music. Their 

 immense poetical literature, to which celebrated poetesses 

 added a lovely portion, bears witness to the wealth of their 

 luxuriant imagination, just as their science shows the richness 

 of their intellectual faculties. To them we are indebted for the 

 introduction of song into Provence ; also for Rhyme, which 

 has enriched the poetry written in our modern languages. 



The words nadir, zenith, algebra, cypher, carat, alchemy, 

 alembic, alkali, alcohol, syrup, julep, elixir together with the 

 words admiral, cotton, chemise, morocco, cordovan, which we 

 have adopted, throw a light upon the contribution of the 

 Arabs to progress in various paths. 



All that could shorten or foster research was either in- 

 vented or instituted by them : 



Libraries, 



Observatories, 



Laboratories, 



Menageries and Aviaries of rare animals and birds, 



Surgical Instruments, 



Globes, and 



Dictionaries. 



They originated dictionaries, those most serviceable of all 

 books ; they had every kind biographical, historical, scien- 

 tific, written in Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin some of them 

 in sixty volumes besides lexicons for the tuition of these 

 languages. They even had dictionaries of celebrated horses 

 and camels. 



Their PUBLIC LIBRARIES were numerous, extensive, and 

 rich. There were as many as seventy in Spain alone. 

 Khalif Alhakem's private one was so large that its catalogue 

 filled forty volumes. It had no less than 600,000 works. 

 The Cairo library had 100,000 volumes. The Tripoli 

 library (burnt by the Crusaders!) also 100,000. Such 

 value was attached to books, and so earnest the love of 



