162 Remarks on the Alif Leilah. [March, 



strength of Mons. De Schlegel's position by examining the instances 

 with which he supports it. If his conclusion be a true one, then the 

 Macan MS. must be the worst instead of the best form of the 

 thousand and one nights hitherto discovered, for it is " the most 

 voluminous :" the first five nights in this MS. for instance, contain 

 the matter of the first seventeen nights of Galland's edition, and an 

 additional tale, entirely new, besides. In deference to so celebrated 

 a .literatist as Mons. Schlegel, it is proper to consider what he 

 advances attentively, and, keeping strictly to the letter of his argu- 

 ments, to refute them, if possible, by their own assertions. It will not 

 be perhaps difficult to show that the critic's reasons for the adoption 

 of the above opinion are remarkable rather for ingenuity than sound- 

 ness, or to prove by demonstration that the new tales of a "most 

 voluminous" edition may bear not only the stamp of originality, 

 but also strong internal evidence that they are indigenous to Arabia. 

 Mons. DeSchlegel supposes that the tales of the thousand and 

 one nights could never have been popular with Mussulmans, owing 

 to the multitude of supernatural beings of different kinds crowded 

 into them, there being, he says, " scarcely another step hence to the 

 doctrine of polytheism." In expressing this opinion, Mons. Da S. 

 has entirely forgotten the extreme superstition of the followers 

 of the Prophet with respect to the existence of jinns, (both believers 

 and accursed,) ghols, uf reels, and many other classes of imaginary 

 beings, each distinguished by some peculiarity of character and 

 habits. These are introduced in multitudes in the tales in accordance 

 with the ordinary Arab superstitions which obtain most credit with 

 the most bigoted Mussulmans. They are introduced with most 

 liberality in some of the tales abounding especially in the expressions 

 of i-eligious feeling, and the believing spirits invariably make use of 

 the ordinary devotional phrases so constantly in the mouth of an 

 Arab. They are introduced not on the dignus vindice nodus principle 

 as what Mons. De S. calls " semi-deities ;" they take part in the action 

 of the story, and from their stupidity are the butts of the superior 

 intelligence of men. So far from showing marks of transmutation 

 to an Arab shape from a heathen original, they appear to be them- 

 selves the surest proofs of the Arabian extraction of the stories they 

 figure in. Mons. De S.'s determination to prove the Indian origin of 

 many of the tales has led him to the singular supposition that a 

 people whose manners they faithfully depict, and whose superstitions 

 they embody, that a people whose very language bears testimony to 

 their passion for fiction, (the same word being employed in Arabic 



