HIKAYAT SAIF-AL-YEZAN. 247 



10. Bifah and Derzqkq. The story of these ladies, pro- 

 mised here, is not in the present work. Possibly their history 

 is the subject of another romance written or contemplated by 

 the author. 



11. A few words have to be omitted here for decency's 

 sake. 



12. Hakim Sakerdion. It is rather curious that this 

 personage, who plays a very important part in the story, 

 should be thus mentioned without any introduction. It is 

 probable that a paragraph has been omitted by the transcriber. 



13. la berjalan picking. This reads as if what follows 

 occurred immediately after the two children had been seen to- 

 gether, but it must have been twenty years afterwards. 



14. Nabi Sa-yid al anam. I could get no light on this 

 expression from any of the Malays whom I consulted. But I 

 believe the explanation is to be found in the following extract 

 from Lane's Modern Egyptians in the chapter on Eeligion and 

 Laws : — -" Mohammad is believed to be the last and greatest 

 of prophets and apostles. Six of these viz., Adam, Noah, 

 Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed are believed each 

 to have received a revealed Law or system of morality." At 

 the date of the events in this story Mohammed had not 

 yet appeared, so an anachronism is involved in this explana- 

 tion, but that might easily have been forgotten by the narrator, 

 as he used a familiar phrase. 



15. This pious disposition of mind, and his prayer to " the 

 Lord who knows what is concealed and what is open," are 

 ascribed to Wahash-al-Falah before his conversion to Islam as 

 recorded later. In the same way, a few paragraphs before 

 this, the author represents Seti Shameh as appealing to 

 the Creator quite in the language of an orthodox Moham- 

 medan. 



16. Tarikh-al-Nil. One would be glad to know what idea 

 the author had in his mind of this sacred volume, upon 

 the acquisition of which so much of the story hangs. The 

 title might mean the History, or the Chronological Tables, or 

 the Calendar of the Nile. Later on we are told that it 

 H. A. Soc, No. 58, iqii, 



