A Boswell of Baghdad; with Diversions

A curious and very entertaining work lies before me, or, to be more accurate, ramparts me,for it is in four ponderous volumes, capable, each, even in less powerful hands than those ofthe Great Lexicographer, of felling a bookseller. At these volumes I have been sipping,beelike, at odd times for some years, and I now propose to yield some of the honey--theseason having become timely, since the great majority of the heroes of its thousands ofpages hail from Baghdad; and Baghdad, after...
More Description

A curious and very entertaining work lies before me, or, to be more accurate, ramparts me,for it is in four ponderous volumes, capable, each, even in less powerful hands than those ofthe Great Lexicographer, of felling a bookseller. At these volumes I have been sipping,beelike, at odd times for some years, and I now propose to yield some of the honey--theseason having become timely, since the great majority of the heroes of its thousands ofpages hail from Baghdad; and Baghdad, after all its wonderful and intact Oriental past, is today under Britain's thumb.The title of the book is Ibn Khallikan's Biographical Dictionary, translated from the Arabicby Bn Mac Guckin de Slane, and printed in Paris for the Oriental Translation Fund of GreatBritain and Ireland, 1842-71, some centuries after it was written, for its author was deadbefore Edward II ascended the English throne. Who would expect Sir Sidney Lee to havehad so remote an exemplar?