Of the stories related to me of Ṣádoomeh's miracles, the following will serve as a specimen:--In order to give one of his friends a treat, he took him to the distance of about half an hour's walk into the desert on the north of Cairo; here they both sat down, upon the pebbly and sandy plain, and, the magician having uttered a spell, they suddenly found themselves in the midst of a garden, like one of the gardens of paradise, abounding with flowers and fruit-trees of every kind, springing up from a soil clothed with verdure brilliant as the emerald and irrigated by numerous streamlets of the clearest water. A repast of the most delicious viands and fruits and wines was spread before them by invisible hands; and they both ate to satiety, taking copious draughts of the various wines. At length, the magician's guest sank into a deep sleep; and when he awoke, he found himself again in the pebbly and sandy plain, with Ṣádoomeh still by his side. The reader will probably attribute this vision to a dose of opium or some similar drug; and such I suppose to have been the means employed; for I cannot doubt the integrity of the narrator, though he would not admit such an explanation,--regarding the whole as an affair of magic effected by the operation of the Jinn. FOOTNOTES: [80] Ḳur. xxvii. 40; and Commentary of the Jeláleyn. [81] Ḳur. ii. 96. [82] El-Ḳazweenee, account of the well of Bábil, in his ´Ajaïb el-Makhlooḳát. [83] See Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 374. [84] "Talisman," is a corruption of the Arabic word "ṭalsam." I write this latter word in accordance with the manner in which it is generally pronounced by the Arabs, and the manner in which my sheykh has written it; by some it is written "ṭilsem," and "ṭilism." It is a term applied to mystical characters; and also to seals, images, etc., upon which such characters are engraved or inscribed. These characters are astrological, or of some other magical kind. The purposes for which ṭalsams are contrived are various; one has the property of preserving from enchantment, or from a particular accident, or a variety of evils; another protects a treasure with which it is deposited; a third, by being rubbed, procures the presence and services of a Jinnee. [85] See Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 384 ff.; and above, 33 and 38. [86] Account of the early Arabs, in the Mir-át ez-Zemán. [87] Some curious performances of this kind, by means of a fluid mirror of ink, have been described in my "Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians," ch. xii., and in No. 117 of the _Quarterly Review_. [88] Mishkát el-Maṣábeeḥ, ii. 385.