Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol. 1: A Revised American Edition of the Reader's HandbookBrewer, Ebenezer Cobham
General
Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol. 1: A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook
Brewer, Ebenezer Cobham
Allusions; Fiction -- Dictionaries; Literature -- Dictionaries
The Highlanders to this day call themselves
"_Cael_" and their language "_Caelic_" or "_Gaelic_"
and their country "_Caeldock_" which the Romans
softened into Caledonia.--_Dissertation on the
Poems of Ossian_.
CA´LENDERS, a class of Mohammedans who abandoned father and mother,
wife and children, relations and possessions, to wander through the
world as religious devotees, living on the bounty of those whom they
made their dupes.--D'Herbelot, _Supplement_, 204.
He diverted himself with the multitude of calenders,
santons, and dervises, who had travelled
from the heart of India, and halted on their way
with the emir.--W. Beckford, _Vathek_ (1786).
_The Three Calenders_, three royal princes, disguised as begging
dervishes, each of whom had lost his right eye. Their adventures form
three tales in the _Arabian Nights' Entertainments_.
_Tale of the First Calender_. No names are given. This calender was
the son of a king, and nephew of another king. While on a visit to his
uncle his father died, and the vizier usurped the throne. When the
prince returned, he was seized, and the usurper pulled out his right
eye. The uncle died, and the usurping vizier made himself master of
this kingdom also. So the hapless young prince assumed the garb of a
calender, wandered to Baghdad, and being received into the house
of "the three sisters," told his tale in the hearing of the caliph
Haroun-al-Raschid.--_The Arabian Nights_.
_Tale of the Second Calender._ No names given. This calender, like the
first, was the son of a king. On his way to India he was attacked by
robbers, and though he contrived to escape, he lost all his effects.
In his flight he came to a large city, where he encountered a tailor,
who gave him food and lodging. In order to earn a living, he turned
woodman for the nonce, and accidentally discovered an underground
palace, in which lived a beautiful lady, confined there by an evil
genius. With a view of liberating her, he kicked down the talisman,
when the genius appeared, killed the lady, and turned the prince into
an ape. As an ape he was taken on board ship, and transported to a
large commercial city, where his penmanship recommended him to the
sultan, who made him his vizier. The sultan's daughter undertook to
disenchant him and restore him to his proper form; but to accomplish
this she had to fight with the malignant genius. She succeeded in
killing the genius, and restoring the enchanted prince; but received
such severe injuries in the struggle that she died, and a spark of
fire which flew into the right eye of the prince destroyed it. The
sultan was so heart-broken at the death of his only child, that he
insisted on the prince quitting the kingdom without delay. So he
assumed the garb of a calender, and being received into the hospitable
house of "the three sisters," told his tale in the hearing of the
caliph Haroun-al-Raschid.--_The Arabian Nights_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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