"Muzaffar asked to hear what he had composed, and the other recited as follows: The whiteness of my beard proceeds from the blackness of her ringlets-
"On hearing these words, Muzaffar replied that he had found their completion, and recited as follows:-even as the flame with which I burn for her acquired its intensity from her pomegranate-flower [her rosy cheeks].
"As-Said approved of the addition, and commenced another verse on the same model; but Muzaffar said to himself: 'I must rise and be off, or else he will make the entire piece at the expense of my wits.'"
XII.-An Early Chess Champion
Table of Contents Much has been written of the origin of chess, and many countries contend for the honour of its inception. According to my encyclopædia, China, India, Persia, and Egypt have each a claim, but it is probable that the game existed, in some form or other, before history. The theory is that the Arabs introduced it to Europe in the eighth century. Thus the cautious encyclopædia; but Ibn Khallikan has no such hesitancy. From him we get names and dates. Ibn Khallikan gives the credit boldly to one Sissah, who, says he, "imagined the game for the amusement of King Shihram." Whether Sissah built it out of a clear sky, or had foundations on which to erect, is not stated. Anyway, the pastime was a complete success. "It is said that, when Sissah invented the game of chess and presented it to Shihram, the latter was struck with admiration and filled with joy; he ordered chess-boards to be placed in the temples, and considered that game as the best thing that could be learned, inasmuch as it served as an introduction to the art of war, as an honour to religion and the world, and as the foundation of all justice.
"He manifested also his gratitude and satisfaction for the favour which Heaven had granted him in illustrating his reign by such an invention, and he said to Sissah, 'Ask me for whatever you desire.'
"'I then demand,' replied Sissah, 'that a grain of wheat be placed in the first square of the chess-board, two in the second, and that the number of grains be progressively doubled till the last square is attained: whatever this quantity may be, I ask you to bestow it on me.'
"The king, who meant to make him a present of something considerable, exclaimed that such a recompense would be too little, and reproached Sissah for asking for so inadequate a reward.
"Sissah declared that he desired nothing but what he had mentioned, and, heedless of the king's remonstrances, he persisted in his demand.
"The king, at length, consented, and ordered that quantity of wheat to be given him. When the chiefs of the government office received orders to that effect, they calculated the amount, and answered that they did not possess near so much wheat as was required.
"These words were reported to the king, and he, being unable to credit them, ordered the chiefs to be brought before him. Having questioned them on the subject, they replied that all the wheat in the world would be insufficient to make up the quantity. He ordered them to prove what they said, and, by a series of multiplications and reckonings, they demonstrated to him that such was the fact.
"On this, the king said to Sissah: 'Your ingenuity in imagining such a request is yet more admirable than your talent in inventing the game of chess.'"
Ibn Khallikan was at pains to investigate the matter. Having, he says, "met one of the accountants employed at Alexandria, I received from him a demonstration which convinced me that the declaration was true. He placed before me a sheet of paper in which he had doubled the numbers up to the sixteenth square, and obtained thirty-two thousand seven hundred and sixty-eight grains. 'Now,' said he, 'let us consider this quantity to be the contents of a pint measure, and this I know by experiment to be true'-these are the accountant's words, so let him bear the responsibility-'then let the pint be doubled in the seventeenth square, and so on progressively. In the twentieth square it will become a waiba (peck), the waibas will then become an irdabb (bushel), and in the fortieth square we shall have one hundred and seventy-four thousand seven hundred and sixty-two irdabbs. Let us suppose this to be the contents of a corn store, and no corn store contains more than that; then in the fiftieth square we shall have the contents of one thousand and twenty-four stores; suppose these to be situated in one city-and no city can have more than that number of stores or even so many-we shall then find that the sixty-fourth and last square gives sixteen thousand three hundred and eighty-four cities. Now, you know that there is not in the world a greater number of cities than that, for geometry informs us that the circumference of the globe is eight thousand parasangs; so that, if the end of a cord were laid on any part of the earth, and the cord passed round it till both ends met, we should find the length of the cord to be twenty-four thousand miles, which is equal to eight thousand parasangs.' This demonstration is decisive and indubitable."
Of Sissah I know no more, except that he was from India and that his game became popular. Up to the time of Ibn Khallikan, in the thirteenth century, its best player was one As-Suli, famous as an author and a convivialist, who died one hundred and twenty years before the Norman Conquest. "To play like As-Suli" was indeed a proverb. Among this proficient's friends was his pupil, the khalif Ar-Radi, who had the greatest admiration for As-Suli's genius. One day, for instance, walking with some boon companions through a garden filled with beautiful flowers, Ar-Radi asked them if they ever saw a finer sight. To this they replied, speaking as wise men speak to autocratic rulers, that nothing on earth could surpass it.
The retort of the khalif must have given them the surprise of their lives. "You are wrong," said he: "As-Suli's manner of playing chess is yet a finer sight, and surpasses all you could describe!" So might we now refer to Hobbs on his day at the Oval, on a hard wicket, against fast bowling, with Surrey partisans standing four deep behind the seats, or to Stevenson nursing the balls from the middle pocket to the top left-hand pocket and then across to the right.
One more anecdote of the Persian Steinitz, and I have done. I tell it because it rounds off this interlude with some symmetry by bringing us back to my own consultation of the encyclopædia at the beginning of it. As-Suli had a famous library of books in which he had jotted down the fruits of his various reading. When asked a question on any subject, instead of answering it he would tell his boy to bring such and such a volume in which the matter at issue was treated. This trait led to an epigram being written upon him by a rival scholar, Abu Said, to the effect that "of all men As-Suli possessed most learning-in his library." There are still men learned on the same terms, but, nowadays, we do not have to collect the information for ourselves but go to The Times and Messrs. Chambers for it.
XIII.-Courtesy and Justice
Table of Contents Harun Ar-Raschid passing near Manbij with Abd Al-Malik Ibn Salih, who was the most elegant speaker of all the surviving descendants of Al-Abbas, observed a well-built country-seat and a garden full of trees covered with fruit, and asked to whom that property belonged.
Abd Al-Malik replied: "To you, Commander of the Faithful! and then to me."
This Abd Al-Malik was so famous, as a story-teller that a wise man said of him: "When I reflect that Abd Al-Malik's tongue must sooner or later moulder into dust, the world loses its value in my sight."
Abu 'l-Amaithal, the poet, was also a most efficient courtier. As he kissed one day the hand of Abd Allah Ibn Tahir, that prince complained of the roughness of the poet's moustachios, whereupon he immediately observed that the spines of the hedgehog could not hurt the wrist of the lion. Abd Allah was so pleased with this compliment that he ordered him a valuable present.
Another graceful compliment. Of Ishak Ibn Ibrahim Al-Mausili, who was famous for his voice and was a "constant companion of the khalifs in their parties of pleasure," the khalif Al-Motasim charmingly said: "Ishak never yet sang without my feeling as if my possessions were increased."
Another compliment that goes still deeper. Abu Nuwas, in a lament composed on the death of the khalif Al-Amin, said of him: His death was the only thing I feared, and now nothing remains for me to dread.
These, however, were but speeches. Compliments may be conveyed also by deeds, as we find in the case of Imam Al-Haramain, who was so learned and acceptable a teacher that, at the moment of his death, his scholars, who were four hundred and one in number, broke their pens and inkhorns; and they let a full year pass over before they resumed their studies. Of these Persians we can believe in the sincerity; but the motives of English scholars performing a similar act of renunciation might be open to suspicion.
Badi Az-Zaman Az-Hamadani was famous for his epistolary style. Here is a passage which, though written in Persia in the tenth century, might have aptness in English country houses at this moment: When water has long remained at rest, its noxious qualities appear; and when its surface has continued tranquil, its foulness gets into motion. Thus it is with a guest: his presence is displeasing when his stay has been protracted, and his shadow is oppressive when the time for which he should sojourn is at an end. Adieu.
The khalif Ali Ibn Ali Talib was a very just man. Some one having committed a theft was brought...
