The History of the Caliph VathekJ.C. Nimmo and Bain, 1883 - 405 pages No words can describe the amazement of the courtiers when they beheld this rude merchant withstand the encounter unshocked. They all fell prostrate with their faces on the ground to avoid the risk of their lives, and continued in the same abject posture till the Caliph exclaimed in a furious tone, "Up, cowards! seize the miscreant! see that he be committed to prison and guarded by the best of my soldiers! |
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Common terms and phrases
Abyssinia Æneid Alboufaki amongst amuse animals answered Imlac appeared Arab Arabian Nights Bababalouk beautiful Beckford began Cairo Caliph camels Carathis CHAPTER commanded companions considered curiosity delight desire dwarfs earth Eblis Emir endeavoured enjoy entered escape eunuchs evil eyes Fakreddin fancy father favourite fire Genii Giaour Gulchenrouz hand happy valley harem hast hath heard heart Herbelot hope imagination Imlac knowledge Koran labour ladies learned less light live looked Mahomet Mahometans ment mind misery Morakanabad mountains nature Nekayah never Nouronihar observed palace passed Pekuah Persia Persian pleased pleasure poet possessed prince princess pyramid Rasselas reason replied repose resolved rest retired rock Samarah Santons Simurgh Soliman solitude soon soul sound of music stranger suffered supposed Sutlememe terror thee thou thought thousand tion tower travelled Vathek vizier voice weary whilst WILLIAM BECKFORD wonder
Popular passages
Page 210 - Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of high degree are a lie: to be laid in the balance, they are altogether lighter than vanity.
Page 318 - ... or vicious delights. They act as beings under the constant sense of some known inferiority, that fills their minds with rancour, and their tongues with censure. They are peevish at home, and malevolent abroad; and, as the outlaws of human nature, make it their business and their pleasure to disturb that society which debars them from its privileges. To live without feeling or exciting sympathy, to be fortunate without adding to the felicity of others, or afflicted without tasting the balm of...
Page 156 - Not that Nepenthes, which the wife of Thone, In Egypt, gave to Jove-born Helena, Is of such power to stir up joy as this, To life so friendly, or so cool to thirst.
Page 403 - The prince desired a little kingdom, in which he might administer justice in his own person, and see all the parts of the government with his own eyes. But he could never fix the limits of his dominion, and was always adding to the number of his subjects. Imlac and the astronomer were contented to be driven along the stream of life, without directing their course to any particular port.
Page 268 - By what means (said the prince) are the Europeans thus powerful ? or why, since they can so easily visit Asia and Africa for trade or conquest, cannot the Asiatics and Africans invade their coasts, plant colonies (') in their ports, and give laws to their natural princes ? The same wind that carried them back would bring us thither.
Page 205 - I'll read you matter deep and dangerous ; As full of peril and adventurous spirit, As to o'er-walk a current, roaring loud, On the unsteadfast footing of a spear.
Page 263 - ... the province of poetry is to describe Nature and Passion, which are always the same, the first writers took possession of the most striking objects for description, and the most probable occurrences for fiction, and left nothing to those that followed them, but transcription of the same events, and new combinations of the same images.
Page 208 - Woe to him that coveteth an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil!
Page 248 - fishes have the water, in which yet beasts can swim by nature, and men by art. He that can swim needs not despair to fly: to swim is to fly in a grosser fluid, and to fly is to swim in a subtler. We are only to proportion our power of resistance to the different density of matter through which we are to pass. You will be necessarily upborn by the air, if you can renew any impulse upon it faster than the air can recede from the pressure.
Page 173 - The fig-tree, not that kind for fruit renowned, But such as at this day to Indians known In Malabar or Deccan spreads her arms Branching so broad and long, that in the ground The bended twigs take root, and daughters grow About the mother tree, a pillared shade High overarched, and echoing walks between...