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A Malay loses something he values; he has a bad night in the gambling houses; some of his property is wantonly damaged; he has a quarrel with one whom he loves; his father dies; or his mistress proves unfaithful; any one of these things causes him 'sickness of liver. In the year 1888, I spent two nights awake by the side of Râja Haji Hamid, with difficulty restraining him from running âmok in the streets of Pĕkan, because his father had died a natural death in Sĕlângor.
It was in this place that I heard the following story of a Were-Tiger, from Pĕnghûlu Mat Saleh, who was, and perhaps is still, the Headman of this miscellaneous crew. Into the Slim Valley, some years ago, there came a Korinchi trader named Haji Äli, and his two sons, Äbdulrahman and Äbas.
During their stay at Sockna, the marriage of the son of one of the richest inhabitants, Haji Mohammed-el-Hair-Trigge, was celebrated in the true Arab style.
Even in the city of Ishqábád the newly established Shí’ah community, envious of the rising prestige of the followers of Bahá’u’lláh who were living in their midst, instigated two ruffians to assault the seventy-year old Ḥájí Muḥammad-Riḍáy-i-Iṣfáhání, whom, in broad day and in the midst of the bazaar, they stabbed in no less than thirty-two places, exposing his liver, lacerating his stomach and tearing open his breast.
That, in their enthusiasm, they lost count and gave him about double the number of "guns" prescribed for the President of the United States caused Haji Mohamed no embarrassment; on the contrary, it seemed to please him immensely.
At first Burton made some attempt to create the impression that there was actually a Haji Abdu, and that the verses were merely a translation. Indeed, he quotes him, at the end of his Supplemental Nights, vol. ii., and elsewhere, as an independent author. Later, however, the mask which deceived nobody was removed.
'Can words make foul things fair? and, however much I might sympathise with my friend, there was no blinking the fact, that he and I were then engaged in trying to do for another set of Malay râjas, all that Râja Haji Hamid so bitterly regretted that the white men had done for him, and for Sĕlângor.
Neither the repeated and vigorous intercessions of highly placed members of the professions to which these martyrs belonged, nor the considerable sums which, in the case of one of them—the noble and serene Ḥájí Mírzá Siyyid ‘Alí, the Báb’s maternal uncle—affluent merchants of Shíráz and Ṭihrán were eager to offer as ransom, nor the impassioned pleas of state officials on behalf of another—the pious and highly esteemed dervish, Mírzá Qurbán-‘Alí—nor even the personal intervention of the Amír-Nizám, who endeavored to induce both of these brave men to recant, could succeed in persuading any of the seven to forego the coveted laurels of martyrdom.
They were coming with many more boats to exterminate every living thing. A sense of near, incomprehensible danger affected the common people. At one moment there was a panic in the courtyard amongst the women; shrieking; a rush; children crying Haji Sunan went out to quiet them.
The king gave him money, treated him with respect, and ordered him to be shown much flattering attention; till one of the courtiers, who had that day returned from a voyage at sea, said, "I saw him on the Eeduzha, or anniversary of sacrifice at Busrah; how then can he be a Haji, or pilgrim?" And they discovered his verses in the divan of Anwari.
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