338
of the Nile, and from Morocco to the eastern shores of
China, opposite the islands of Japan, and find himself'every
where understood.
The Arabic language, independently of its different dia¬
lects, is divided into two principal parts — the Lisan <>n-
vahiri, or grammatical language; and the Lisan-damma,
or vulgar tongue. The former of these is the pure ancient
Arabic, and forms in itself a dialect of the Hebrew; suffi¬
cient indications of which appear in the resemblance of the
characters of one to those ofthe other. The latter is used
in the three Arabias; and is likewise spoken, with some
variation of dialect, over great part ofthe East, from Egypt
to the court ofthe Great Mogul.
By the Eastern nations, the Arabic language is esteemed
the richest and most energetic of any in the world ; and it
is taught in their schools, as Greek and Latin are in the
academies of Europe and America. But its distinguishing
honor is, that it is the language in which the Koran was
written, and the only one in which the Turks will allow the
sacred text to be publicly read. They regard it as the lan¬
guage of Paradise; and since it comprises several millions
if words, think, and certainly not without reason, that no
)ne can be perfectly master of its treasures. The great
lumber of its synonymes forms one of the distinguishino-
eatures of this language. To express the article honey, ft
jas more than eighty different words—possesses two hun-
red names for the serpent, five hundred for the lion, a
housand for the camel, and a thousand and some hundreds
or a sword.
The modern Arabic is written from right to left, and its
Iphabet is composed of twenty-eight letters; being six
lore than are contained either in that of the Samaritan or
f the Chaldean. '
The Arabs have also a character called Lamalif, com-
osed of Lam and Alif; the power of which is equivalent
> the sound la, in English. The numeric value of the
stters corresponds with that of the Hebrew character* •
e from Ahf to Ra, is from one to ten; Za is twenty'
ad Sui is thirty, and so forth ; while the six extra charac-
■rs are employed, as are the Hebrew elongations and finals
• carry.ng, on the series from four hundred, where the
verity-second letter stops, to one thousand. Indeed these
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