Preface - Page 2

Queen Anne and George I.,
when they were translated into French by Monsieur Galland.
Grown-up people were then very fond of fairy tales, and they thought
these Arab stories the best that they had ever read. They were
delighted with Ghouls (who lived among the tombs) and Geni, who seemed
to be a kind of ogres, and with Princesses who work magic spells,
and with Peris, who are Arab fairies. Sindbad had adventures which
perhaps came out of the Odyssey of Homer; in fact, all the East
had contributed its wonders, and sent them to Europe in one parcel.
Young men once made a noise at Monsieur Galland's windows in the dead
of night, and asked him to tell them one of his marvellous tales.
Nobody talked of anything but dervishes and vizirs, rocs and peris.
The stories were translated from French into all languages,
and only Bishop Atterbury complained that the tales were not likely
to be true, and had no moral. The bishops was presently banished
for being on the side of Prince Charlie's father, and had leisure
to repent of being so solemn.

In this book "The Arabian Nights" are translated from the French version
of Monsieur Galland, who dropped out the poetry and a great deal of what
the Arabian authors thought funny, though it seems wearisome to us.
In this book the stories are shortened here and there, and omissions
are made of pieces only suitable for Arabs and old gentlemen.
The translations are by the writers of the tales in the Fairy Books,
and the pictures are by Mr. Ford.

I can remember reading "The Arabian Nights" when I was six years old,
in dirty yellow old volumes of small type with no pictures, and I
hope children who read them with Mr. Ford's pictures will be as happy
as I was then in the company of Aladdin and Sindbad the Sailor.