The three following songs were written by Mashdud, Rakeek, and Rais, three of the most celebrated improvisators in Bagdad, at an entertainment given by Abou Isy.

The whole world knows pretty well the style of these improvisators, and how fascinating they are, in our translations of the "Arabian Nights."

It must reluctantly be confessed that one of the most fascinatingly vital of them all, Alexandre Dumas, is one of the exceptions, born improvisator as he was; yet immense research, it needs hardly be said, went to the making of his enormous library of romanceeven though, it be allowed, that much of that work was done for him by his "disciples.