What others said about Arabic Read in the original
In the preface to his English–Arabic dictionary, speaking of himself in the third person, as authors of his day did:
“…he will feel himself amply rewarded for the care and labour bestowed on it, if it affords aid and wins friends to the study of a language which not only possesses great beauties of its own, and a rich literature, but which will also become of more and more practical importance to Englishmen, as the Eastern policy of the empire follows out its destinies – let us hope, not in narrow-minded hostility to, but in friendly and mutually advantageous alliance with, the Muhammadan World.”
Francis Joseph Steingass
1825–1903
Born in Munich, he worked in London; author of the well-known Persian–English dictionary and of two Arabic dictionaries.
In Arabic
…وسيرى المؤلّفُ أنّه جُزي عن عنايته وتعبه خيرَ الجزاء إن أعان هذا الكتابُ، وكسب أصدقاءَ، على درس لغةٍ لا تملك جمالاً عظيماً خاصّاً بها وأدباً غنيّاً فحسب، بل ستزداد أهمّيّتُها العمليّة للإنجليز يوماً بعد يوم، كلّما مضت سياسةُ الإمبراطوريّة في المشرق إلى مصائرها – ولنرجُ أن يكون ذلك لا في عداءٍ ضيّق الأفق، بل في تحالفٍ وديٍّ نافعٍ للطرفين، مع العالم المحمّديّ.
Source
English-Arabic Dictionary: For the Use of Both Travellers and Students, Preface, London: W. H. Allen, 1882, p. vi
Read in the OCR text of the archive.org scan. The preface is dated “London, September 13th 1882, on the day of the Battle of Tel-el-Kebir”, the battle by which Britain occupied Egypt.
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