“O Master, Patron of the humble! * I have a representation [to make]
in eloquent language.
I have an old and sympathetic sister, who entertains for me a mother's
love.
Fourteen years or more have passed since my eyes were parted from
the sight of her face.
I was removed from her service in 'Iráq, and this sin is a grievous
fault of mine.

She could not bear to remain far from me, for she is as a mother to me.
Lo, she hath come to Ágra, and in longing for her my heart flutters
like a pigeon.
My heart craves after her: what can I do? Yearning impels me on
the road.
If leave should be granted me to visit her, it would be worth a world
to me.”

Of love-poems there are only too many in Persian, but poems such as this, testifying to deep and sincere family affection, are rare enough to make them worthy of record.

(7) Shifá'í (d. 1037/1627). There exists in the British Museum (Or. 1372, f. 7^a) a portrait of this poet, as well as Shifá'í (d. 1037/1627). one of his satires, entitled Sízdah-band * (Add. 12,560, ff. 134-140): see Rieu, pp. 786 and 822. I cannot find in my manuscript of the Ta'ríkhi-'Álam-árá-yi-'Abbásí , either amongst the poets or the physicians of the court of Sháh 'Abbás, the notice of him to which Rieu refers, but there is a long account of him in M. F. (vol. ii, pp. 21-23) and in the R. 'Á. of the same author (pp. 213-218), as well as in A. K. (pp. 168-9). His proper name was Ḥakím (Doctor) Sharafu'd-Dín Ḥasan, and he was court-physician and boon companion to Sháh 'Abbás the Great. Riḍá-qulí Khán says that “his medicine eclipsed his scholarship, as his poetry eclipsed his medicine”:

Besides satires and odes he composed a mathnawí poem entitled Namakdán-i-Ḥaqíqat in imitation of Saná'í's Ḥadí-qatu'l-Ḥaqíqat .

(8) Mír Muḥammad Báqir-i-Dámád of Astarábád (d. 1040/1630-1). The title Dámád (“Son-in-law”) really Mír Báqir-iDámád (d. 1040/1630-1). applies to his father, who was the son-in-law of the celebrated mujtahid Shaykh 'Alí ibn 'Abdu'l-'Ál al-'Ámilí. Mír Dámád, who wrote

SHIFÁ'Í, POET AND PHYSICIAN
1920 . 9 . 17 -0298 [2] (Brit. Mus.)
To face p. 256

verse under the pen-name of Ishráq, was more notable as a theologian and philosopher than as a poet. See Rieu, p. 835; M. F., ii, p. 7; R. 'Á., pp. 166-7; Á. K., p. 159. There are long notices of him in the Rawḍátu'l-Jannát (pp. 114-116), and in the Ta'ríkh-i-'Álam-árá-yi-'Abbásí, written in 1025/1616, while he was still living. He is there described as skilled in most of the sciences, especially philosophy, philology, mathematics, medicine, jurisprudence, exegesis and tradition, and about a dozen of his prose works are mentioned. He was one of the teachers of the great philosopher Mullá Ṣadrá of Shíráz.

(9) Mír Abu'l-Qásim-i-Findariskí (d. about 1050/1640-1) was also more notable as a philosopher than as a poet, but Mír Abu'lQásim-iFindariskí (d. 1050/1640). is mentioned in M. F., vol. ii, pp. 6-7; R. 'Á., pp. 165-6; A. K., pp. 143-4; and Rieu, pp. 815-816. One poem of his, written in imitation of Náṣir-i-Khusraw, is cited in all the tadhkiras, and is therefore, presumably, his best known if not his best production. It begins:

“The heaven with these fair and pleasant stars should be beautiful;
it hath an aspect beneath, whatever there may be above.
If this lower aspect should ascend by the ladder of knowledge, it
would indeed be at one with its original.
No exoteric understanding can comprehend this speech, though it
be Abú Naṣr [al-Fárábí] or Abú 'Alí [ibn] Síná (Avicenna).”

Abu'l-Qásim was extraordinarily careless of appearances, dressing like a darwísh, avoiding the society of the rich and the respectable, and associating with disreputable vagabonds. One day Sháh 'Abbás, intending to rebuke him for keeping such low company, said to him, “I hear that certain students cultivate the society of vagabonds and look on at their degrading diversions.” “I move constantly in those circles,” replied Mír Abu'l-Qásim, “but I have never seen any of the students there.” He made a journey to India, and there, according to the Dabistán, * came under the influence of certain disciples of Ádhar Kaywán and imbibed Zoroastrian and Hindú or Buddhist ideas which led him to declare that he would never perform the pilgrimage to Mecca, since it would involve his taking the life of an innocent animal. Though his attainments are rated high by Riḍá-qulí Khán, very meagre details are given concerning his life; perhaps because, while more a philosopher than a poet, and more a darwísh than a philosopher, he does not exactly fall into any one of these three classes, and is consequently apt to be omitted from the special biographies of each.

Among the better-known minor poets of this period are Jalál Asír (d. 1049/1639-40), Qudsí (d. 1056/1646-7), Salím of Ṭihrán (d. 1057/1647-8), Abú Ṭálib Kalím and Amání of Mázandarán (both died in 1061/1651), Muḥammad Ṭáhir Waḥíd (d. about 1120/1708-9), and Shawkat of Bukhárá (d. 1107/1695-6). Besides Ṣá'ib (d. 1088/1677-8), the greatest of them all, only the fourth, the sixth and the last of these demand any separate notice.

(10) Abú Ṭálib Kalím (d. 1061/1651) was born at Hama-dán, but, until he went to India, lived chiefly at Káshán Abú Ṭálib Kalím (d. 1061/1651). (whence he is often described as “Káshání”) and Shíráz. Riḍá-qulí Khán (M. F., ii, p. 28) gives a very meagre notice of him, but Shiblí (Shi'ru'l-'Ajam, iii, pp. 205-230) discusses him at some length. About 1028/1619 he paid a visit to his native country, but after remaining there for about two years, he again returned to India, where he became poet-laureate to Sháh Jahán. He accompanied that monarch to Cashmere and was so charmed with that country that he remained there until his death. He was a man of genial disposition, free from jealousy, and consequently popular with his fellow-poets, of whom Ṣá'ib and Mír Ma'ṣúm were his special friends, so that Ṣá'ib says:

“Except Ṣá'ib, the epigrammatic Ma'ṣúm, and Kalím, who of all the
poets are kind to one another?”

When the poet Malik of Qum died, Abú Ṭálib composed the following verses giving the date of his death:

“Malik, that king of the realm of ideas, whose name is stamped on
the coin * of poetry,
So enlarged the horizons of this realm of ideas that the frontiers of
his domains extended from Qum to the Deccan.
I sought for the date of the year [of his death] from the days: they
said ‘He was the chief of the Masters of Speech’” (ú Sar-i-ahl-
i-sukhun búd= 1025/1616).*

Most of the Persian poets who went to India to seek a Dislike of most of the Persian poets for India. fortune, or at least a livelihood, had, according to Shiblí, * nothing but evil to say of the country, but Kalím speaks of it with appreciation:*

“One can call it the second Paradise, in this sense, that whoever
quits this garden departs with regret.”

On one occasion the Sulṭán of Turkey wrote a letter to the Emperor Sháh Jahán reproaching him with arrogance in calling himself by this title, which means “King of the World,” when he was in reality only king of India. Kalím justified his patron in the following verse: