One of those noble cavaliers escaped,
And made his way on horseback and a-foot.
When he had reached Zábulistán he said: –
“The mighty Elephant is with the dust,
So are Zawára and the escort too,
And not another horseman hath escaped!”
Rose from Zábulistán a cry against
The foe and monarch of Kábulistán,
Zál scattered dust upon his shoulders, tore
His breast and face, and cried: “Alas! alas!
Thou elephantine hero! would that I
Were in my winding-sheet! Zawára too,
That noble warrior, that valiant Dragon,
That famous Lion! Luckless, cursed Shaghád
Hath dug up by the roots that royal Tree.
Who could imagine that a wretched Fox
Would meditate revenge in yonder land
Upon a Lion? Who can call to mind
Such a misfortune, who could bear to hear
From his instructor that a Lion like Rustam
Had died in dust and through a Fox's words?
Why died I not before them wretchedly?
Why am I left as their memorial?

Why need I life and fame now that the seed
Of me, the son of Sám, hath been uprooted?
O chieftain! lion-taker! hero! lord!
O man of valour and world-conqueror!”
He sent an army under Farámarz
Against the monarch of Kábul forthwith,
To gather those slain bodies from the dust,
And give the world good cause for sorrowing.
When Farámarz arrived before Kábul
He found no man of name within the city.
They all had fled, the people were in tears,
And seared with grief for world-subduing Rustam.
Then Farámarz went to the hunting-ground—
The plain wherein the pitfalls had been dug.
He ordered that a stretcher should be brought,
And to lay out thereon that noble Tree,
Unloosed that belt which marked a paladin,
And stripped the body of its royal raiment.
Then first of all they laved in tepid water
The bosom, neck, and beard right tenderly,
Burned musk and ambergris before the corpse,
And sewed up all the gashes of its wounds,
Poured o'er the head rose-water and disposed
The purest camphor over all the form.
Then, when they had arrayed it in brocade,
They requisitioned roses, musk, and wine.
The man who sewed the shroud shed tears of blood
On combing out that beard of camphor hue.
Two stretchers scarce sufficed to hold the body;
Was it a man's trunk or a shady tree's?
They fashioned out of teak a goodly coffin
With golden nails and ivory ornaments.
The apertures were all sealed up with pitch,
Which they o'erlaid with musk and spicery.
They drew Zawára's body from the pit,
Washed it, sewed up the gashes that they found,
And placed it in a shroud made of brocade.
They sought about to find an elmtree-trunk,
And skilful carpenters went forth and cut
Some mighty planks therefrom. They drew the body
Of Rakhsh out of the pit—that steed whose like
None had beheld on earth—a two days' task,
And then they hoised it on an elephant.
Kábulistán up to Zábulistán
Was like a place of public lamentation,
And men and women stood there in such throngs
That none had room to move, and so they passed
The coffins on from hand to hand and thought,
Such were their multitudes, the travail wind.
They reached Zábul in two days and a night,
And neither bier was seen to touch the ground.
The death of Rustam filled the age with wailing;
Thou wouldst have said: “The very waste is moved!”
They made the charnel-house within a garden,
And raised the summit of it to the clouds.
They set two golden thrones there face to face;
It was the blessèd hero's place of rest.
Then all of those who were his servitors,
The free by birth and honest-hearted slaves,
When they had mingled musk and roses poured
them
Out at the elephantine hero's feet,
And every one exclaimed: “O famous man!
Why need'st thou gifts of musk and ambergris?
Thou hast no part in sovereignty and feast,
No longer toilest in the battle-tide,
No longer lavishest thy gold and treasure.
In sooth such things are worthless in thy sight.
Be happy now in jocund Paradise,
For God compacted thee of manliness
And justice.”

Having closed the charnel's door

They left him there. That famed, exalted Lion
Had passed away. Beside the door they made
A tomb for Rakhsh as of a horse upstanding.
What wouldst thou with this Wayside Inn—this gain
Of treasure first but in the end of pain?
Serve God or Áhriman yet still thou must,
Though made of iron, crumble into dust,
Yet lean to good while here thou shalt abide,
Elsewhere perchance thou wilt be satisfied.