O'er my sad heart the fowls and fishes weep;
For my life's stream doth into darkness creep.
Why am I parted from my mistress dear?
Now Shírín's gone, why should I tarry here?
Without her face should I desire to thrive
'Twould serve me right if I were boned alive!…
Felled to the dust, my cypress quick lies dead:
Shall I remain to cast dust on my head?
My smiling rose is fallen from the tree:
The garden is a prison now to me.
My bird of spring is from the meadow flown,
I, like the thunder-cloud, will weep and groan.
My world-enkindling lamp is quenched for aye:
Shall not my day be turned to night to-day?
My lamp is out, and chilly strikes the gale:
My moon is darkened and my sun is pale.
Beyond Death's portals Shírín shall I greet,
So with one leap I hasten Death to meet!’
Thus to the world his mournful tale he cried,
For Shírín kissed the ground, and kissing died.”*

The romance of Laylá and Majnún, which forms the third poem of the Quintet, has been since Nidhámí's time one of Laylá and Majnún. the most popular, if not the most popular, of all love-stories in the East, not only in Persia but in Turkey, where Fuḍúlí of Baghdád gave the sad tale of the Distraught Lover and the Night-black Beauty a fresh impulse towards the West of Asia. * In Arabic also there is current a Díwán of love-poems, many of them of extreme beauty, ascribed to “the possessed” (Majnún) Qays al-'Ámirí, * “an almost mythical personage,” as Brockelmann says, “who is supposed to have died about A.H. 70 (A.D. 689).” In this poem the scene is laid not in Persia but in Arabia, and the hero and heroine are no longer royal personages but simple Arabs of the desert. The colouring, however, as was to be expected, is almost entirely Persian. The metre chosen by Nidhámí for this poem runs thus:—

The poem occupies pp. 194-278 of the Ṭihrán edition, and probably comprises rather more than 4,000 verses. The following passage describes how Zayd in a dream sees Laylá and Majnún in the Gardens of Paradise, and might serve to prove, were proof needed, how false is the European supersti­tion which pretends that the Muhammadans deny immortality to women, or lightly esteem a pure and faithful love.

“Now when once more the Night's ambrosial dusk
Upon the skirts of Day had poured its musk, *
In sleep an angel caused him to behold
The heavenly gardens' radiancy untold,
Whose wide expanse, shadowed by lofty trees,
Was cheerful as the heart fulfilled of ease.
Each flow'ret in itself a garden seemed;
Each rosy petal like a lantern gleamed.
Each glade reflects, like some sky-scanning eye,
A heavenly mansion from the azure sky.
Like brightest emeralds its grasses grow,
While its effulgence doth no limit know.
Goblet in hand, each blossom of the dale
Drinks to the music of the nightingale.
Celestial harps melodious songs upraise,
While cooing ring-doves utter hymns of praise.
Beneath the roses, which like sunsets gleam,
A couch was set beside a rippling stream.
With fair brocades and fine this couch was spread,
Lustrous and bright as heaven's azure bed.
Thereon were seated, now at last at rest,
The immortal angels of these lovers blessed,
From head to foot adorned with robes of light,
Like hourís fair in heaven's mansions bright.

Amidst eternal spring their souls they cheer
With heav'nly wine, and commune mouth to ear.
Now from the goblet ruby wine they sip;
Now interchange their kisses, lip to lip;
Now hidden mysteries of love unfold;
And now in close embrace each other hold.*