‘Two virgin jewels these, who long did lie
Sealed in a casket of pure constancy.
No joy was theirs within that world of pain,
Nor ever there did they their hopes attain.
Here never shall they suffer grief again,
But as thou seest them shall e'er remain.
Who in that world hath suffered pain and grief,
Thus in this world shall find at last relief.
Who in that world was sorrowful and sad,
His in this world shall be a portion glad.’”
The Haft Paykar or Bahrám-náma, though in reality,
The Haft Paykar. as we have seen, the last of Nidhámí's poems, comes next in the Ṭihrán edition, in which it occupies pp. 280-394, and comprises rather more than 5,000 verses. It is written in the following metre:— and, like Khusraw and Shírín, deals with the legendary history of one of the Sásánian Kings, namely Bahrám Gúr. Many of the episodes related of this monarch, so famous for his knightly deeds and his skill in the chase, have a historical basis, or at least repose on a genuine and ancient tradition, being chronicled by Ṭabarí (whom Nidhámí explicitly names as one of his sources; see Bacher, p. 54); and the title Bahrámnáma (“Bahrám-book”) better describes the nature and scope of the poem than that of Haft Paykar (“Seven Portraits” or “Effigies”), which refers only to one, though the chief, topic of the romance. The Seven Portraits in question, discovered by Bahrám one day in a secret chamber in his castle of Khawarnaq, represented seven princesses of incomparable beauty, these being respectively the daughters of the Rájá of India, the Kháqán of China, the Sháh of Khwárazm, the King of the Slavs, the Sháh of Persia, the Emperor of Byzantium, and the King of the West, or “Sunset-land.” Bahrám falls in love with these portraits, and, succeeding almost immediately afterwards to the throne vacated by the death of his father Yazdigird, he demands and obtains these seven princesses in marriage from their respective fathers. Each one, representing one of the Seven Climes into which the habitable world is divided, is lodged in a separate palace symbolically coloured, and Bahrám visits each of them on seven successive days, beginning on Saturday with the Black Palace assigned to the Princess of India, and ending on Friday with the White Palace in which the Princess of the Seventh Clime is housed. Each of the seven princesses entertains him in turn with stories, somewhat after the scheme of the Arabian Nights, and the romance concludes with the story of the unjust Minister, to whose ill deeds Bahrám's attention was directed by the incident of the shepherd and his unfaithful sheep-dog, * and is brought to a close with the death of Bahrám.An interesting episode, illustrating the proverb that “practice makes perfect,” occurs in this romance. Bahrám Gúr, it is said, had a favourite handmaiden named Fitna (“Mischief”) whom he used to take with him on his hunting expeditions, where she would beguile him, during the intervals of repose, with the strains of the harp, in which she was skilled. One day the King had displayed his prowess in the chase and in archery to the utmost, expecting to win from his favourite some expression of admiration and wonder; but—
“The maiden, prompted by mere wantonness,
Refused her admiration to express.
The King was patient, till a wild ass broke
Forth from its lair, then thus to her he spoke:
‘My skill, O Tartar maid, thy narrow eyes *
Behold not, or beholding do despise.
My skill, which knoweth neither bound nor end,
Entereth not thy narrow eyes, O friend!
Behold this beast, and bid my skill impale
What spot thou wilt between its head and tail.’
‘Wouldst thou,’ said she, ‘thy skill to me make clear?
Then with one shaft transfix its hoof and ear.’
The King, when this hard test was offered him,
Prepared to gratify her fancy's whim;
Called for a cross-bow, and forthwith did lay
Within the groove thereof a ball of clay.
Straight to the quarry's ear the pellet shot,
Whereat the beast, to soothe the smarting spot,
And to remove the clay, its foot on high
Did raise, whereon the King at once let fly
An arrow like a lightning-flash, which sped
Straight to the hoof, and nailed it to the head.
Then to the maid of China said the King:
‘Success is mine! What think you of this thing?’
‘For long,’ said she, ‘the King this art hath wrought,
In tricks long practised to succeed is naught!
What man hath studied long, he does with ease,
And solves the hardest problems, if he please.
That thus my lord the quarry's hoof should hit
Proves not so much his courage as his wit.’”
The King, infuriated at his favourite's impertinence, handed her over to one of his officers to be put to death; but she by her entreaties, and assurances that her royal lover would repent of his hasty action, induced him to spare her life and to conceal her in his hunting-lodge in the country. In this lodge was a staircase of sixty steps, and she, determined to prove the truth of her assertion that “practice makes perfect,” obtained a newly-born calf, and every day carried it on her shoulders up and down these stairs, her strength increasing with its growth. After some time her host, the officer, entertained King Bahrám in this country-house, and Fitna, veiling her face, seized the opportunity of displaying her accomplishment to her former lover, who, filled with admiration at this athletic feat, demanded to see her face, and recognised with joy and forgiveness his sweetheart whom he had supposed to be dead.
The fifth poem, the Iskandar-náma or “Alexander-book,”
The Iskandarnáma. is written in the heroic mutaqárib metre proper to epic verse:— and is divided into two distinct parts, of which the first is properly entitled the Iqbál-náma, or “Book of [Alexander's] Fortune,” while the second is correctly named the Khirad-Far less known and read than the three poets already discussed in this chapter is Dhahír (in full Dhahíru'd-Dín Ṭáhir Dhahíru'd-Dín Fáryábí. b. Muḥammad) * of Fáryáb, who owes such celebrity as he possesses chiefly to the well-known verse (by whom composed I know not)—
Díwán-i-Dhahír-i-Fáryábí
Dar Ka'ba bi-duzd, agar bi-yábí.
“Steal the Díwán of Dhahír of Fáryáb, even if you find it in
the Ka'ba.”
We have already alluded to the versified judgements of Majdu'd-Dín Hamkar, Imámí and a third poet as to the respective merits of Dhahír and Anwarí, and though all three decisions are in favour of the latter, the fact that the question could be raised at all clearly shows that, however little Dhahír's poems are read now, they were once ranked very high. They have been lithographed at Lucknow by Nawal Kashor, but the only text at my disposal has been an undated but good manuscript (O??. 6. 46) belonging to the University Library of Cambridge, comprising 160 folios, each containing (save for titles and empty spaces) twenty-two couplets, eleven on each side, or in all something over three thousand couplets, forming qaṣídas, fragments, ghazals, and quatrains.
'Awfí includes a somewhat lengthy notice of Dhahír in
vol. ii of his Lubáb (pp. 298-307), in which he rates this poet
very high, even declaring that “his verse has a grace which no
other verse possesses,” and adds that, though born at Fáryáb,
in the extreme north-east of Persia, he enjoyed the greatest
fame in 'Iráq, where he was especially patronised by the
Atábek Nuṣratu'd-Dín Abú Bakr b. Muḥammad “Jahán-
Dawlatsháh also devotes a lengthy article (pp. 109-114 of my edition) to Dhahír, in which he says that the poet was a pupil of Rashídí of Samarqand, that he left Khurásán for 'Iráq and Ádharbayján in the reign of the Atábek Qizil Arslán b. Íldigiz (A.D. 1185-91), having previously been in the service of Ṭughán, the ruler of Níshápúr, and that some critics consider his verse “fresher and more delicate” than that of Anwarí. He was also previously to this, as we learn from Ibn Isfandiyár's History of Ṭabaristán (pp. 71-3 of my translation), in the service of the Ispahbad of Mázandarán, Ḥusámu'd-Dawla Ardashír b. Ḥasan (murdered on April 1, A.D. 1210), and to the generosity of this ruler he makes regretful reference in the line:—