Page:A history of Chinese literature - Giles.djvu/190

 1 78 CHINESE LITERATURE

The secret of perpetual youth

is already known to me : Accept with philosophic calm

whatever fate may be"

Hsu AN-CHN, of the ninth century, is entitled to a place among the Tang poets, if only for the following piece :

" When the Bear athwart was lying. And the night was just on dying, And the moon was all but gone, How my thoughts did ramble on /

" Then a sound of music breaks From a lute that some one wakes, And I know that it is she, (

The sweet maid next door to me.

" And as the strains steal o'er me Her moth-eyebrows rise before me, And I feel a gentle thrill That her fingers must be chill.

" But doors and locks between us So effectually screen us That I hasten from the street And in dreamland pray to meet."

The following lines by Tu CH'IN-NIANG, a poetess of gems of the T'ang dynasty :

" / would not have thee grudge those robes

which gleam in rich array, But I would have thee grudge the hours

of youth which glide away. Go, pluck the blooming flower betimes,

lest when thou com!st again Alas ! upon the withered stem

no blooming Jlowers remain ! *

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