Page:From Constantinople to the home of Omar Khayyam.djvu/478

 290 RUINED TUS, THE HOME OF THE POET FIRDAUSI

might be used towards determining the identification of the mausoleum.

As I gazed out of the dilapidated portal upon the ruined walls of the desolate city that once had been the heart of East- ern Iran, an owl in the domed cupola above fluttered its wings and uttered a dismal hoot. No words could better describe the situation — melancholy as Poe's lines on the ' Raven ' — than those which serve as a motto to this chapter ; ^ and they are paralleled by a quatrain ascribed to Omar: —

Before him lay the skull of Kai Kawiis,
 * I saw a bird perched on the walls of Tiis,

And thus he made his moan, " Alas, poor king ! Thy drums are hushed, thy 'larums have rung truce.'"*

My comrades had meanwhile left me to the ruminations aroused by the scene and its associations, and had ridden for- ward in a northeasterly direction toward the Rizan Gate. Quickly vaulting into the saddle, I cantered after them, observ- ing, as I rode, that the mountains beyond the ancient site were still capped with snow, even though it was June, while nearer lay a row of low swelling green hills. This was the ' Mountain of Tus ' of the Pahlavi Bundahishn, with ' Lake Sovbar,' now Chashmah-i Sabz, on its summit.^ Together we all galloped out of the Rizan Gate to have a glimpse of the surroundings of Firdausi's home, and we were interested, above all, in the problem of possibly locating the position of his tomb.

The view generally held by scholars who have touched upon the subject is that Firdausi was buried outside of the city,*

1 For the Persian text of this qua- ^ gee Whinfield, The Quatrains of

train by Shahid of Balkh, see Pizzi, Omar Khayyam^ p. 186 (no. 277); cf.

Chrestomathie persane^ p. 67, and Payne's version, p. 122 (no. 492).

Ethd, BudagVs Vorldufer und Zeit- ^ Bd. 22. 3, cf. Bd. 12. 24. See

genossen, in Morgenldndische For- also Sykes, Geog. Journ. 37. 3-4. Cf.

schungen (Fleischer Festschrift), p. 44, pp. 212, n. 1 ; p. 279, note, above.

Leipzig, 1875 ; also Darmesteter, Ori- * The idea seems to have been con-

gines de la poesie persane, pp. 27-28, nected with the fact that Firdausi's

Paris, 1887. body was actually carried out of the

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