Page:Persian Literature (1900), vol. 1.djvu/291

 She had presented to him a bunch of roses, and he had given her a rose-branch, and each regarded the other with smiles of mutual satisfaction. In the morning Kitabún issued a proclamation, inviting all the young men of royal extraction, whether natives of the kingdom or strangers, to her father's feast. On that day Gushtásp and the husbandman had come into the city from the country, and hearing the proclamation the latter said: "Let us go, for in this lottery the prize may be drawn in thy name." They accordingly went. Kitabún's handmaid was in waiting at the door, and kept every young man standing awhile, that her mistress might mark him well before she allowed him to pass into the banquet. The keen eyes of Kitabún soon saw Gushtásp, and her heart instantly acknowledged him as her promised lord, for he was the same person she had seen in her dream.

As near the graceful stripling drew, She cried:--"My dream, my dream is true! Fortune from visions of the night  Has brought him to my longing sight.  Truth has portrayed his form divine;  He lives--he lives--and he is mine!"

She presently descended from her balcony, and gave him a bunch of roses, the token by which her choice was made known, and then retired. The king, when he heard of what she had done, was exceedingly irritated, thinking that her affections were placed on a beggar, or some nameless stranger of no birth or fortune, and his first impulse was to have her put to death. But his people assembled around him, and said:--"What can be the use of killing her?--It is in vain to resist the flood of destiny, for what will be, will be.

"The world itself is governed still by Fate, Fate rules the warrior's and the monarch's state;  And woman's heart, the passions of her soul,  Own the same power, obey the same control;  For what can love's impetuous force restrain?  Blood may be shed, but what will be thy gain?"

After this remonstrance he desired enquiries to be made into the character and parentage of his proposed son-in-law, and was told his name, the name of his father, and of his ancestors, and the causes which led to his present condition.