Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 29.djvu/654

636 tribe and kindred tribes joined to do him honor." Every year, from all parts of this strange land, there was a gathering near Mecca. The poets recited their poetry, disputing for the prize, and the assembly determined the merits of the productions. Seven poems, each the work of a distinct poet, were thought worthy of special esteem. They were written down in golden characters upon Egyptian paper, and suspended upon the walls of the Kaaba.

Only one of these poems antedates the new faith; the author was contemporaneous with the Prophet. I make two brief selections from the first poem; in the one the poet is describing his steed, in the other a storm:

"Often have I risen at early dawn, while the birds were yet in their nests, and mounted a hunter, with smooth, short hair, of a full height, and so fleet as to make captive the beasts of the forest—a bright bay steed, from whose polished back the trappings slide as drops of rain glide hastily down the slippery marble.

"Even in his weakest state he seems to boil while he runs, and the sound which he makes in his rage is like that of a bubbling caldron. When other horses are languid, he rushes on like a flood, and strikes the hard earth with a firm hoof. He has the loins of an antelope and the thighs of an ostrich; he trots like a wolf and gallops like a young fox."

"O friend, seest thou the lightning, whose flashes resemble the quick glance of two hands amid clouds raised above clouds?

"I sit gazing at it—far distant is the cloud on which my eyes are fixed. Its right side seems to pour its rain on the hills of Katan, its left on the mountains of Sitar and Jadbul. The cloud unloads its freight on the desert of Ghabeit, like a merchant of Yemen alighting with his bales of rich apparel.

"The small birds of the valley warble at daybreak, as if they had taken their early draught of generous wine mixed with spice."

A verse from the poem of Tarafa:

"I consider time as a treasure decreasing every night, and that which every day diminishes soon perishes forever.

"By thy life, my friend, when Death inflicts not her wound, she resembles a camel-driver who relaxes the cord which remains twisted in his hand."

From the poem of Zohair:

"I am weary of the hard burdens which life imposes, and every man who, like me, has lived fourscore years, will assuredly be no less weary. I have seen Death herself stumble like a dim-sighted camel; but he whom she strikes falls, and he whom she misses grows old even to decrepitude.

"Whenever a man has a peculiar cast in his nature, although he supposes it concealed, it will soon be known; experience has taught me the events of this day and yesterday, but as to the events of to-morrow I confess my blindness."

A later Arabian poet says:

"No sooner do I see a learned man, than I long to prostrate myself before