Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/103

Rh And those from Attruck and the Caspian sands;

Light men and on light steeds, who only drink

The acrid milk of camels, and their wells.

And then a swarm of wandering horse, who came

From far, and a more doubtful service owned,—

The Tartars of Ferghana, from the banks

Of the Jaxartes, men with scanty beards

And close-set skull-caps; and those wilder hordes

Who roam o'er Kipchak and the northern waste,

Kalmucks and unkempt Kuzzaks, tribes who stray

Nearest the Pole, and wandering Kirghizzes,

Who come on shaggy ponies from Pamere,—

These all filed out from camp into the plain.

And on the other side the Persians formed,—

First a light cloud of horse, Tartars they seemed,

The Ilyats of Khorassan; and behind,

The royal troops of Persia, horse and foot,

Marshalled battalions bright in burnished steel.

But Peran-Wisa with his herald came,

Threading the Tartar squadrons to the front,

And with his staff kept back the foremost ranks.

And when Ferood, who led the Persians, saw

That Peran-Wisa kept the Tartars back,

He took his spear, and to the front he came,

And checked his ranks, and fixed them where they stood.

And the old Tartar came upon the sand

Betwixt the silent hosts, and spake, and said,—

"Ferood, and ye, Persians and Tartars, hear!

Let there be truce between the hosts to-day.

But choose a champion from the Persian lords

To fight our champion Sohrab, man to man."

As in the country, on a morn in June,

When the dew glistens on the pearled ears,