Page:The poetical works of Matthew Arnold, 1897.djvu/117

Rh But a dark rumor will be bruited up,

From tribe to tribe, until it reach her ear;

And then will that defenceless woman learn

That Sohrab will rejoice her sight no more;

But that in battle with a nameless foe,

By the far-distant Oxus, he is slain."

He spoke; and as he ceased, he wept aloud,

Thinking of her he left, and his own death.

He spoke; but Rustum listened, plunged in thought.

Nor did he yet believe it was his son

Who spoke, although he called back names he knew;

For he had had sure tidings that the babe

Which was in Ader-baijan born to him

Had been a puny girl, no boy at all—

So that sad mother sent him word, for fear

Rustum should seek the boy, to train in arms.

And so he deemed that either Sohrab took,

By a false boast, the style of Rustum's son;

Or that men gave it him, to swell his fame.

So deemed he: yet he listened, plunged in thought;

And his soul set to grief, as the vast tide

Of the bright rocking ocean sets to shore

At the full moon; tears gathered in his eyes;

For he remembered his own early youth,

And all its bounding rapture; as, at dawn,

The shepherd from his mountain-lodge descries

A far, bright city, smitten by the sun,

Through many rolling clouds,—so Rustum saw

His youth; saw Sohrab's mother in her bloom;

And that old king, her father, who loved well

His wandering guest, and gave him his fair child

With joy; and all the pleasant life they led,

They three, in that long-distant summer-time,—

The castle, and the dewy woods, and hunt