The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore

T >> Thomas Moore et al >> The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84

[134] The Afghans believe each of the numerous solitudes and deserts of
their country to be inhabited by a lonely demon, whom they call The
Ghoolee Beeabau, or Spirit of the Waste. They often illustrate the
wildness of any sequestered tribe, by saying they are wild as the Demon of
the Waste."--_Elphinstone's Caubul_.

[135] "They have all a great reverence for burial-grounds, which they
sometimes call by the poetical name of Cities of the Silent, and which
they people with the ghosts of the departed, who sit each at the head of
his own grave, invisible to mortal eyes."--_Elphinstone_.

[136] The celebrity of Mazagong is owing to its mangoes, which are
certainly the best I ever tasted. The parent-tree, from which all those of
this species have been grafted, is honored during the fruit-season by a
guard of sepoys; and, in the reign of Shah Jehan, couriers ware stationed
between Delhi and the Mahratta coast, to secure an abundant and fresh
supply of mangoes for the royal table."--_Mrs. Graham's_ Journal of
Residence in India.

[137] This old porcelain is found in digging, and "if it is esteemed, it
is not because it has acquired any new degree of beauty in the earth, but
because it has retained its ancient beauty; and this alone is of great
importance in China, where they give large sums for the smallest vessels
which were used under the Emperors Yan and Chun, who reigned many ages
before the dynasty of Tang, at which time porcelain began to be used by
the Emperors" (about the year 442).--_Dunn's_ Collection of curious
Observations, etc.

[138] The blacksmith Gao, who successfully resisted the tyrant Zohak, and
whose apron became the royal standard of Persia.

[139] "The Huma, a bird peculiar to the East. It is supposed to fly
constantly in the air, and never touch the ground; it is looked upon as a
bird of happy omen; and that every head it overshades will in time wear a
crown."--_Richardson_.

In the terms of alliance made by Fuzel Oola Khan with Hyder in 1760, one
of the stipulations was, "that he should have the distinction of two
honorary attendants standing behind him, holding fans composed of the
feathers of the humma, according to the practice of his family."--
_Wilks's_ South of India. He adds in a note;--"The Humma is a fabulous
bird. The head over which its shadow once passes will assuredly be circled
with a crown. The splendid little bird suspended over the throne of Tippoo
Sultaun, found at Seringapatam in 1799, was intended to represent this
poetical fancy."

[140] "To the pilgrims to Mount Sinai we must attribute the inscriptions,
figures, etc., on those rocks, which have from thence acquired the name of
the Written Mountain."--_Volney_.

M. Gebelin and others have been at much pains to attach some mysterious
and important meaning to these inscriptions; but Niebuhr, as well as
Volney, thinks that they must have been executed at idle hours by the
travellers to Mount Sinai, "who were satisfied with cutting the unpolished
rock with any pointed instrument; adding to their names and the date of
their journeys some rude figures, which bespeak the hand of a people but
little skilled in the arts."--_Niebuhr_.

[141] The Story of Sinbad.

[142] "The Camalata (called by Linnaeus, Ipomaea) is the most beautiful of
its order, both in the color and form of its leaves and flowers; its
elegant blossoms are 'celestial rosy red, Love's proper hue,' and have
justly procured is the name of Camalata, or Love's creeper."--_Sir W.
Jones_.

[143] "According to Father Premare, in his tract on Chinese Mythology, the
mother of Fo-hi was the daughter of heaven, surnamed Flower-loving; and as
the nymph was walking alone on the bank of a river, she found herself
encircled by a rainbow, after which she became pregnant, and, at the end
of twelve years, was delivered of a son radiant as herself."--_Asiat.
Res_.

[144] "Numerous small islands emerge from the Lake of Cashmere. One is
called Char Chenaur, from the plane trees upon it.--_Foster_.

[145] "The Altan Kol or Golden River of Tibet, which runs into the Lakes
of Sing-su-hay, has abundance of gold in its sands, which employs the
inhabitants all the summer in gathering it."--_Description of Tibet in
Pinkerton_.

[146] "The Brahmins of this province insist that the blue campac flowers
only in Paradise."--_Sir W. Jones_. It appears, however, from a curious
letter of the Sultan of Menangeabow, given by Marsden, that one place on
earth may lay claim to the possession of it. "This is the Sultan, who
keeps the flower champaka that is blue, and to be found in no other
country but his, being yellow elsewhere."--_Marsden's_ Sumatra.

[147] "The Mahometans suppose that falling stars are the firebrands
wherewith the good angels drive away the bad, when they approach too near
the empyrean or verge or the heavens."--_Fryer_.

[148] The Forty Pillars; so the Persians call the ruins of Persepolis. It
is imagined by them that this palace and the edifices at Balbec were built
by Genii, for the purpose of hiding in their subterraneous caverns immense
treasures, which still remain there.--_D'Herbelot, Volney_.

[149] _Diodorus_ mentions the Isle of Panchai, to the south of Arabia
Felix, where there was a temple of Jupiter. This island, or rather cluster
of isles, has disappeared, "sunk [says _Grandpre_] in the abyss made by
the fire beneath their foundations."--_Voyage to the Indian Ocean_.

[150] The Isles of Panchaia.

[151] "The cup of Jamshid, discovered, they say, when digging for the
foundations of Persepolis."-_Richardson_.

[152] "It is not like the Sea of India, whose bottom is rich with pearls
and ambergris, whose mountains of the coast are stored with gold and
precious stones, whose gulfs breed creatures that yield ivory, and among
the plants of whose shores are ebony, red wood, and the wood of Hairzan,
aloes, camphor, cloves, sandal-wood, and all other spices and aromatics;
where parrots and peacocks are birds of the forest, and musk and civit are
collected upon the lands."--_Travels of Two Mohammedans_.

[153] "With this immense treasure Mamood returned to Ghizni and in the
year 400 prepared a magnificent festival, where he displayed to the people
his wealth in golden thrones and in other ornaments, in a great plain
without the city of Ghizni." _Ferishta_.

[154] "Mahmood of Gazna, or Chizni, who conquered India in the beginning
of the 11th century."--See his History in _Dow_ and Sir _J. Malcolm_.

[155] "It is reported that the hunting equipage of the Sultan Mahmood was
so magnificent, that he kept 400 greyhounds and bloodhounds each of which
wore a collar set with jewels and a covering edged with gold and
pearls."--_Universal History_, vol. iii.

[156] "The Mountains of the Moon, or the _Montes Lunae_ of antiquity, at
the foot of which the Nile is supposed to arise."--_Bruce_.

[157] "The Nile, which the Abyssinians know by the names of Abey and Alawy
or the Giant."--_Asiat. Research_. vol. i. p. 387.

[158] See Perry's View of the Levant for an account of the sepulchres in
Upper Thebes, and the numberless grots, covered all over with
hieroglyphics in the mountains of Upper Egypt.

[159] "The orchards of Rosetta are filled with turtle-doves.--_Sonnini_.

[160] Savary mentions the pelicans upon Lake Moeris.

[161] "The superb date-tree, whose head languidly reclines, like that of a
handsome woman overcome with sleep."--_Dafard el Hadad_.

[162] "That beautiful bird, with plumage of the finest shining blue, with
purple beak and legs, the natural and living ornament of the temples and
palaces of the Greeks and Romans, which, from the stateliness of its part,
as well as the brilliancy of its colors, has obtained the title of
Sultana,"--_Sonnini_.

[163] Jackson, speaking of the plague that occurred in West Barbary, when
he was there, says, "The birds of the air fled away from the abodes of
men. The hyaenas, on the contrary, visited the cemeteries," etc.

[164] "Gondar was full of hyaenas from the time it turned dark, till the
dawn of day, seeking the different pieces of slaughtered carcasses, which
this cruel and unclean people expose in the streets without burial, and
who firmly believe that these animals are Falashta from the neighboring
mountains, transformed by magic, and come down to eat human flesh in the
dark in safety."--_Bruce_.

[165] "In the East, they suppose the Phoenix to have fifty orifices in his
bill, which are continued to his tail; and that, after living one thousand
years, he builds himself a funeral pile, sings a melodious air of
different harmonies through his fifty organ pipes, flaps his wings with a
velocity which sets fire to the wood and consumes himself."--_Richardson_.

[166] "On the shores of a quadrangular lake stand a thousand goblets, made
of stars, out of which souls predestined to enjoy felicity drink the
crystal wave."--From _Chateaubriand's_ Description of the Mahometan
Paradise, in his _"Beauties of Christianity_."

[167] Richardson thinks that Syria had its name from Suri, a beautiful and
delicate species of rose, for which that country has always been
famous;--hence, Suristan, the Land of Roses.

[168] "The number of lizards I saw one day in the great court of the
Temple of the Sun at Balbec amounted to many thousands; the ground, the
walls, and stones of the ruined buildings, were covered with
them."--_Bruce_.

[169] "The Syrinx or Pan's pipes is still a pastoral instrument in
Syria."--_Russel_.

[170] "Wild bees, frequent in Palestine, in hollow trunks or branches of
trees, and the clefts of rocks. Thus it is said (Psalm lxxxi.), _'honey
out of the stony rock.'_"--_Burder's_ Oriental Customs.

[171] "The River Jordan is on both sides beset with little, thick, and
pleasant woods, among which thousands of nightingales warble all
together."_--Thevenot_.

[172] The Temple of the Sun at Balbec.

[173] "You behold there a considerable number of a remarkable species of
beautiful insects, the elegance of whose appearance and their attire
procured for them the name of Damsels.--_Sonnini_.

[174] "Such Turks as at the common hours of prayer are on the road, or so
employed as not to find convenience to attend the mosques, are still
obliged to execute that duty; nor are they ever known to fail, whatever
business they are then about, but pray immediately when the hour alarms
them, whatever they are about, in that very place they chance to stand on;
insomuch that when a janissary, whom you have to guard you up and down the
city, hears the notice which is given him from the steeples, he will turn
about, stand still, and beckon with his hand, to tell his charge he must
have patience for awhile; when, taking out his handkerchief, he spreads it
on the ground, sits cross-legged thereupon, and says his prayers, though
in the open market, which, having ended he leaps briskly up, salutes the
person whom he undertook to convey, and renews his journey with the mild
expression of _Ghell yelinnum ghell_, or Come, dear, follow me."--_Aaron
Hill's_ Travels.

[175] The Nucta, Or Miraculous Drop, which falls in Egypt precisely on St.
John's day in June and is supposed to have the effect of stopping the
plague.

[176] The Country of Delight--the name of a province in the kingdom of
Jinnistan, or Fairy Land, the capital of which is called the City of
Jewels. Amberabad is another of the cities of Jinnistan.

[177] The tree Tooba, that stands in Paradise, in the palace of Mahomet.
See _Sale's Prelim. Disc_.--Tooba, says _D'Herbelot_, signifies beatitude,
or eternal happiness.

[178] Mahomet is described, in the 53d chapter of the Koran, as having
seen the Angel Gabriel "by the lote-tree, beyond which there is no
passing: near it is the Garden of Eternal Abode." This tree, say the
commentators, stands in the seventh Heaven, on the right hand of the
Throne of God.

[179] "It is said that the rivers or streams of Basra were reckoned in the
time of Peisl ben Abi Bordeh, and amounted to the number of one hundred
and twenty thousand streams."--_Ebn Haukal_.

[180] The name of the javelin with which the Easterns exercise. See
_Castellan, "Moeurs des Ottomans," tom_. iii. p. 161.

[181] "This account excited a desire of visiting the Banyan Hospital, as I
had heard much of their benevolence to all kinds of animals that were
either sick, lame, or infirm, through age or accident. On my arrival,
there were presented to my view many horses, cows, and oxen, in one
apartment; in another, dogs, sheep, goats, and monkeys, with clean straw
for them to repose on. Above stairs were depositories for seeds of many
sorts, and flat, broad dishes for water, for the use of birds and
insects."--_Parson_'s Travels. It is said that all animals know the
Banyans, that the most timid approach them, and that birds will fly nearer
to them than to other people.--See _Grandpre_.

[182] "A very fragrant grass from the banks of the Ganges, near Heridwar,
which in some places covers whole acres, and diffuses, when crushed, a
strong odor."--_Sir W. Jones_ on the Spikenard of the Ancients.

[183] "Near this is a curious hill, called Koh Talism, the Mountain of the
Talisman, because, according to the traditions of the country, no person
ever succeeded in gaining its summit."--_Kinneir_.

[184] "The Arabians believe that the ostriches hatch their young by only
looking at them."

[185] Oriental Tales.

[186] Ferishta. "Or rather," says _Scott_, upon the passage of Ferishta,
from which this is taken, "small coins, stamped with the figure of a
flower. They are still used in India to distribute in charity and on
occasion thrown by the purse-bearers of the great among the populace."

[187] The fine road made by the Emperor Jehan-Guire from Agra to Lahore,
planted with trees on each side. This road is 250 leagues in length. It
has "little pyramids or turrets," says _Bernier_, "erected every half
league, to mark the ways, and frequent wells to afford drink to
passengers, and to water the young trees."

[188] The Baya, or Indian Grosbeak.--_Sir W. Jones_.

[189] "Here is a large pagoda by a tank, on the water of which float
multitudes of the beautiful red lotus: the flower is larger than that of
the white water-lily, and is the most lovely of the nymphaeas I have
seen."--_Mrs. Graham's_ Journal of a Residence in India.

[190] "Cashmere (says its historian) had its own princes 4000 years before
its conquest by Akbar in 1585. Akbar would have found some difficulty to
reduce this paradise of the Indies, situated as it is within such a
fortress of mountains, but its monarch, Yusef-Khan, was basely betrayed by
his Omrahs."--_Pennant_.

[191] Voltaire tells us that in his tragedy, "_Les Guebres_," he was
generally supposed to have alluded to the Jansenists. I should not be
surprised if this story of the Fire worshippers were found capable of a
similar doubleness of application.

[192] The Persian Gulf, sometimes so called, which separates the shores of
Persia and Arabia.

[193] The present Gombaroon, a town on the Persian side of the Gulf.

[194] A Moorish instrument of music.

[195] "At Gombaroon and other places in Persia, they have towers for the
purpose of catching the wind and cooling the houses.--_Le Bruyn_.

[196] "Iran is the true general name for the empire of Persia.--_Asiat.
Res. Disc. 5_.

[197] "On the blades of their scimitars some verse from the Koran is
usually inscribed.--_Russel_.

[198] There is a kind of Rhododendros about Trebizond, whose flowers the
bee feeds upon, and the honey thence drives people mad;"--_Tournefort_.

[199] Their kings wear plumes of black herons' feathers, upon the right
side, as a badge of sovereignty "--_Hanway_.

[200] "The Fountain of Youth, by a Mahometan tradition, is situated in
some dark region of the East."--_Richardson_.

[201] Arabia Felix.

[202] "In the midst of the garden is the chiosk, that is, a large room,
commonly beautified with a fine fountain in the midst of it. It is raised
nine or ten steps, and enclosed with gilded lattices, round which vines,
jessamines, and honeysuckles, make a sort of green wall; large trees are
planted round this place, which is the scene of their greatest
pleasures."--_Lady M. W. Montagu_.

[203] The women of the East are never without their looking-glasses. "In
Barbary," says _Shaw_, "they are so fond of their looking-glasses, which
they hang upon their breasts, that they will not lay them aside, even when
after the drudgery of the day they are obliged to go two or three miles
with a pitcher or a goat's skin to fetch water."--_Travels_.

[204] "They say that if a snake or serpent fix his eyes on the lustre of
those stones (emeralds), he immediately becomes blind."--_Ahmed ben
Abdalaziz_, Treatise on Jewels.

[205] "At Gombaroon and the Isle of Ormus, it is sometimes so hot, that
the people are obliged to lie all day in the water."--_Marco Polo_.

[206] This mountain is generally supposed to be inaccessible. _Struy_
says, "I can well assure the reader that their opinion is not true, who
suppose this mount to be inaccessible." He adds, that "the lower part of
the mountain is cloudy, misty, and dark, the middlemost part very cold,
and like clouds of snow, but the upper regions perfectly calm."--It was on
this mountain that the Ark was supposed to have rested after the Deluge,
and part of it, they say, exists there still, which Struy thus gravely
accounts for:--"Whereas none can remember that the air on the top of the
hill did ever change or was subject either to wind or rain, which is
presumed to be the reason that the Ark has endured so long without being
rotten."--See _Carreri's_ Travels, where the Doctor laughs at this whole
account of Mount Ararat.

[207] In one of the books of the Shah Nameh, when Zal (a celebrated hero
of Persia, remarkable for his white hair,) comes to the terrace of his
mistress Rodahver at night, she lets down her long tresses to assist him
in his ascent;--he, however, manages it in a less romantic way by fixing
his crook in a projecting beam.--See _Champion's_ Ferdosi.

[208] "On the lofty hills of Arabia Petraea, are rock-goats."--_Niebuhr_.

[209] "They (the Ghebers) lay so much stress on their cushee or girdle, as
not to dare to be an instant without it."--_Grose's_ Voyage.

[210] "They suppose the Throne of the Almighty is seated in the sun, and
hence their worship of that luminary."--_Hanway_.

[211] The Mameluks that were in the other boat, when it was dark used to
shoot up a sort of fiery arrows into the air which in some measure
resembled lightning or falling stars."--_Baumgarten_.

[212] "Within the enclosure which surrounds his monument (at Gualior) is a
small tomb to the memory of Tan-Sein, a musician of incomparable skill,
who flourished at the court of Akbar. The tomb is overshadowed by a tree,
concerning which a superstitious notion prevails, that the chewing of its
leaves will give an extraordinary melody to the voice."--_Narrative of a
Journey from Agra to Ouzein, by W. Hunter, Esq_.

[213] "It is usual to place a small white triangular flag, fixed to a
bamboo staff of ten or twelve feet long, at the place where a tiger has
destroyed a man. It is common for the passengers also to throw each a
stone or brick near the spot, so that in the course of a little time a
pile equal to a good wagon-load is collected. The sight of these flags and
piles of stones imparts a certain melancholy, not perhaps altogether void
of apprehension."--_Oriental Field Sports_, vol. ii.

[214] "The Ficus Indica is called the Pagod Tree of Councils; the first,
from the idols placed under its shade; the second, because meetings were
held under its cool branches. In some places it is believed to be the
haunt of spectres, as the ancient spreading oaks of Wales have been of
fairies; in others are erected beneath the shade pillars of stone, or
posts, elegantly carved, and ornamented with the most beautiful porcelain
to supply the use of mirrors."--_Pennant_.

[215] The Persian Gulf.--"To dive for pearls in the Green Sea, or Persian
Gulf."--_Sir W. Jones_.

[216] Or Selemeh, the genuine name of the headland at the entrance of the
Gulf, commonly called Cape Musseldom. "The Indians when they pass the
promontory throw cocoa-nuts, fruits, or flowers into the sea to secure a
propitious voyage."--_Morier_.

[217] "The nightingale sings from the pomegranate-groves in the daytime
and from the loftiest trees at night."--_Russel's_ "Aleppo."

[218] In speaking of the climate of Shiraz, Francklin says, "The dew is of
such a pure nature, that if the brightest scimitar should be exposed to it
all night, it would not receive the least rust."

[219] The place where the Persians were finally defeated by the Arabs, and
their ancient monarchy destroyed.

[220] The Talpot or Talipot tree. "This beautiful palm-tree, which grows
in the heart of the forests, may be classed among the loftiest trees, and
becomes still higher when on the point of bursting forth from its leafy
summit. The sheath which then envelopes the flower is very large, and,
when it bursts, makes an explosion like the report of a cannon."--
_Thunberg_.

[221] "When the bright scimitars make the eyes of our heroes wink."--_The
Moallakat, Poem of Amru_.

[222] Tahmuras, and other ancient Kings of Persia; whose adventures in
Fairy-land among the Peris and Divs may be found in Richardson's curious
Dissertation. The griffin Simoorgh, they say, took some feathers from her
breast for Tahmuras, with which he adorned his helmet, and transmitted
them afterwards to his descendants.

[223] This rivulet, says Dandini, is called the Holy River from the
"cedar-saints" among which it rises.

[224] This mountain is my own creation, as the "stupendous chain," of
which I suppose it a link, does not extend quite so far as the shores of
the Persian Gulf.

[225] These birds sleep in the air. They are most common about the Cape of
Good Hope.

[226] "There is an extraordinary hill in this neighborhood, called Kohe
Gubr, or the Guebre's mountain. It rises in the form of a lofty cupola,
and on the summit of it, they say, are the remains of an Atush Kudu or
Fire Temple. It is superstitiously held to be the residence or Deeves or
Sprites, and many marvellous stories are recounted of the injury and
witchcraft suffered by those who essayed in former days to ascend or
explore it."--_Pottinger's_ "Beloochistan."

[227] The Ghebers generally built their temples over subterraneous fires.

[228] "At the city of Yezd, in Persia, which is distinguished by the
appellation of the Darub Abadut, or Seat of Religion, the Guebres are
permitted to have an Atush Kudu or Fire Temple (which, they assert, has
had the sacred fire in it since the days of Zoroaster) in their own
compartment of the city; but for this indulgence they are indebted to the
avarice, not the tolerance of the Persian government, which taxes them at
twenty-five rupees each man."--_Pottinger's_ "Beloochistan."

[229] Ancient heroes of Persia. "Among the Guebres there are some who
boast their descent from Rustam."--_Stephen's Persia_.

[230] See Russel's account of the panther's attacking travellers in the
night on the sea-shore about the roots of Lebanon.

[231] "Among other ceremonies the Magi used to place upon the tops of high
towers various kinds of rich viands, upon which it was supposed the Peris
and the spirits of their departed heroes regaled themselves."--
_Richardson_.

[232] In the ceremonies of the Ghebers round their Fire, as described by
Lord, "the Daroo," he says, "giveth them water to drink, and a pomegranate
leaf to chew in the mouth, to cleanse them from inward uncleanness."

[233] "Early in the morning, they (the Parsees or Ghebers at Oulam) go in
crowds to pay their devotions to the Sun, to whom upon all the altars
there are spheres consecrated, made by magic, resembling the circles of
the sun, and when the sun rises, these orbs seem to be inflamed, and to
turn round with a great noise. They have every one a censer in their
hands, and offer incense to the sun.'--_Rabbi Benjamin_.

[234] A vivid verdure succeeds the autumnal rains, and the ploughed fields
are covered with the Persian lily, of a resplendent yellow color."--
_Russel's_ "Aleppo."

[235] It is observed, with respect to the Sea of Herkend, that when it is
tossed by tempestuous winds it sparkles like fire."--_Travels of Two
Mohammedans_.

[236] A kind of trumpet;--it "was that used by Tamerlane, the sound of
which is described as uncommonly dreadful, and so loud as to be heard at a
distance of several miles."--_Richardson_.

[237] "Mohammed had two helmets, an interior and exterior one; the latter
of which, called Al Mawashah, the fillet, wreath, or wreathed garland, he
wore at the battle of Ohod."--_Universal History_.

[238] "They say that there are apple-trees upon the sides of this sea,
which bear very lovely fruit, but within are all full of ashes."--
_Thevenot_.

[239] "The Suhrab or Water of the Desert is said to be caused by the
rarefaction of the atmosphere from extreme heat; and, which augments the
delusion, it is most frequent in hollows, where water might be expected to
lodge. I have seen bushes and trees reflected in it, with as much accuracy
is though it had been the face of a clear and still lake."--_Pottinger_.