And whether it will heave us up to land, Or whether it will roll us out to sea, Dizzy, and on his knees, and choked with sand; Back out to sea, to the deep waves of But he looked on, and smiled, nor bared death, 395 Hissed, and went quivering down into the sand, his sword, 425 But courteously drew back, and spoke, and said: "Thou strikest too hard! that club of thine will float Upon the summer-floods, and not my bones. But rise, and be not wroth! not wroth am I; No, when I see thee, wrath forsakes my soul. 430 Thou sayst thou art not Rustum: be it so. Who art thou then, that canst so touch my soul? Boy as I am, I have seen battles tooWhich it sent flying wide;-then Sohrab Have waded foremost in their bloody threw 405 waves, He ceased: but while he spake, Rustum had risen, And stood erect, trembling with rage: his club He left to lie, but had regained his spear, Whose fiery point now in his mailed righthand 451 Blazed bright and baleful, like that autumn-star, The baleful sign of fevers: dust had soiled Was choked with rage: at last these words broke way: "Girl! nimble with thy feet, not with thy hands! Curled minion, dancer, coiner of sweet words! Fight, let me hear thy hateful voice no more! Thou art not in Afrasiab's gardens now 460 With Tartar girls, with whom thou art wont to dance; But on the Oxus-sands, and in the dance Of battle, and with me, who make no play Of war; I fight it out, and hand to hand. Speak not to me of truce, and pledge, and wine! 465 Remember all thy valor: try thy feints And cunning! all the pity I had is gone; Because thou hast shamed me before both the hosts With thy light skipping tricks, and thy girl's wiles." He spoke, and Sohrab kindled at his taunts, 470 For both the on-looking hosts on either hand Stood in broad daylight, and the sky was pure, Glared, and he shook on high his menacing spear, And shouted, Rustum!-Sohrab heard that shout, And shrank amazed: back he recoiled one step, But that belovèd name unnerved my arm And scanned with blinking eyes the ad- That name, and something, I confess, in vancing form; And then he stood bewildered; and he dropped 520 thee, Which troubles all my heart, and made my shield 550 His covering shield, and the spear pierced Fall; and thy spear transfixed an unhis side. He reeled, and staggering back, sank to the ground; armed foe. And now thou boastest, and insultest my fate. And then the gloom dispersed, and the But hear thou this, fierce man, tremble wind fell, praise to hear! And followed her to find her where she fell 560 Far off;-anon her mate comes winging back From hunting, and a great way off descries His huddling young left sole; at that, he checks His pinion, and with short uneasy sweeps Circles above his eyry, with loud screams Thy courage or thy craft, and spread thy Chiding his mate back to her nest; but fame, 535 566 she Lies dying, with the arrow in her side, In some far stony gorge out of his ken, A heap of fluttering feathers-never more Shall the lake glass her, flying over it; 570 Never the black and dripping precipices Echo her stormy scream as she sails by:As that poor bird flies home, nor knows his loss, So Rustum knew not his own loss, but stood Over his dying son, and knew him not. 575 But, with a cold incredulous voice, he said: "What prate is this of fathers and revenge? The mighty Rustum never had a son." And, with a failing voice, Sohrab replied: 579 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 His youth; saw Sohrab's mother, in her bloom; And that old king, her father, who loved well 625 His wandering guest, and gave him his fair child With joy; and all the pleasant life they led, They three, in that long-distant summertime The castle, and the dewy woods, and hunt And hound, and morn on those delightful hills 630 In Ader-baijan. And he saw that youth, Of an unskilful gardener has been cut, 635 Mowing the garden grass-plots near its bed, And lies, a fragrant tower of purple bloom, On the mown, dying grass-so Sohrab lay, Lovely in death, upon the common sand. And Rustum gazed on him with grief, and said:640 "O Sohrab, thou indeed art such a son Whom Rustum, wert thou his, might well have loved. Yet here thou errest, Sohrab, or else men Have told thee false-thou art not Rustum's son. For Rustum had no son: one child he had645 But one-a girl; who with her mother now Rustum should take the boy, to train in Plies some light female task, nor dreams of arms; 610 us And so he deemed that either Sohrab took, Of us she dreams not, nor of wounds, nor By a false boast, the style of Rustum's war." And in a hollow voice he spake, and said:"Sohrab, that were a proof which could not lie! If thou show this, then art thou Rustum's son." Then, with weak hasty fingers, Sohrab loosed His belt, and near the shoulder bared his arm, 670 And showed a sign in faint vermilion points Pricked; as a cunning workman, in Pekin, Pricks with vermilion some clear porcelain vase, An emperor's gift-at early morn he paints, And all day long, and, when night comes, the lamp 675 Lights up his studious forehead and thin hands So delicately pricked the sign appeared On Sohrab's arm, the sign of Rustum's seal. It was that griffin, which of old reared Zal, Rustum's great father, whom they left to And with a soothing voice he spake, and said: "Father, forbear! for I but meet to-day The doom that at my birth was written down In Heaven, and thou art Heaven's unconscious hand. 710 A helpless babe, among the mountain Surely my heart cried out that it was thou, rocks; When first I saw thee; and thy heart spoke too, I know it! but fate trod those promptings down Under its iron heel; fate, fate engaged The strife, and hurled me on my father's spear. 715 |