Journeys Through Bookland Volume Vi Part 22

So, on the b.l.o.o.d.y sand, Sohrab lay dead; And the great Rustum drew his horseman's cloak Down o'er his face, and sate by his dead son.

As those black granite pillars, once high-rear'd By Jemshid in Persepolis, to bear His house, now 'mid their broken flights of steps Lie p.r.o.ne, enormous, down the mountain side-- So in the sand lay Rustum by his son.

And night came down over the solemn waste, And the two gazing hosts, and that sole pair, And darken'd all; and a cold fog, with night, Crept from the Oxus. Soon a hum arose, As of a great a.s.sembly loosed, and fires Began to twinkle through the fog; for now Both armies moved to camp, and took their meal; The Persians took it on the open sands Southward, the Tartars by the river marge; And Rustum and his son were left alone.

But the majestic river floated on, Out of the mist and hum of that low land, Into the frosty starlight, and there moved, Rejoicing, through the hush'd Chorasmian waste, Under the solitary moon;--he flow'd Right for the polar star, past Orgunje, Br.i.m.m.i.n.g, and bright, and large; then sands begin

[Ill.u.s.tration: RUSTUM SORROWS OVER SOHRAB]

To hem his watery march, and dam his streams, And split his currents; that for many a league The shorn and parcel'd Oxus strains along Through beds of sand and matted rushy isles-- Oxus, forgetting the bright speed he had In his high mountain cradle in Pamere, A foil'd circuitous wanderer--till at last The long'd-for dash of waves is heard, and wide His luminous home of waters opens, bright And tranquil, from whose floor the new-bathed stars Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea.[204-27]

Matthew Arnold was one of England's purest and greatest men. As scholar, teacher, poet and critic he labored zealously for the betterment of his race and sought to bring them back to a clearer, lovelier spiritual life and to win them from the base and sordid schemes that make only for material success.

He was born in 1822 and was the son of Doctor Thomas Arnold, the great teacher who was so long headmaster of the famous Rugby school, and whose scholarly and Christian influence is so faithfully brought out in Hughes's ever popular story _Tom Brown's School Days_.

Matthew Arnold received his preparatory education in his father's school at Rugby, and his college training at Oxford. He was always a student and always active in educational work, as an inspector of schools, and for ten years as professor of poetry at Oxford. He twice visited the United States and both times lectured here. His criticisms of America and Americans were severe, for he saw predominant the spirit of money-getting, the thirst for material prosperity and the absence of spiritual interests. In 1888, while at the house of a friend in Liverpool, he died suddenly and peacefully from an attack of heart disease.

Arnold was one of the most exacting and critical of English writers, a man who applied to his own works the same severe standards that he set up for others. As a result his writings have become one of the standards of purity and taste in style.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MATTHEW ARNOLD

1822-1888]

The story of _Sohrab and Rustum_ pleased him, and he enjoyed writing the poem, as may be seen from a letter to his mother, written in 1853. He says:

"All my spare time has been spent on a poem which I have just finished, and which I think by far the best thing I have yet done, and I think it will be generally liked; though one can never be sure of this. I have had the greatest pleasure in composing it, a rare thing with me, and, as I think, a good test of the pleasure what you write is likely to afford to others. But the story is a very n.o.ble and excellent one."

Two men, both competent to judge, have given at length their opinion of Matthew Arnold's character. So admirable a man deserves to be known by the young, although most of his writings will be understood and appreciated only by persons of some maturity in years. Mr. John Morley says:

"He was incapable of sacrificing the smallest interest of anybody to his own; he had not a spark of envy or jealousy; he stood well aloof from all the hustlings and jostlings by which selfish men push on; he bore life's disappointments--and he was disappointed in some reasonable hopes--with good nature and fort.i.tude; he cast no burden upon others, and never shrank from bearing his own share of the daily load to the last ounce of it; he took the deepest, sincerest, and most active interest in the well-being of his country and his countrymen."

Mr. George E. Woodbury in an essay on Arnold remarks concerning the man as shown in his private letters:

"A nature warm to its own, kindly to all, cheerful, fond of sport and fun, and always fed from pure fountains, and with it a character so founded upon the rock, so humbly serviceable, so continuing in power and grace, must wake in all the responses of happy appreciation and leave the charm of memory."

FOOTNOTES:

[173-1] The Oxus, 1300 miles long, is the chief river of Central Asia, and one of the boundaries of Persia.

[173-2] Peran-Wisa was the commander of King Afrasiab's troops, a Turanian chief who ruled over the many wild Tartar tribes whose men composed his army.

[173-3] Pamir or Pamere is a high tableland called by the natives "the roof of the world." In it lies the source of the Oxus. Arnold has named many places for the purpose of giving an air of reality to the poem. It is not necessary to locate them accurately in order to understand the poem, and so the notes will refer to them only as the story is made clearer by the explanation.

[174-4] Samarcand is a city of Turkistan, now a center of learning and of commerce.

[175-5] _Common_ here means _general_. The idea is that little fame comes to him who fights in a general combat in which numbers take part.

What is the real reason for Sohrab's desire to fight in single combat?

Arnold gives a different reason from that in the _Shah Nameh_. In the latter case it is that by defeating their champion Sohrab may frighten the Persians into submission.

[176-6] Seistan was the province in which Rustum and his father Zal had ruled for many years, subjects of the King of Persia.

[176-7] _Whether that_ and _Or in_ beginning the second line below may be understood to read _Either because_ and _Or because of_.

[177-8] _Frore_ means _frozen_.

[177-9] From mares' milk is made koumiss, a favorite fermented drink of Tartar tribes.

[178-10] _Fix'd_ means _halted_. He caused his army to remain stationary while he rode forward.

[178-11] The _corn_ is grain of some kind, not our maize or Indian corn.

[181-12] Kai Khosroo was one of the Persian kings who lived in the sixth century B. C., and is now understood to be Cyrus. He was the grandson of Kai Kaoos, in whose reign the _Shah Nameh_ places the episode of Sohrab and Rustum. Here as elsewhere Arnold alters the legend to suit his convenience and to make the poem more effective. For instance, he compresses the combat into a single day, while in the Persian epic, the battle lasts three days. This change gives greater vitality and more rapid action to the poem.

[181-13] Zal was born with snowy hair, a most unusual thing among the black-haired Persians. His father was so angered by the appearance of his son that he abandoned the innocent babe in the Elburz mountains, where, however, a great bird or griffin miraculously preserved the infant and in time returned it to its father, who had repented of his hasty action.

[183-14] _Ruksh_, also spelled _Raksh_.

[183-15] _Tale_ means _count_ or _reckoning_. The diver had gathered all the pearls required from him for the day.

[184-16] This description by Arnold scarcely tallies with the idea we have obtained of the powerful Sohrab from reading the accounts taken from the _Shah Nameh_. Arnold's is the more poetic idea, and increases the reader's sympathy for Sohrab.

[185-17] _Be governed_, that is, _take my advice_.

[189-18] It is not natural for father and son to fight thus.

[191-19] In the _Shah Nameh_ Rustum overpowers Sohrab and slays him by his superior power and skill. Arnold takes the more poetic view that Sohrab's arm is powerless when he hears his father's name.

[193-20] _Sole_ means _solitary, alone_.

[193-21] _Gla.s.s her_ means _reflect her_ as in a mirror.

[195-22] He sees that this young men, as far as age and appearance are concerned, might be a son of his.

[196-23] Again Arnold departs from the Persian tale, in which Sohrab wears a bracelet or amulet on his arm. Arnold's work gives a more certain identification.

[196-24] The griffin spoken of in note 13.

[200-25] The Persian tradition is that over the spot where Sohrab was buried a huge mound, shaped like the hoof of a horse, was erected.

[201-26] It is said that shortly after the death of Sohrab the king himself died while on a visit to a famous spring far in the north, and as the n.o.bles were returning with his corpse all were lost in a great tempest. Unfortunately for Sohrab's prophecy, Persian traditions do not include Rustum among the lost.

[204-27] This beautiful stanza makes a peculiarly artistic termination to the poem. After the storm and stress of the combat and the heart-breaking pathos of Sohrab's death, the reader willingly rests his thought on the majestic Oxus that still flows on, unchangeable, but ever changing. The suggestion is that after all nature is triumphant, that our pains and losses, our most grievous disappointments and greatest griefs are but incidents in the great drama of life, and that, though like the river Oxus, we for a time become "foiled, circuitous wanderers," we at last see before us the luminous home, bright and tranquil under the shining stars.

THE POET AND THE PEASANT

FROM THE FRENCH OF EMILE SOUVESTRE