The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore Part 170

[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 lx.x.xi.), _'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 _Gh.e.l.l yelinnum gh.e.l.l_, 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 beat.i.tude, 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 pa.s.sing: 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 G.o.d.

[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 gra.s.s 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 pa.s.sage 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 Lah.o.r.e, 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 pa.s.sengers, and to water the young trees."

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

[189] "Here is a large paG.o.da by a tank, on the water of which float mult.i.tudes 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 sh.o.r.es 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-gla.s.ses. "In Barbary," says _Shaw_, "they are so fond of their looking-gla.s.ses, which they hang upon their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, 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 l.u.s.tre 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 a.s.sure 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 a.s.sist 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 superst.i.tious 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 pa.s.sengers 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 PaG.o.d 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_.