[I]
To open a poem with a few amatory lines, is a literary tradition among Arab poets. But Abu’l-Ala, having had no occasion to evince such tender emotions, whether real or merely academic, succeeded, as in everything else he did, in deviating from the trodden path. I find, however, in his minor Diwan, Suct uz-Zand, a slight manifestation of his youthful ardor, of which this and the succeeding quatrains, descriptive of the charms of Night, are fairly representative.
[III]
“Ahmad,” Mohammed the Prophet.
[IV]
“And hear the others who with cymbals try,” etc., meaning the Christians; in the preceding quatrain he referred to the Mohammedans.