“Xanthus and Balius, of immortal breed,
Sprung from the wind, and like the wind in speed.
* * * * * * * *
From their high manes they shake the dust, and bear
The kindling chariot through the parted war.”
Būddha is represented, too, as deserting his wife and child, riding upon his coal-black steed, Kanthāka, which was said to be thirty feet in length, and able to clear the high gates of the palace, or the broad rivers that flowed across his pathway, at a single bound.
The Persian poem, like the colossal epics of India, is of such interminable length that the readers of modern times would not be willing to scan the many pages of endless description and hyperbole. We therefore give, in simple phrase, the best incidents of this heroic legend.
CHAPTER XI.
STORY OF THE SHĀH NĀMAH.
SĀM SUWĀR—THE SĪMŪRGH’S NEST—THE FATHER’S DREAM—RŪDABEH—THE MARRIAGE—RUSTEM—THE TŪRĀNIAN INVASION—THE WHITE DEMON.
In the golden age of Persian chivalry there lived a famous warrior by the name of Sām Suwār. He was the son of the great chieftain Narimān, and he was the commander-in-chief of the Persian armies, and not only a valiant hero upon the battlefield, but more than once he had warred against the allied hosts of demons, and come off victorious. He had conquered the furious monster Soham, which was of the color and nature of fire, and, bringing it beneath the obedient rein, he made it his war horse in all his later battles with the demons.