Store my lesson in your breast,
Trust me it shall profit well:
Hear and heed me, and be blest!”[307]
The little warbler had no sooner ended his lay of love when he discovered the churl, upon which the bird ordered the river to retire to its source, the flowers to fade, the fruit to wither, and the castle to sink into the earth; for a vile churl should not be suffered to dwell where the beautiful and the brave had once held sweet communion. The churl, having heard the melodious strains of the little bird, resolved to capture him and sell him for a large sum. Accordingly he set his snare and caught the feathered songster. “What injury have I done thee?” cried the little bird. “And why dost thou doom me to death?” “Fear not,” said the churl; “I only desire to hear thy song, and will get thee a fine cage and plenty of seeds and kernels to eat. But sing thou must, else I’ll wring thy neck and pick thy bones.” “Alas,” sighed the pretty captive, “who can sing in prison? And even were I cooked, I could scarce furnish thee with one mouthful.” Finding that all entreaties failed to move the hard-hearted churl, the bird then promised that, if set free, he would tell him three rare and precious secrets. This offer the churl could not resist, so he freed the little bird, who straightway flew to the summit of the pine tree, and then proceeded to disclose the three precious secrets. “First then,” said the bird: “Yield not a ready faith to every tale.” “Is this all your secret?” quoth the fellow, in rising wrath. “I need it not.” “Yet,” said the bird, “you seemed but lately to have forgot it—but now you may hold it fast. My second secret is: What is lost, ’tis wise to bear with patience.” At this the churl chafed more and more. “My third secret,” continued the bird, “is by far the best: What good thou hast, do not cast lightly away.” So saying, the little bird fluttered his wings a moment, and then flew away; and immediately the castle sank into the ground; and the fountain flowed back to its source; and the fruits dropped withered from the trees; and the flowers faded—and all the beauteous scene was melted into thin air.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
[Page 206]—Five hundred pons.—It is possible that pon, like hun, is another name of a pagoda, a gold coin of the value of 3½ rupís, which has not been coined in the mints of India since the early part of this century.
[Page 212]—The Want of Children.—In the note on this subject I omitted to include Hannah, mother of Samuel, the illustrious Hebrew seer (First Book of Samuel, ch. i, v, 9-11, and 20).—Asiatics consider a son as the “light,” or the “lamp,” of the household; and so it is said of a king, in the opening of the Persian romance entitled Bahár-i Dánish, or Garden and Spring, by ’Ináyatu-’lláh: “In the house of his prosperity the light [i.e. a son], which is the hope of descending life, beamed not, as the blossoms of his house [i.e. his women] produced not the fruit of his wishes; for which he made grief his companion, and sat lonely, like a point in the centre of the circle of sorrow”—poor fellow!
[Page 391]—The Story of the Envious Vazír.—I cannot call to mind any close parallel to this, but the incident upon which it turns, that of the old hag’s artifice in procuring the lady’s dress, recalls the story of “The Burnt Veil” in the Book of Sindibád, where a youth, desperately in love with the virtuous wife of a merchant, employs a crone—who, like too many of her sex in Muslim countries, went about evil-doing, in the guise of a devotee—to cause the lady’s husband to put her away on suspicion of her being unfaithful. But this slight resemblance is doubtless merely fortuitous. The tale of the Envious Vazír exhibits more art than is usually found in Eastern fictions, especially the dénouement, where the Khoja’s wife cleverly causes the malignant Vazír to convict himself of gross falsehood.
[Page 430]—The sentiment expressed to Sultan Mahmúd by the Independent Man has its analogue in one of the countless traditions of Hatim Taï, which goes thus: They asked Hatim: “Hast thou ever seen in the world any one more noble-minded than thyself?” He replied: “One day I had offered a sacrifice of 40 camels, and had gone out with some other chiefs to a corner of the desert. I saw a thorn-cutter, who had gathered together a bundle of thorns. I said to him: ‘Why goest thou not to share the hospitality of Hatim Taï, when a crowd has assembled at his feast?’ He replied: ‘Whoever can eat of the bread of his own labour will not put himself under an obligation to Hatim Taï.’ This man, in mind and magnanimity, I consider greater than myself.”
[Page 483]—For the original of the story of the Two Merchants see Méon’s edition of Barbazan’s collection of Fabliaux, Paris, 1808, tome i, 52, “Des Deux Bons Amis Loiax,” and for the modern French prose version see Le Grand’s Fabliaux, edition 1781, iii, 262.