FitzGerald's note (10), with its variants, is as follows:

Persepolis call'd also Takht-i-Jamshyd- THE THRONE OF JAMSHYD, "King Splendid," of the mythical Peshdádian [Peeshdádian] Dynasty, and supposed [with Shah-náma Authority] (according to the Sháh-náma) to have been founded and built by him. Others [though others] refer it to the Work of the Genie King, Ján Ibn Ján [Jann] — who also built the Pyramids before the time of Adam.

[Ed. I: It is also called Chehl-minar — Forty-column; which is Persian, probably, for Column-countless; the Hall they adorned or supported with their Lotus Base and taurine Capital indicating double that Number, though now counted down to less than half by Earthquake and other Inroad. By whomsoever built, unquestionably the Monument of a long extinguished Dynasty and Mythology; its Halls, Chambers and Galleries, inscribed with Arrow-head Characters, and sculptured with colossal, wing'd, half human Figures like those of Nimroud; Processions of Priests and Warriors (doubtful if any where a Woman) — and kings sitting on Thrones or in chariots, Staff or Lotus-flower in hand, and the Ferooher-Symbol of Existence - with his wing'd Globe, common also to Assyria and Ægypt― over their heads. All this, together with Aqueduct and Cistern, and other Appurtenance of a Royal Palace, upon a Terrace-platform, ascended by a double Flight of Stairs that may be gallop'd up, and cut out of and into the Rock-side of the Koh'i Ráhmet, Mountain of Mercy, where the old Fire-worshiping Sovereigns are buried, and overlooking the Plain of Merdasht.

Persians, like some other People, it seems, love to write their own Names, with sometimes a Verse or two, on their Country's Monuments. Mr. Binning (from whose sensible Travels the foregoing Account is mainly condens't) found several such in Persepolis; in one Place a fine Line of Háfiz; in another "an original, no doubt," he says, "by no great Poet, however right in his Sentiment." The Words somehow looked to us, and the "halting metre" sounded, familiar; and on looking back at last among the 500 Rubáyiát of the

Calcutta Omar MS.

there it is: old Omar quoted by one of his Countrymen, and here turned into hasty Rhyme, at any

rate

"This Palace that its Top to Heaven threw,

And Kings their Forehead on its Threshold drew

I saw a Ring-dove sitting there alone,

་

And Coo, Coo, Coo,' she cried, and 'Coo, Coo, Coo.'"

So as it seems the Persian speaks the English Ring-dove's Péhlevi, which is also articulate Persian for "Where?"]

BAHRÁM GÚR.— Bahrám of the Wild Ass [from his Fame in hunting it] a Sassanian Sovereign - had also his Seven Castles (like the King of Bohemia !) each of a different Colour: each with a Royal Mistress within [side; each of whom recounts to Bahrám a Romance, according to one of]; each of whom tells him a Story, as told in one of the most famous Poems of Persia, written by Amír Khusraw: all these Sevens also figuring (according to Eastern Mysticism) the Seven Heavens; and perhaps the Book itself that Eighth, into which the mystical Seven transcend, and within which they revolve. The Ruins of Three of those Towers are yet shown by the Peasantry; as also the Swamp in which Bahrám sunk, like the Master of Ravenswood, while pursuing his Gúr.

The Palace that to Heav'n his pillars threw,
And Kings the forehead on his threshold drew

I saw the solitary Ringdove there,

And "Coo, coo, coo," she cried; and "Coo, coo, coo."

This Quatrain Mr. Binning found, among several of Háfiz and others, inscribed by some stray hand among the ruins of Persepolis. The Ringdove's ancient Péhlevi Coo, Coo, Coo, signifies also in Persian "Where? Where? Where?" [note of 1859 edition ended with these words]. In Attár's "Birdparliament" she is reproved by the Leader of the Birds for sitting still, and for ever harping on that one note of lamentation for her lost Yusuf.

Apropos of Omar's Red Roses in Stanza XIX I am reminded of an old English Superstition that our Pulsatilla, or

purple "Pasque Flower," (which grows plentifully about the Fleam Dyke, near Cambridge,) grows only where Danish Blood has been spilt.

Various versions of the Ring-dove Rubá'iy follow:

Ce château qui par sa splendeur rivalisait avec les Nicolas

cieux, ce château où les souverains se succédaient à

(350)

l'envi, nous avons vu une tourterelle s'y poser et sur ses créneaux en ruine crier: "Kou, kou, kou, kou.”

(364)

That palace which touched the heavens, before whose McCarthy door kings bowed the head, we saw the ring-dove on its battlements, resting and crying, “Coo, coo, coo, coo."

Yon palace, towering to the welkin blue,
Where kings did bow them down, and homage do,
I saw a ring-dove on its arches perched,
And thus she made complaint, "Coo Coo, Coo, Coo!"

Yon palace whose roofs touch the empyreal blue,
Where kings bowed down and rendered homage due,
The ringdove is its only tenant now,

And perched aloft she wails," Coo Coo, Coo Coo."

Whinfield (392)

1889

(206) 1882

Yon fallen Palace once with Heaven vying,
Where Kings bowed down, is now in ruin lying,
The Ring-dove haunts its desolated courts,
And wails coo-coo, coo-coo, forever crying.

Garner

(I. 9)

(VIII.60)

Coo, or ku, is a contraction of the Persian word
The German versions paraphrase the

kuja, where.
meaning:-

Bodenstedt Jenes Schloss, drin die mächtigsten Herrscher gethront, Das zum Himmel aufglänzte, ward doch nicht verschont. Eine Turteltaube ruft auf den Zinnen jetzt:

Wo sind, die einst hausten darinnen, jetzt?

Von Schack Dies Schloss, wie der Himmel so leuchtend, einst (189) strotzend von Gold und von Schätzen,

In dessen prangenden Sälen der Könige viele gethront, Auf seine zerfallenen Zinnen jetzt seh'n wir die Taube

sich setzen;

Sie girrt, als wollte sie sagen: "Wo blieben sie, die hier gewohnt?"

"Bird

In the Mantik-ut-tair (Mantik et Teyr), or
Parliament," there is a pretty passage about the "Ring
Dove." FitzGerald's version runs :-

Then from a Wood was heard unseen to coo
The Ring Dove -"Yúsuf! Yúsuf! Yúsuf! Yú".
(For thus her sorrow broke her Note in twain,
And, just where broken, took it up again)

66 suf! Yúsuf! Yúsuf! Yúsuf!" But one Note, Which still repeating, she made hoarse her throat :

APPENDIX VIII.

RUBA'IY XX.

It would be difficult to decide which Rubá'iy FitzGerald took for his original,

(pp. 40, 41), or the following:

the one already given

(29)

Avant toi et moi, il y a eu bien des crépuscules, bien Nicolas des aurores, et ce n'est pas sans raison que le mouvement de rotation a été imprimé aux cieux. Sois donc attentif quand tu poseras ton pied sur cette poussière, car elle a été sans doute la prunelle des yeux d'une jeune beauté.

(75)

Before ever you or I were born, there were dawns McCarthy and twilights and it was not without design that the revolutions of the skies were sanctioned. Be careful, then, how you tread upon this dust, for it was once, no doubt, the apple of some fair girl's eye.

Days changed to nights, ere you were born, or I,

And on its business ever rolled the sky;

See you tread gently on this dust, perchance 'T was once the apple of some beauty's eye.

Before us twain were many Nights and Days,
The Stars have long pursued their Heavenly ways,
But tread with Lightest Foot upon this Dust,
'T was once an Eye that beamed with Loving Rays.

Whinfield (33)

Garner (V. 9)