continue our march,
On, to the bound of the waste,
On, to the City of God. deg. deg.208

* * * * *
[149]

NOTES

* * * * *

SOHRAB AND RUSTUM

"I am occupied with a thing that gives me more pleasure than anything
I have ever done yet, which is a good sign, but whether I shall not
ultimately spoil it by being obliged to strike it off in fragments
instead of at one heat, I cannot quite say." (Arnold, in a letter to
Mrs. Foster, April, 1853.)

"All my spare time has been spent on a poem which I have just finished
and which I think by far the best thing I have yet done, and I think
it will be generally liked; though one can never be sure of this. I
have had the greatest pleasure in composing it, a rare thing with me,
and, as I think, a good test of the pleasure what you write is likely
to afford to others. But the story is a very noble and excellent one."
(Arnold, in a letter to his mother, May, 1853.)

The following synopsis of the story of Sohrab and Rustum the "tale
replete with tears," is gathered from several sources, chiefly
Benjamin's _Persia_, in _The Story of the Nations_, Sir John Malcolm's
_History of Persia_, and the great Persian epic poem, _Shah Nameh_.
The _Shah Nameh_ the original source of the story, and which purports
to narrate the exploits of Persia's kings and champions over a space
of thirty-six centuries, bears the same relation to Persian literature
as the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ to the Greek, and the _AEneid_ to the
Latin, though in structure it more nearly resembles _Morte d'Arthur_,
which records in order the achievements of various heroes. In it
the native poet Mansur ibn Ahmad, afterwards known to literature
as Firdausi, the Paradisaical, has set down the early tales and
traditions of his people with all the vividness and color common to
oriental writers. The principal hero of the poem is the mighty Rustum,
who, mounted on his famous horse Ruksh, performed prodigies of valor
in defence of the Persian throne. Of all his adventures his encounter
with Sohrab is the most dramatic. The poem was probably written in
the latter half of the tenth century. As will be seen, the incidents
narrated in Arnold's poem form but an episode in the complete story of
the two champions.