The yellow Oxus, by whose brink I die."
And, with a heavy groan, Rustum replied:
"Oh that its waves were flowing over me!
Oh that I saw its grains of yellow silt
Roll tumbling in the current o'er my head!"
And, with a grave mild voice, Sohrab re-
plied:
"Desire not that, my father: thou must live.
For some are born to do great deeds, and live,
As some are born to be obscur'd, and die. 771
Do thou the deeds I die too young to do,
And reap a second glory in thine age.
Thou art my father, and thy gain is mine.
But come: thou seest this great host of men
Which follow me; I pray thee, slay not these:
Let me entreat for them: what have they
done?
They follow'd me, my hope, my fame, my star.
Let them all cross the Oxus back in peace.
But me thou must bear hence, not send with
them,
But carry me with thee to Seïstan,
And place me on a bed, and mourn for me, Thou, and the snow-hair'd Zal, and all thy friends.
And thou must lay me in that lovely earth,
And heap a stately mound above my bones,
And plant a far-seen pillar over all:
That so the passing horseman on the waste
May see my tomb a great way off, and say
'Sohrab, the mighty Rustum's son, lies there,
Whom his great father did in ignorance kill'
And I be not forgotten in my grave."
And, with a mournful voice, Rustum replied:
"Fear not; as thou hast said, Sohrab, my son, So shall it be; for I will burn my tents,
And quit the host, and bear thee hence with
And carry thee away to Seïstan,
And place thee on a bed, and mourn for thee,
With the snow-headed Zal, and all my friends.
And I will lay thee in that lovely earth,
And heap a stately mound above thy bones,
And plant a far-seen pillar over all:
And men shall not forget thee in thy grave.
And I will spare thy host: yea, let them go:
Let them all cross the Oxus back in peace.
What should I do with slaying any more?
For would that all whom I have ever slain
Might be once more alive; my bitterest foes,
And they who were call'd champions in their
time,
And through whose death I won that fame I have;
And I were nothing but a common man, 810
A poor, mean soldier, and without renown;
So thou mightest live too, my Son, my Son!
Or rather would that I, even I myself,
Might now be lying on this bloody sand,
Near death, and by an ignorant stroke of thine,
Not thou of mine; and I might die, not thou;
And I, not thou, be borne to Seïstan;
And Zal might weep above my grave, not
thine;
And say 'O son, I weep thee not too sore,
For willingly, I know, thou met'st thine end.'
But now in blood and battles was my youth,
And full of blood and battles is my age; 822
And I shall never end this life of blood."
Then, at the point of death, Sohrab replied:
"A life of blood indeed, thou dreadful Man!
But thou shalt yet have peace; only not now;
Not yet but thou shalt have it on that day,
When thou shalt sail in a high-masted Ship,
Thou and the other peers of Kai Khosroo,
Returning home over the salt blue sea,
From laying thy dear Master in his grave."
And Rustum gazed on Sohrab's face, and
said:
"Soon be that day, my Son, and deep that sea! Till then, if Fate so wills, let me endure."
He spoke; and Sohrab smil'd on him, and took
The spear, and drew it from his side, and eased His wound's imperious anguish: but the blood Came welling from the open gash, and life Flow'd with the stream: all down his cold white side
The crimson torrent pour'd, dim now and soil'd,
And the two gazing hosts, and that sole pair,
And darken'd all; and a cold fog, with night,
Crept from the Oxus. Soon a hum arose,
As of a great assembly loosed, and fires
Began to twinkle through the fog: for now
Both armies moved to camp, and took their
meal:
The Persians took it on the open sands
Southward; the Tartars by the river marge:
And Rustum and his son were left alone. 871
But the majestic River floated on,
Out of the mist and hum of that low land,
Into the frosty starlight, and there mov'd,
Rejoicing, through the hush'd Chorasmian 2
waste,
Under the solitary moon: he flow'd
Right for the Polar Star, past Orgunjè,3
1 a mythical king who reigned 700 years; the black granite pillars found at Persepolis in Persia are called the ruins of his throne 2 Chorasmia on the Oxus was once the seat of a great empire. 3 a village on the Oxus
Brimming, and bright, and large: then sands begin
To hem his watery march, and dam his streams,
And split his currents; that for many a league
The shorn and parcell'd Oxus strains along
Through beds of sand and matted rushy isles-
Oxus, forgetting the bright speed he had 883
In his high mountain cradle in Pamere,
A foil'd circuitous wanderer: - till at last
The long'd-for dash of waves is heard, and
wide
His luminous home of waters opens, bright
And tranquil, from whose floor the new-bath'd
Here, where the reaper was at work of late, In this high field's dark corner, where he leaves
His coat, his basket, and his earthen cruse,2
And in the sun all morning binds the sheaves, Then here, at noon, comes back his stores to use;
Here will I sit and wait, While to my ear from uplands far away 17 The bleating of the folded flocks is borne; With distant cries of reapers in, the cornAll the live murmur of a summer's day.
Screen'd is this nook o'er the high, half-reap'd field,
And here till sun-down, Shepherd, will I be. Through the thick corn, the scarlet poppies peep,
And round green roots and yellowing stalks I see
Pale blue convolvulus in tendrils creep: And air-swept lindens yield Their scent, and rustle down their perfum'd showers
1 sheepfolds built of woven boughs: the gates were tied up 2 water-jug 3 grain
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