Читать книгу COMMODUS & THE WOOING OF MALKATOON (Illustrated) - Lew Wallace - Страница 12

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"And Othman had

A bosom friend, the Lord of Eskischeer,

Youthful and warm of fancy, like himself;

And him he one day told of Malkatoon,

And of her sire ascetic in the cave

Above the spring; and of the spring he spake,

A wayside comforter of suffering men,

With endless cheer of draught and song and dance,

Lest that way they should pass, and scoffing say,

It is not true that God is everywhere.

And then he told of how he came to see

The wondrous child, and paused to bless the chance—

A favor shaken from the Prophet's sleeve!

And since that hour, he said, the beautiful

Apparent in the other fairest things

Was not for him. Nay, looked he in the sky

At night, the utmost splendor of the stars

Was all a-rust.

"'And is she then so fair ?'

The listener asked.

"'I know not in the world,'

Our Othman said, 'by which to make thee know

How fair she is, surpassing all her kind—

Nothing of perfume to the nostrils sweet,

Nothing lovely to the eye, or to ear,

Nothing of music.'

"Thereupon they gave

Each other hand, and went their several ways:

Othman, a lover with his love in love,

And doing childish things, as if the air

Were not alive with elves to laugh at him;

Now grumbling to his horse of Malkatoon;

Now whipping quatrains rude and cradleish

Until they sung of her as heroine;

Or when a breeze came stepping o'er the grass,

Lusty with life, and promising to go

A distance, with finger or his sword

Upon the sluggish air he wrote her name,

And bade the breeze, 'Ho! slave of Solomon!

Take thou this writing to my Malkatoon,

Nor say thou canst not find her. In a cave

Scarce two hours hence by measure of my steed

In easy gait, a daughter's part she doth

By old Edebali, the Dervish saint

Well known alike to kings and common men.

Below the cave, and in its shade at noon,

There is a spring, the mother of a pool

Of lucent water. There I saw her first,

And there with equal fortune it may be

That, hasting, thou shalt find her; and if so—

O happy breeze!—be careful not to give

Her fright by any rudeness, but approach

Her gently—gently—would 'twere mine to teach

Thee by example! Fingers of the air

Should have a tender touch; therefore I yield

Thee leave to lift her hair—'tis black as night—

And bare her brow, and blow upon her eyes

A breath not strong enough to more than cool

The dewy lids; or thou mayst fluff her hair,

And with it whip the whiteness of her neck,

So thou disturb her not; for it may be

She dreams of me. Begone!'

"Thus Othman went,

Never a man so with his love in love.

Far otherwise the Lord of Eskischeer!

The reins hung low upon his courser's neck,

And nigh asleep, it drowsed and drowsed along,

While he, forgetful of his armed heels,

And of his journey, and the mine of things

About him and above, in grim debate,

But silent rode, his mien that of one

Just stumbled upon a wonder of the world

Within him, half a feeling, half a thought,

A fancy formless, faint, a vague desire

At first without an object, and so strange

He could but question it. So on a waste

Of waters from the bursting of a wave

There springs a spray so pale and thin it seems

To mock the searching eye; and so as clouds

That ere long mantle Heaven, and possess

It utterly, are first but pallid mist

Of breaking waves, the small desire became

A passion with the Lord of Eskischeer.

And on a hill-top, looking back, he stopt

At sight of Othman in the vale below,

And shook his hand at him, and said aloud:

"'Thou black-browed son of Islam, go thy way,

For 'tis the fool's, and thou becomest it,

A torch not more the night. Thou not to know

That every sense we have is but a gate,

An airy gate on downy hinges hung,

For Love to come and go! Keep the way; pave

It end to end with fantasies in rhyme,

And dreams of Allah, and Edebali,

And Malkatoon, and, with thy comrade fools,

Chatter and sing, and plague the fainting sky

With beat of drums and flaunt of flags; nor leave

Behind the combings of the Wilderness

Thou callest thy Tribe. And I will to the cave;

And should the Dervish give the girl to me,

Vex not the sun or moon or tender stars

With antics of a child. I had not loved

Her but for thee.'

"Then to the cave he sped

With might of galloping,

"A thousand knights

In gold-gilt steel, and girt with belts of gold,

And trebly proud of azure blades, new moons

In curvature, and casting brightness far

As stars ablaze in cold Caucasian skies,

Held all the space about the beaten road

Uptrending to the leafy door; their tents

Enwhitened linen circling one of silk

Capacious as a field, and dyed in green

And purple, graceful as a peacock's neck,

And full as iridescent; and the air

Above the camp was glorified with flags

And bannerets, one richer than the rest,

And heavy with symbolic broidery,

Bespeaking old Iran. Yet, passion-mad,

The Lord of Eskischeer thrust through the maze

Of martial splendor.