Haply the Law that rules the world allows to man the widest range; And haply Fate’s a Theist-word, subject to human chance and change. This “I” may find a future Life, a nobler copy of our own, Where every riddle shall be ree’d, where every knowledge shall be known; Where ’twill be man’s to see the whole of what on Earth he sees in part; Where change shall ne’er surcharge the thought; nor hope defer’d shall hurt the heart. But!—faded flow’er and fallen leaf no more shall deck the parent tree; And man once dropt by Tree of Life what hope of other life has he? The shatter’d bowl shall know repair; the riven lute shall sound once more; But who shall mend the clay of man, the stolen breath to man restore? The shiver’d clock again shall strike; the broken reed shall pipe again: But we, we die, and Death is one, the doom of brutes, the doom of men. Then, if Nirwânâ* round our life with nothingness, ’tis haply best; Thy toils and troubles, want and woe at length have won their guerdon—Rest. * Comparative annihilation. Cease, Abdû, cease! Thy song is sung, nor think the gain the singer’s prize; Till men hold Ignor’ance deadly sin, till man deserves his title “Wise:”* * “Homo sapiens.” In Days to come, Days slow to dawn, when Wisdom deigns to dwell with men, These echoes of a voice long stilled haply shall wake responsive strain: Wend now thy way with brow serene, fear not thy humble tale to tell:— The whispers of the Desert-wind; the tinkling of the camel’s bell. {Hebrew: ShLM} NOTES NOTE I HÂJÎ ABDÛ, THE MAN Hâjî Abdû has been known to me for more years than I care to record. A native, it is believed, of Darâbghird in the Yezd Province, he always preferred to style himself El-Hichmakâni, a facetious “lackab” or surname, meaning “Of No-hall, Nowhere.” He had travelled far and wide with his eyes open; as appears by his “couplets.” To a natural facility, a knack of language learning, he added a store of desultory various reading; scraps of Chinese and old Egyptian; of Hebrew and Syriac; of Sanskrit and Prakrit; of Slav, especially Lithuanian; of Latin and Greek, including Romaic; of Berber, the Nubian dialect, and of Zend and Akkadian, besides Persian, his mother-tongue, and Arabic, the classic of the schools. Nor was he ignorant of “the -ologies” and the triumphs of modern scientific discovery. Briefly, his memory was well-stored; and he had every talent save that of using his talents. But no one thought that he “woo’d the Muse,” to speak in the style of the last century. Even his intimates were ignorant of the fact that he had a skeleton in his cupboard, his Kasîdah or distichs. He confided to me his secret when we last met in Western India—I am purposely vague in specifying the place. When so doing he held in hand the long and hoary honours of his chin with the points toward me, as if to say with the Island-King: