_Verse 3._—The Persians describe the dimple in the chin of their
mistress as a dangerous well filled with her lover’s tears, into which,
when he approaches her mouth, he may fall and be drowned.
_Verse 6._—“Oh rose, tearing thy robe in two”: that is, bursting into
flower beneath the warm breath of the wind that blows from where thou
art.
V
_Stanza 1._—When the conqueror Timur entered Shiraz it is related that
he summoned Hafiz before him and said: “Of all my empire, Bokhara and
Samarkand are the fairest jewels; how comes it that in thy song thou
hast declared that thou would’st exchange them against the black mole on
the cheek of thy mistress?” Hafiz replied: “It is because of such
generosity that I am now as poor as thou seest.” The Emperor was not to
be outdone in repartee: he sent the poet away a richer man by some
hundreds of gold pieces.
“C’est du Molière renversé,” says Darmsteter of these lines, and
quotes:—
“Si le roi m’avait donné
Paris sa grande ville,
Et qu’il me fallût quitter
L’amour de ma mie,
Je dirais au roi Henri:
Reprenez votre Paris,
J’aime mieux ma mie, ô gué,
J’aime mieux ma mie!”
In the garden of Mosalla, Hafiz lies buried; the stream Ruknabad flows
near at hand.
_Stanza 2._—The Luli or gipsies, as they were contemptuously called,
were a people of the tribe of Keredj, of Indian origin, who inhabited
the country between Shiraz and Isfahan. Their young men and maidens were
famous for their beauty and musical accomplishments, and furnished
minstrels and dancing girls to the wealthy inhabitants of Shiraz. Sir
Henry Layard met with a similar tribe near Baghdad. “They bear,” he
says, “a very bad reputation on the score of morality, and according to
general report lead very dissolute lives. The dancing boys and girls who
frequent Baghdad, and are notoriously of evil fame, come principally
from this district. Whilst we were resting at the caravanserai a party
of them came to perform their indecent dances before us, as they were in
the habit of doing on the arrival of travellers.”—_Early Adventures._
In Turkestan there was formerly an institution called the Feast of
Plunder. When the pay-day of the soldiers came round, dishes of rice and
great quantities of cooked food were prepared and set out on the ground.
The soldiers then rode up, armed as if for battle, and carried off the
food with mimic violence. Thus they made reparation to their conscience
for accepting a pay lawfully earned, and reminded themselves that rapine
was their true profession.
_Stanza 3._—Joseph is the Oriental type of perfect beauty. The story of
his relations with Zuleikha, Potiphar’s wife, is one of the famous love
stories of the East; Jami made it the theme of a long metaphysical poem.
The part played by Zuleikha in Persian tales is far more creditable than
that which is assigned to her either in the Bible or the Koran.
Every translator of Hafiz has tried his hand upon this song, which is
one of the most famous in the Divan. It is only right to inform the
reader that the original is of great beauty.
The whole poem has received a mystical interpretation which seems to me
to add but little to its value or to its intelligibility; but in case
any one should wish to gather the higher wisdom from it, I may mention
that the mole, powder, and paint, of which a beautiful face does not
stand in need, represent the ink, colour, dots, and lines of the Koran;
and this is the explanation given to the couplet concerning Joseph and
Zuleikha by a thorough-going Western mystic: “By reason of that beauty
daily increasing that Joseph (the absolute existence, the real beloved,
God) had, I (the first day) knew that love for him would bring Zuleikha
(us, things possible) forth from the screen of chastity (the pure
existence of God).” The learned translator seems to have felt that his
version presented some difficulties, and he adds for the use of his
weaker brethren the following comment: “In the world of non-existence
and possibility, when I beheld the splendour of true beauty with
different qualities, I knew for certain that Love would take us out of
the ambush.” This makes everything clear.