The light of Asia; or, The great renuncia 
 
 3 1924 013 206 150 
 
Zhc XlGbt of Hsia. 
 
Xlbe Xtgbt of Hsia 
 
 THE GREAT RENUNCIATIOxN 
 
 (MAHABHINISHKRAMANA) 
 
 THE LIFE AND TEACHING Of GAUTAMA 
 
 PRINCE OP INDIA AND FOUNDER OF BUDDHISM 
 
 Os Cola in Ferse bu an InSian iBuDSfjtst) 
 
 SIR EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I. 
 
 OFFICER OF THE ORDEIl OF THE WHITE ELEPHANT OF SIAM 
 
 THIRD CLASS OF THE IMPERIAL ORDER OF THE MEDJIDIE 
 
 HONORARY MEMBER OP THE SOCI^T^ DE GEOGRAPHIE, MARSEILLE 
 
 FORMERLY PRINCIPAL OF THE DECCAN COLLEGE, POONA 
 
 AND FELLOW OF THE UNIVERSITY OF BOMBAY 
 
 Author of " The History of Lord Dalhousie's Administration" 
 
 '\Griselda OTid other Poems," " The Euterpe of Herodotus," 
 
 "• The Book o/Good Counsels," from the Sanskrit " Ilitopadesn." " The i'oets o/Greece^ 
 
 "Pearls oj the Faith," " The Indian S07ig of Songs," 
 
 " India Revisited, ' <tc. tfcc. 
 
 LONDON 
 KEGAN PAUL, TEENCH, TEUBNER, & CO. 17' 
 
 PATEENOSTBE HOUSE, CHARING CKOSS KOAD 
 
 1891 
 
-' ^ 
 
 ^.■^7<?^G 
 
 The rig/Us of translation and of reproduction are reierved. 
 
STfjis Folume 
 
 IS DUTIFULLY INSCBIBED TO 
 
 THE SOVEREIGN, GRAND MASTER, AND COMPANIONS 
 
 S;j)C Moet <ZE;raIteli ffitter of tljc Stat of InJia 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this bool< is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013206150 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 In the following Poem I have sought, by the mediam 
 of an imaginary Buddhist votary, to depict the life 
 and character and indicate the philosophy of that 
 noble hero and reformer, Prince Gautama of India, 
 the founder of Buddhism. 
 
 A generation ago little or nothing was known in 
 Europe of this great faith of Asia, which had never- 
 theless existed during twenty- four centuries, and ati 
 this day surpasses, in the number of its followers and/| 
 the area of its prevalence, any other form of creed.j 
 Four hundred and seventy millions of our race live 
 and die in the tenets of Gautama ; and the spiritual 
 dominions of this ancient teacher extend, at the 
 present time, from Nepaul and Ceylon, over the whole 
 Eastern Peninsula, to China, Japan, Thibet, Central 
 
viii PREFACE. 
 
 Asia, Siberia, and even Swedish Lapland. India itself 
 migtt fairly be included in this magnificent Empire 
 of Belief; for though the profession of Buddhism has 
 for the most part passed away from the land of its 
 birth, the mark of Gautama's sublime teaching is 
 stamped ineffaceably upon modem Brahmanism, and 
 the most characteristic habits and convictions of the 
 Hindus are clearly due to the benign influence of 
 Buddha's precepts. More than a third of mankind, 
 therefore, owe their moral and religious ideas to this 
 illustrious prince ; whose personality, though imper- 
 fectly revealed in the existing sources of information, 
 cannot, but appear the highest, gentlest, holiest, and 
 most beneficent, with one exception, in the history of 
 Thought. Discordant in frequent particulars, and 
 sorely overlaid by corruptions, inventions, and miscon- 
 ceptions, the Buddhistical books yet agree in the one 
 point of recording nothing — no single act or word — 
 which mars the perfect purity and tenderness of this 
 Indian teacher, who united the truest princely qualities 
 with the intellect of a sage and the passionate devotion 
 of a martyr. Even M. Barth^lemy St. Hilaire, totally 
 misjudging as he does, many points of Buddhism, ia 
 
PREFACE. ix 
 
 well cited by Professor Max Miiller as saying of Prince 
 Sidddrtha, " Sa vie n'a point de tache. Son. constant 
 h^roisme ^gale sa conviction ; et si la thdorie qu'il 
 pr^conise est fausse, les exemples personnels qu'il donne 
 sont irr^prochables. II est le modele achev^ de tontes 
 les vertus qu'il pr^che ; son abn%ation, sa cbaritd, son 
 inalterable douceur ne se d^mentent point un seul 
 instant. . . II prepare silencieusment sa doctrine 
 par six annfes de retraite et de meditation; il la 
 propage par la seule puissance de la parole et de la 
 persuasion pendant plus d'un demi-sifecle, et quand il 
 meurt entre les bras de ses disciples, c'est avec la 
 sdrenite d'un sage qui a pratiqu^ le bien toute sa vie, 
 et qui est assurd d'avoir trouv^ le vrai." To Gautama 
 has consequently been granted this stupendous con- 
 quest of humanity ; and — though he discountenanced 
 ritual, and declared himself, even when on the thres- 
 hold of Nirvana, to be only what all other men might 
 become — the love and gratitude of Asia, disobeying 
 his mandate, have given him fervent worship. Forests 
 of flowers are daily laid upon his stainless shrines, and 
 countless millions of lips daily repeat the formula 
 " I take refuge in Buddha ! " 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 The Buddha of this poem — if, as need not be doubted, 
 he really existed — was born on the borders of Nepaul 
 about 620 B.C., and died about 543 B.C. at Kusinagara 
 in Oudh. In point of age, therefore, most other creeds 
 are youthful compared with this venerable religion, 
 which has in it the eternity of a universal hope, the 
 immortality of a boundless love, an indestructible ele- 
 ment of faith in final good, and the proudest asser- 
 tion ever made of human freedom. The extravagantes 
 which disfigure the record and practice of Buddhism 
 are to be referred to that inevitable degradation which 
 priesthoods always inflict upon great ideas committed 
 to their charge. The power and sublimity of Gau- 
 tama's original doctrines should be estimated by their 
 influence, not by their interpreters ; nor by that inno- 
 cent but lazy and ceremonious church which has arisen 
 on the foundations of the Buddhistic Brotherhood or 
 " Sangha." 
 
 I have put my poem into a Buddhist's mouth, 
 because, to appreciate the spirit of Asiatic thoughts, 
 they should be regarded from the Oriental point of 
 view ; and neither the miracles which consecrate this 
 record, nor the philosophy which it embodies, could 
 
PREFACE. xj 
 
 have been otherwise so naturally reproduced. The 
 doctrine of Transmigration, for instance — startling to 
 modem minds — was established and thoroughly ac- 
 cepted by the Hindus of Buddha's time ; that period 
 when Jerusalem was being taken by Nebuchadnezzar, 
 when Nineveh was falling to the Medes, and Marseilles 
 was founded by the Phocaeans. The exposition here 
 offered of so antique a system is of necessity incom- 
 plete, and — in obedience to the laws of poetic art — 
 passes rapidly by many matters philosophically most 
 important, as well as over the long ministry of Gau- 
 tama. But my purpose has been obtained if any just 
 conception be here conveyed of the lofty character of 
 this noble prince, and of the general purport of his 
 doctrines. As to these latter there has arisen pro- 
 digious controversy among the erudite, who will bo 
 aware that I have taken the imperfect Buddhistic cita- 
 tio s much as they stand in Spence Hardy's work, and 
 have also modified more than one passage in the 
 Teceived narratives. The views, however, here indi- 
 cated of " Nirvana," " Dharma," " Karma," and the 
 other chief features of Buddhism, are at least the fruits 
 of considerable study, and also of a firm conviction 
 
Kii PREFACE. 
 
 that a third of mankind would never have heea brought 
 to believe in blank abstractions, or in Nothingness as 
 the issue and crown of Being. 
 
 Finally, in reverence to the illustrious Promulgator 
 of this " Light of Asia," and in homage to the many 
 eminent scholars who have devoted noble labours to 
 his memory, for which both repose and ability are 
 wanting to me, I beg that the shortcomings of my too- 
 hurried study may be forgiven. It has been composed 
 in the brief intervals of days without leisure, but is 
 inspired by an abiding desire to aid in the better 
 mutual knowledge of East and West. The time may 
 come, I hope, when this book and my " Indian Song of 
 Songs," and " Indian Idylls,'' will preserve the memory 
 of one who loved India and the Indian peoples. 
 
 EDWIN AENOLD, C.S.L 
 London, Aug. 1884. 
 
THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Book tbe 3fir0t. 
 
JBooFi tbc ifirst. 
 
 The Scripture of the Saviour of the World, 
 Lord Buddha — Prince Sidddrtha styled on earth — 
 In Earth and Heavens and Hells loicomparable, 
 All-honoured, Wisest, Best, most Pitiful ; 
 The Teacher of Nirvdna and the Law. 
 
 Thus came he to be born again for men. 
 
 Below the highest sphere four Eegents sit 
 Who rule our world ; and under them are zones 
 Nearer, but high, where saintliest spirits dead 
 Wait thrice ten thousand years, then live again ; 
 And on Lord Buddha, waiting in that sky, 
 
4 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Came for our sakes the five sure signs of birth. 
 
 So that the Devas knew the signs, and said 
 
 " Buddha will go again to help the World." 
 
 " Tea ! " spake He, " now I go to help the World 
 
 This last of many times ; for birth and death 
 
 End hence for me and those who learn my Law. 
 
 I will go down among the Sakyas, 
 
 Under the southward snows of Himalay, 
 
 Where pious people live and a just King." 
 
 That night the wife of King Suddhddana, 
 Maya the Queen, asleep beside her Lord, 
 Dreamed a strange dream ; dreamed that a star from 
 
 heaven — 
 Splendid, six-rayed, in colour rosy-pearl, 
 Whereof the token was an Elephant 
 Six-tusked, and white as milk of Kamadhuk — 
 Shot through the void ; and, shining into her, 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 5 
 
 Entered her womb upon the right. Awaked, 
 Bliss beyond mortal mother's filled her breast, 
 And over half the earth a lovely light 
 Forewent the morn. The strong hills shook; the 
 
 waves 
 Sank lulled ; all flowers that blow by day came 
 
 forth 
 As 'twere high noon ; down to the farthest hells 
 Passed the Queen's joy, as when warm sunshine 
 
 thrills 
 Wood-glooms to gold, and into all the deeps 
 A tender whisper pierced. " Oh ye," it said, 
 " The dead that are to live, the live who die. 
 Uprise, and hear, and hope ! Buddha is come ! " 
 Whereat in Limbos numberless much peace 
 Spread, and the world's heart throbbed, and a wind 
 
 tlew 
 With unknown freshness over lands and seas. 
 
6 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And when the morning dawned, and this was told, 
 
 The grey dream-readers said " The dream is good ! 
 
 The Crab is in conjunction with the Sun ; 
 
 The Queen shall bear a boy, a holy child 
 
 Of wondrous wisdom, profiting all flesh, 
 
 Who shall deliver men from ignorance. 
 
 Or rule the world, if he will deign to rale." 
 
 In this wise was the holy Buddha born. 
 
 Queen Maya stood at noon, her days fulfilled, 
 Under a Palsa in the Palace-grounds, 
 A stately trunk, straight as a temple-shaft, 
 With crown of glossy leaves and fragrant blooms ; 
 And, knowing the time come — for all things 
 
 knew — 
 The conscious tree bent down its bows to make 
 A bower about Queen Maya's majesty ; 
 And Earth put forth a thousand sudden flowers 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 
 To spread a coucli ; while, ready for tLe bath, 
 The rock hard by gave out a limpid stream 
 Of crystal flow. So brought she forth her child 
 Pangless- — he having on his perfect form 
 The marks, thirty and two, of blessed birth ; 
 Of which the great news to the Palace came. 
 But when they brought the painted palanquin 
 To fetch him home, the bearers of the poles 
 Were the four Eegents of the Earth, come down 
 From Mount Sumeru — they who write men's deeds 
 On brazen plates — the Angel of the East, 
 Whose hosts are clad in silver robes, and bear 
 Targets of pearl : the Angel of the South, 
 Whose horsemen, the Kumbhandas, ride blue steeds, 
 With sapphire shields : the Angel of the West, 
 By Nagas followed, riding steeds blood-red, 
 With' coral shields : the Angel of the North, 
 Environed by his Yakshas, all in gold. 
 
8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 On yellow horses, bearing shields of gold. 
 
 These, with their pomp invisible, came down 
 
 And took the poles, in cast and outward garb 
 
 Like bearers, yet most mighty gods ; and gods 
 
 Walked free with men that day, though men knew 
 
 not : 
 For Heaven was filled with gladness for Earth's 
 
 sake, 
 Knowing Lord Buddha thus was come again. 
 
 But King Suddh6dana wist not of this ; 
 The portents troubled, tUl his dream-readers 
 Augured a Prince of earthly dominance, 
 A Chakravartin, such as rise to rule 
 Once in each thousand years ; seven gifbs he has — 
 The Chakra-ratna, disc divine ; the gem ; 
 The horse, the Aswa-ratna, that proud steed 
 Which tramps the clouds : a snow-white elephant, 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. g 
 
 The Hasti-ratna, born to bear his King ; 
 The crafty Minister, the General 
 Unconqnered, and the wife of peerless grace, 
 The Istri-ratna, lovelier than the Dawn. 
 For which gifts looking with this wondrous boy, 
 The King gave order that his town should keep 
 High festival ; therefore the ways were swept, 
 Rose-odours sprinkled in the street, the trees 
 Were hung with lamps and flags, while merry crowds 
 Gaped on the sword-players and posturers. 
 The jugglers, charmers, swingers, rope-walkers, 
 The nautch-girls in their spangled skirts, and bells 
 That chime light laughter round their restless feet ; 
 The masquers wrapped in skins of bear and deer. 
 The tiger-tamers, wrestlers, quail-fighters. 
 Beaters of drum and twanglers of the wire, 
 Who made the people happy by command. 
 Moreover, from afar came merchant-men. 
 
10 THE LIGHT OP ASIA 
 
 Bringing, on tidings of this birth, rich gifts 
 In golden trays ; goat-shawls, and nard, and jade, 
 Turkises, " evening-sky " tint, woven webs — 
 So fine twelve folds hide not a modest face — 
 Waist-cloths sewn thick with pearls, and sandal- 
 wood; 
 Homage from tribute cities ; so they called 
 Their Prince Savarthasiddh, " All-Prospering," 
 Briefer, Siddartha. 
 
 'Mongst the strangers came 
 A grey-haired saint, Asita, one whose ears. 
 Long closed to earthly things, caught heavenly sounds, 
 And heard at prayer beneath his peepul-tree 
 The Devas singing songs at Buddha's birth. 
 Wondrous in lore he was by age and fasts ; 
 Him, drawing nigh, seeming so reverend, 
 The King saluted, and Queen Maya made 
 To lay her babe before such holy feet ; 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. li 
 
 But wKen he saw the Prince the old man cried 
 " Ah, Queen, not so ! " and thereupon he touched 
 Eight times the dust, laid his waste visage there, 
 Saying, " Babe ! I worship ! Thou art He ! 
 I see the rosy light, the foot-sole marks, 
 The soft curled tendril of the Swastika, 
 The sacred primal signs thirty and two. 
 The eighty lesser tokens. Thou art Buddh^- 
 And thou wilt preach the Law and save all flesh 
 Who learn the Law, though I shall never hear. 
 Dying too soon, who lately longed to die ; 
 Howbeit I have seen Thee. Know, King ! 
 This is that Blossom on our human tree 
 Which opens once in many myriad years — 
 But opened, fills the world with Wisdom's scent 
 And Love's dropped honey; from thy royal root 
 A Heavenly Lotus springs : Ah, happy House ! 
 Yet not all-happy, for a sword must pierce 
 
12 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Thy bowels for this boy — whilst thou, sweet Queen ! 
 
 Dear to all gods and men for this great birth. 
 
 Henceforth art grown too sacred for more woe ; 
 
 And life is woe, therefore in seven days 
 
 Painless thou shalt attain the close of pain." 
 
 Which fell : for on the seventh evening 
 Queen Maya smiling sleptj and waked no more, 
 Passing content to TrS,yastrinshas-Heaven, 
 Where countless Devas worship her, and wait 
 Attendant on that radiant Motherhead. 
 But for the Babe they found a foster-nurse, 
 Princess MahaprajS,pati — her breast 
 Nourished with noble milk the lips of Him 
 Whose lips comfort the worlds. 
 
 When th' eighth year passed, 
 The careful King bethought to teach his son 
 All that a Prince should learn, for still he shunned 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 15 
 
 The too vast presage of those miracles, 
 The glories and the sufferings of a Buddh.a., 
 So, in full council of his Ministers, 
 " Who is the wisest man, great sirs," he asked, 
 "To teach my Prince that which a Prince should 
 
 know ? " 
 Whereto gave answer each with instant voice : 
 " King ! Viswamitra is the wisest one, 
 The farthest-seen in Scriptures, and the best 
 In learning, and the manual arts, and all." 
 Thus Viswamitra came and heard commands ; 
 And, on a day found fortunate, the Prince 
 Took up his slate of ox-red sandal wood 
 All beautified by gems around the rim, 
 And sprinkled smooth with dust of emery. 
 These took he, and his writing-stick, and stood 
 With eyes bent down before the Sage, who said, 
 " Child, write this Scripture," speaking slow the verse 
 
14 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 " Gdyato'i " named, which only High-born hear : — 
 
 Om, tatsaviturvarenyam 
 Bhargo devasya dhimahi 
 DMyo yo na 'prachodaydt. 
 
 " Acharya, I write," meekly replied 
 
 The Prince, and quickly on the dust he drew — 
 
 Not in one script, but many characters — 
 
 The sacred verse : Nagri and Dakshin, Ni, 
 
 Mangal, Parusha, Yava, Tirthi, Uk, 
 
 Darad, Sikhyani, Mana, Madhyachar, 
 
 The pictured writings and the speech of signs, 
 
 Tokens of cave men and the sea-peoples, 
 
 Of those who worship snakes beneath the earth, 
 
 And those' who flame adore and the sun's orb. 
 
 The Magians and the dwellers on the mounds ; 
 
 Of all the nations all strange scripts he traced 
 
 One after other with his writing- stick, 
 
 Beading the master's verse in every tongue ; 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 
 And Viswamitra said, " It is enough. 
 Let us to numbers. 
 
 After me repeat 
 Your numeration till we reach the Lakh, 
 One, two, three, four, to ten, and then by tens 
 To hundreds, thousands." After him the child 
 Named digits, decads, centuries ; nor paused. 
 The round lakh reached, but softly murmured on, 
 " Then comes the koti, nahut, ninnahut, 
 Khamba, viskhamba, abab, attata. 
 To kumuds, gundhikas, and utpalas, 
 By pundarikas unto padumas, 
 Which last is how you count the utmost grains 
 Of Hastagiri ground to finest dust ; 
 But beyond that a numeration is, 
 The Katha, used to note the stars of night ; 
 The Koti-Katha, for the ocean drops ; 
 Ingga, the calculus of circulars ; 
 
f5 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Sarvanikchepa, by the which you deal 
 
 With all the sands of Gunga, till we come 
 
 To Antah-Kalpas, where the unit is 
 
 The sands of ten crore Gungas. If one seeks 
 
 More comprehensive scale, th' arithmic mounts 
 
 By the Asankya, which is the tale 
 
 Of all the drops that in ten thousand years 
 
 Would fall on all the worlds by daily rain ; 
 
 Thence unto Maha-Kalpas, by the which 
 
 The Gods compute their future and their past." 
 
 " 'Tis good," the sage rejoined. " Most noble 
 Prince, 
 If these thou know'st, needs it that I should teach 
 The mensuration of the lineal ? " 
 Humbly the boy replied, " Acharya ! 
 Be pleased to hear me. Paramanus ten 
 A parasukshma make ; ten of those build 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 17 
 
 The trasarene, and seven trasarenes 
 One mote's-lengfch floating in the beam, seven motes 
 The whisker-point of mouse, and ten of these 
 One likhya ; likhyas ten a yuka, ten 
 Tukas a heart of barley, which is held ^■--~ 
 Seven times a wasp-waist ; so unto the grain 
 Of mung and mustard and the barley-corn. 
 Whereof ten give the finger-joint, twelve joints 
 The span, wherefrom we reach the cubit, staff. 
 Bow-length, lance-length ; while twenty lengths of 
 
 lance 
 Mete what is named a ' breath,' which is to say 
 Such space as man may stride with lungs once filled, 
 Whereof a gow is forty, four times that 
 A ySjana ; and, Master ! if it please, 
 I shall recite how many sun-motes lie 
 From end to end within a y6jana." 
 Thereat, with instant skill, the little Prince 
 
1 8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Pronounced the total of tlie atoms true. 
 
 But Viswamitra heard it on his face 
 
 Prostrate before the boy ; " For thou," he cried, 
 
 " Art Teacher of thy teachers — thou, not I, 
 
 Art Guru. Oh, I worship thee, sweet Prince ! 
 
 That comest to my school only to show 
 
 Thou knowest all without the books, and know'st 
 
 Fair reverence besides." 
 
 Which reverence 
 Lord Buddha kept to all his schoolmasters, 
 Albeit beyond their learning taught ; in speech 
 Right gentle, yet so wise ; princely of mien, 
 Tet softly-mannered ; modest, deferent, 
 And tender-hearted, though of fearless blood ; 
 No bolder horseman in the youthful band 
 E'er rode in gay chase of the shy gazelles ; 
 No keener driver of the chariot "^ 
 
 In mimic contest scoured the Palace-courts : 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 19 
 
 Yet in mid-play the boy would ofttimes pause, 
 Letting the deer pass free ; would ofttimes yield 
 His half-won race because the labouring steeds 
 Fetched painful breath ; or if his princely mates 
 Saddened to lose, or if some wistful dream 
 Swept o'er his thoughts. And ever with the years 
 Waxed this compassionateness of our Lord, 
 Even as a great tree grows from two soft leaves 
 To spread its shade afar ; but hardly yet 
 KJaew the young child of sorrow, pain, or tears. 
 Save as strange names for things not felt by kings, 
 Not ever to be felt. Then it befell 
 In the Eoyal garden on a day of spring, 
 A flock of wild swans passed, voyaging north 
 To their nest-places on Him^a's breast. 
 Calling in love-notes down their snowy line 
 The bright birds flew, by fond love piloted ; 
 And Devadatta, cousin of the Prince, 
 
20 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Pointed Lis bow, and loosed a wilful sliafb 
 
 Which found the wide wing of the foremost swan 
 
 Broad-spread to glide upon the free blue road, 
 
 So that it fell, the bitter arrow fixed. 
 
 Bright scarlet blood-gouts staining the pure plumes. 
 
 Which seeing, Prince Sidd^rtha took the bird 
 
 Tenderly up, rested it in his lap — 
 
 Sitting with knees crossed, as Lord Buddha sits — 
 
 And, soothing with a touch the wild thing's fright, 
 
 Composed its ruffled vans, calmed its quick heart, 
 
 Caressed it into peace with light kind palms 
 
 As soft as plantain-leaves an hour unroUed ; 
 
 And while the right hand held, the left hand 
 
 drew 
 The cruel steel forth from the wound, and laid 
 Cool leaves and healing honey on the smart. 
 Yet all so little knew the boy of pain 
 That curiously into his wrist he pressed 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 21 
 
 The arrow's barb, and winced to feel it sting, 
 And turned with tears to soothe his bird again. 
 
 Then some one came who said, " My Prince hath 
 shot 
 A swan, which fell among the roses here. 
 He bids me pray you send it. Will you send ? " 
 " Nay," quoth Siddartha, " if the bird were dead 
 To send it to the slayer might be well. 
 But the swan lives ; my cousin hath but killed 
 The god-like speed which throbbed in this white wing." 
 And Devadatta answered, " The wild thing. 
 Living or dead, is his who fetched it down ; 
 'Twas no man's in the clouds, but fall'n 'tis mine. 
 Give me my prize, fair Cousin." Then our Lord 
 Laid the swan's neck beside his own smooth cheek 
 And gravely spake, " Say no ! the bird is mine, 
 The first of myriad things which shall be mine 
 
22 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 By right of mercy and love's lordliness. 
 
 For now I know, by what within me stirs, 
 
 That I shall teach compassion unto men 
 
 And be a speechless world's interpreter, 
 
 Abating this accursed flood of woe, 
 
 Not man's alone ; but, if the Prince disputes, 
 
 Let him submit his matter to the wise 
 
 And we will wait their word." So was it done ; 
 
 In full divan the business had debate, 
 
 And many thought this thing and many that ; 
 
 Till there arose an unknown priest who said, 
 
 " If life be aught, the saviour of a life 
 
 Owns more the Kving thing than he can own 
 
 Who sought to slay — the slayer spoils and wastes. 
 
 The cherisher sustains ; give him the bird : " 
 
 Which judgment all found just ; but when the Kinw 
 
 Sought out the sage for honour, he was gone. 
 
 And some one saw a hooded snake glide forth, — 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 23 
 
 The gods come ofttimes thus ! So our Lord Buddh 
 Began his works of mercy. 
 
 Yet not more 
 Knew he as yet of grief than that one bird's, 
 Which, being healed, went joyous to its kind. 
 But on another day the King said, " Come, 
 Sweet son ! and see the pleasaunce of the spring. 
 And how the fruitful earth is wooed to yield 
 Its riches to the reaper ; how my realm — 
 Which shall be thine when the pile flames for me — 
 Feeds all its mouths and keeps the King's chest filled. 
 Fair is the season with new leaves, bright blooms, 
 Green grass, and cries of plough-time." So they 
 
 rode 
 Into a land of wells and gardens, where, 
 All up and down the rich red loam, the steers 
 Strained their strong shoulders in the creaking yoke 
 Dragging the ploughs ; the fat soil rose and rolled 
 
24 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 In smootli long waves back from the plough; who 
 
 drove 
 Planted both feet upon the leaping share 
 To make the furrow deep ; among the palms 
 The tinkle of the rippling water rang, 
 And where it ran the glad earth 'broidered it 
 With balsams and the spears of lemon-grass. 
 Elsewhere were sowers who went forth to sow ; 
 And all the jungle laughed with nesting-songs, 
 And all the thickets rustled with small life 
 Of lizard, bee, beetle, and creeping things 
 Pleased at the spring-time. In the mango-sprays 
 The sun-birds flashed ; alone at his green forge 
 Toiled the loud coppersmith ; bee-eaters hawked, 
 Chasing the purple butterflies ; beneath. 
 Striped squirrels raced, the mynas perked and picked, 
 The seven brown sisters chattered in the thorn, 
 The pied fish-tiger hung above the pool, 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. 
 The egrets stalked among the buffaloes, 
 The kites sailed circles in the golden air ; 
 About the painted temple peacocks flew, 
 The blue doves cooed from every well, far off 
 The village drums beat for some marriage- feast ; 
 All things spoke peace and plenty, and the Prince 
 Saw and rejoiced. But, looking deep, he saw 
 The thorns which grow upon this rose of life : 
 How the swart peasant sweated for his wage. 
 Toiling for leave to live ; and how he urged 
 The great-eyed oxen through the flaming hours, 
 Goading their velvet flanks : then marked he, too, 
 How lizard fed on ant, and snake on him. 
 And kite on both ; and how the fish-hawk robbed 
 The fish-tiger of that which it had seized ; 
 The shrike chasing the bulbul, which did hunt 
 The jewelled butterflies ; till everywhere 
 Each slew a slayer and in turn was slain, 
 
26 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Life living upon death. So the fair show 
 
 Veiled one vast, savage, grim conspiracy 
 
 Of mutual murder, from the worm to man, 
 
 Who himself kills his fellow ; seeing which — 
 
 The hungry ploughman and his labouring kine. 
 
 Their dewlaps blistered with the bitter yoke. 
 
 The rage to live which makes all living strife — 
 
 The Prince Siddartha sighed. " Is this," he said, 
 
 " That happy earth they brought me forth to see ? 
 
 How salt with sweat the peasant's bread ! how hard 
 
 The oxen's service ! in the brake how fierce 
 
 The war of weak and strong ! i' th' air what plots ! 
 
 No refuge e'en in water. Go aside 
 
 A space, and let me muse on what ye show." 
 
 So saying the good Lord Buddha seated him 
 Under a jambu-tree, with ankles crossed — 
 As holy statues sit — and first began 
 
BOOK THE FIRST. ij 
 
 To meditate this deep disease of life, 
 What its far source and whence its remedy. 
 So vast a pity filled him, such .wide love 
 For living things, such passion to heal pain, 
 That by their stress his princely spirit passed 
 To ecstasy, and, purged from mortal taint 
 Of sense and self, the boy attained thereat 
 DhyElna, first step of " the path." 
 
 There flew 
 High overhead that hour five holy ones, 
 Whose free wings faltered as they passed the tree. 
 " What power superior draws us from our flight ? " 
 They asked, — ^for spirits feel all force divine, 
 And know the sacred presence of the pure. 
 Then, looking downward, they beheld the Buddh 
 Crowned with a rose-hued aureole, intent 
 On thoughts to save ; while from the grove a voice 
 Cried, " Rishis ! this is He shall help the world, 
 
28 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Descend and worship." So tlie Bright Ones came 
 And sang a song of praise, folding their wings ; 
 Then journeyed on, taking good news to Gods. 
 
 But certain from the King seeking the Prince 
 Found him still musing, though the noon was past, 
 And the sun hastened to the western hills : 
 Yet, while all shadows moved, the jambu- tree's 
 Stayed in one quarter, overspreading him, 
 Lest the sloped rays should strike that sacred head ; 
 And he who saw this sight heard a voice say. 
 Amid the blossoms of the rose-apple, 
 " Let be the King's son ! till the shadow goes 
 Forth from his heart my shadow will not shift." 
 
"Book tbe Second. 
 
( .V ) 
 
 Booft tbc Second. 
 
 Now, when our Lord was come to eighteen years, 
 The Bang commanded that there should be built 
 Three stately houses, one of hewn square beams 
 With cedar lining, warm for winter days ; 
 One of veined marbles, cool for summer heat ; 
 And one of burned bricks, with blue tiles bedecked, 
 Pleasant at seed-time, when the champaks bud — 
 Subha, Suramma, Eamma, were their names. 
 Delicious gardens round about them bloomed, 
 Streams wandered wild, and musky thickets stretched. 
 With many a bright pavilion and fair lawn, 
 In midst of which Siddartha strayed at will, 
 Some new delight provided every hour ; 
 
32 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And tappy hours lie knew, for life was rich, 
 
 With youthful blood at quickest j yet still came 
 
 The shadows of his meditation back, 
 
 As the lake's silver dulls with driving clouds. 
 
 Which the King marking, called his Ministers : 
 " Bethink ye, sirs ! how the old Eishi spake," 
 He said, "and what my dream-readers foretold. 
 This boy, more dear to me than mine heart's blood. 
 Shall be of universal dominance, 
 Trampling the neck of all his enemies, 
 A King of kings — and this is in my heart ; — 
 Or he shall tread the sad and lowly path 
 Of self-denial and of pious pains. 
 Gaining who knows what good, when all is lost 
 Worth keeping ; and to this his wistful eyes 
 Do stUl incline amid my palaces. 
 But ye are sage, and ye will counsel me ; 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 33 
 
 How may his feet be turned to that proud road 
 Where they should walk, and all fair signs come 
 
 true 
 Which gave him Earth to rule, if he would rule ? " 
 
 The eldest answered, " Maharaja ! love 
 Will cure these thin distempers ; weave the spell 
 Of woman's wiles about his idle heart. 
 What knows this noble boy of beauty yet. 
 Eyes that make heaven forgot, and lips of balm ? 
 Find him soft wives and pretty playfellows ; 
 The thoughts ye cannot stay with brazen chains 
 A girl's hair lightly binds." 
 
 And all thought good. 
 But the King answered, " If we seek him wives, 
 Love chooseth ofttimes with another eye ; 
 And if we bid range Beauty's garden round, 
 To pluck what blossom pleases, he will smile 
 
34 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And sweetly shun tlie joy he knows not of." 
 Then said another, " Roams the barasingh 
 Until the fated arrow flies ; for him, 
 As for less lordly spirits, some one charms, 
 Some face will seem a Paradise, some form 
 Fairer than pale Dawn when she wakes the world. 
 This do, my King ! Command a festival 
 Where the realm's maids shall be competitors 
 In youth and grace, and sports that S^kyas usa. 
 Let the Prince give the prizes to the fair. 
 And, when the lovely victors pass his seat, 
 There shall be those who mark if one or two 
 Change the fixed sadnfess of his tender cheek ; 
 So we may chose for Love with Love's own eyes, 
 And cheat his Highness into happiness." 
 This thing seemed good ; wherefore, upon a day, 
 The criers bade the young and beautiful 
 Pass to the palace, for 'twas in command 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 35 
 
 To hold a court of pleasure, and the Prince 
 "Would give the prizes, something rich for all, 
 The richest for the fairest judged. Thus flocked 
 Kapilavastu's maidens to the gate. 
 Each with her dark hair newly smoothed and bound. 
 Eyelashes lustred with the soorma-stick. 
 Fresh-bathed and scented ; all in shawls and cloths 
 Of gayest ; slender hands and feet new-stained 
 With crimson, and the tilka-spots stamped bright. 
 Fair show it was of all those Indian girls 
 Slow-pacing past the throne with large black eyes 
 Fixed on the ground ; for when they saw the Prince 
 More than the awe of Majesty made beat 
 Their fluttering hearts, he sate so passionless, 
 Gentle, but so beyond them. Each maid took 
 With down-dropped lids her gift, afraid to gaze; 
 And if the people hailed some lovelier one 
 Beyond her rivals worthy royal smiles, 
 
36 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 She stood like a scared antelope to touch 
 The gracious hand, then fled to join her mates 
 Trembling at favour, so divine he seemed. 
 So high and saint-like and above her world. 
 Thus filed they, one bright maid after another, 
 The city's flowers, and all this beauteous march 
 Was ending and the prizes spent, when last 
 Came young Yas6dliara, and they that stood 
 Nearest Siddartha saw the princely boy 
 Start, as the radiant girl approached. A form 
 Of heavenly mould ; a gait like Parvati's ; 
 Eyes like a hind's iu love-time ; face so fair 
 Words cannot paint its spell ; and she alone 
 Gazed full — folding her palms across her breasts — 
 On the boy's gaze, her stately neck unbent. 
 " Is there a gift for me ? " she asked, and smiled. 
 " The gifts are gone," the Prince replied, " yet take 
 This for amends, dear sister, of whose grace 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 37 
 
 Our happy city boasts ; " therewith he loosed 
 The emerald necklet from his throat, and clasped 
 Its green beads round her dark and silk-soft waist ; 
 And their eyes mixed, and from the look sprang love, 
 
 Long after — when enlightenment was full — 
 Lord Buddha, being prayed why thus his heart 
 Took fire at first glance of the Sakya girl. 
 Answered, " We were not strangers, as to us 
 And all it seemed ; in ages long gone by 
 A hunter's son, playing with forest girls 
 By Yamun's springs, where Nandadevi stands, 
 Sate umpire while they raced beneath the firs 
 Like hares at eve that run their playful rings ; 
 One with flower-stars he crowned ; one with long 
 
 plumes 
 Plucked from eyed pheasant and the jungle-cock ; 
 One with fir-apples : but who ran the last 
 
38 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Came first for Mm, and unto her the boy 
 Gave a tame fawn and Hs heart's love beside. 
 And in the wood they lived many glad years, 
 And in the wood they undivided died. 
 Lo ! as hid seed shoots after rainless years, 
 Bo good and evil, pains and pleasures, hates 
 And loves, and all dead deeds, come forth again 
 Bearing bright leaves or dark, sweet fruit or sour. 
 Thus I was he and she Yas6dhara ; 
 And while the wheel of birth and death turns round 
 That which hath been must be between us two." 
 
 But they who watched the Prince at prize-giving 
 Saw and heard all, and told the careful Eang 
 How sate SiddS,rtha heedless, till there passed 
 Great Suprabuddha's child, Yas6dhara ; 
 And how — at sudden sight of her — he changed, 
 And how she gazed on him and he on her, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 39 
 
 And of the jewel-gift, and what beside 
 Passed in their speaking glance. 
 
 The fond King smiled : 
 " Look ! we have found a lure ; take counsel now 
 To fetch therewith our falcon from the clouds. 
 Let messengers be sent to ask the maid 
 In marriage for my son." But it was law 
 With Seikyas, when any asked a maid 
 Of noble house, fair and desirable. 
 He must make good his skill in martial arts 
 Against all suitors who should challenge it ; 
 Nor might this custom break itself for kinga 
 Therefore her father spake : " Say to the King, 
 The child is sought by princes far and near ; 
 If thy most gentle son can bend the bow. 
 Sway sword, and back a horse better than they, 
 Best would he be in all and best to us : 
 But how shall this be, with his cloistered ways ? " 
 
40 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Then the King's heart was sore, for now the Prince 
 
 Begged sweet Yasodhara for wife — in vain, 
 
 With Devadatta foremost at the bow, 
 
 Ardjuna master of all fiery steeds, 
 
 And Nanda chief in sword-play ; but the Prince 
 
 Laughed low and said, " These things, too, I have learned: 
 
 Make proclamation that thy son will meet 
 
 All comers at their chosen games. I think 
 
 I shall not lose my love for such as these." 
 
 So 'twas given forth that on the seventh day 
 
 The Prince Sidddrtha summoned whoso would 
 
 To match with him in feats of manliness, 
 
 The victor's crown to be Yas6dhara. 
 
 Therefore, upon the seventh day, there went 
 The Sakya lords, and town and country round, 
 Unto the maidan ; and the maid went too 
 A.mid her kinsfolk, carried as a bride, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 41 
 
 With music, and with litters gaily dight, 
 And gold-horned oxen, flower-caparisoned : 
 Whom Devadatta claimed, of royal line, 
 And Nanda and Ardjuna, noble hoth. 
 The flower of all youths there ; till the Prince came 
 Eiding his white horse Kantaka, which neighed, 
 Astonished at this great strange world without : 
 Also Siddartha gazed with wondering eyes 
 On all those people born beneath the throne, 
 Otherwise housed than kings, otherwise fed. 
 And yet so like — perchance — in joys and griefs. 
 But when the Prince saw sweet Yas6dhara, 
 Brightly he smiled, and drew his silken rein. 
 Leaped to the earth from Kantaka's broad back, 
 And cried, " He is not worthy of this pearl 
 Who is not worthiest ; let my rivals prove 
 If I have dared too much in seeking her." 
 Then Nanda challenged for the arrow-test 
 
42 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 And set a brazen drum six gows away, 
 Ardjuna six and Devadatta eight ; 
 But Priace Siddartta bade them set his drum 
 Ten gows from off the line, until it seemed 
 A cowry-shell for target. Then they loosed, 
 And Nanda pierced his drum, Ardjuna his, 
 And Devadatta drove a well-aimed shaft 
 Through both sides of his mark, so that the crowd 
 Marvelled and cried ; and sweet Yas6dhara 
 Dropped the gold sari o'er her fearful eyes, 
 Lest she should see her Prince's arrow fail. 
 But he, taking their bow of lacquered cane, 
 "With sinews bound, and strung with silver wire, 
 Which none but stalwart arms could draw a span. 
 Thrummed it — low laughing — drew the twisted string 
 Till the horns kissed, and the thick belly snapped : 
 " That is for play, not love," he said ; " hath none 
 A bow more fit for Sakya lords to use ? " 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 43 
 
 And one said, " There is Sinhahanu's bow, 
 Kept in the temple since we know not when. 
 Which none can string, nor draw if it be strung." 
 " Fetch me," he cried, " that weapon of a man ! " 
 They brought the ancient bow, wrought of black steel. 
 Laid with gold tendrils on its branching curves 
 Like bison-horns ; and twice Siddartha tried 
 Its strength across his knee, then spake — "Shoot now 
 With this, my cousins ! " but they could not bring 
 The stubborn arms a hand's-breadth nigher use ; 
 Then the Prince, lightly leaning, bent the bow. 
 Slipped home the eye upon the notch, and twanged 
 Sharply the cord, which, like an eagle's wing 
 Thrilling the air, sang forth so clear and loud, 
 That feeble folk at home that day inquired 
 " What is this sound ? " and people answered them, 
 " It is the sound of Sinhahinu's bow. 
 Which the King's son has strung and goes to shoot." 
 
44 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Then fitting fair a shaft, he drew and loosed, 
 
 And the keen arrow clove the sky, and drave 
 
 Right through that farthest drum, nor stayed its flight, 
 
 But skimmed the plain beyond, past reach of eye. 
 
 Next, Devadatta challenged with the sword, 
 And clove a Talas-tree six fingers thick ; 
 Ardjuna seven ; and Nanda cut through nine ; 
 But two such stems together grew, and both 
 Siddi,rtha's blade shred at one flashing stroke, 
 Keen, but so smooth that the straight trunks upstood. 
 And Nanda cried, " His edge turned ! " and the maid 
 Trembled anew seeing the trees erect ; 
 Until the Devas of the air, who watched. 
 Blew light breaths from the south, and both green crowns 
 Crashed in the sand, clean-felled. 
 
 Then brought they steeds 
 High-mettled, nobly-bred, and three times scoured 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 45 
 
 Around the maiddn, but white Kantaka 
 Left even the fleetest far behind — so swift, 
 That ere the foam fell from his mouth to earth 
 Twenty spear-lengths he flew ; but Nanda said, 
 " We too might win with such as Kantaka ; 
 Fetch an unbroken horse, and let men see 
 Who best can back him." So the syces brought 
 A stallion dark as night, led by three chains, 
 Fierce-eyed, with nostrils wide and tossing mane. 
 Unshod, unsaddled, for no rider yet 
 Had crossed him. Three times each young S§,kya 
 Sprang to his mighty back, but the hot steed 
 Furiously reared, and flung them to the plain 
 In dust and shame ; only Ardjuna held 
 His seat awhile, and, bidding loose the chains. 
 Lashed the black flank, and shook the bit, and held 
 The proud jaws fast with grasp of master-hand, 
 So that in storms of wrath and rage and fear 
 
46 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The savage stallion circled once the plain 
 Half-tamed ; but sudden turned with naked teeth, 
 Gripped by the foot Ardjuna, tore him down, 
 And would have slain him, but the grooms ran in 
 Fettering the maddened beast. Then all men 
 
 cried, 
 " Let not Siddartha meddle with this Bhut, 
 Whose liver is a tempest, and his blood 
 Red flame ; " but the Prince said, " Let go the 
 
 chains. 
 Give me his forelock only," which he held 
 With quiet grasp, and speaking some low word, 
 Laid his right palm across the stallion's eyes, 
 And drew it gently down the angry face. 
 And all along the neck and panting flanks, 
 Till men astonished saw the night-black horse 
 Sink his fierce crest and stand subdued and meek, 
 As though he knew our Lord and worshipped him, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 47 
 
 Nor stirred he while Siddartha mounted ; then 
 Went soberly to touch of knee and rein 
 Before all eyes, so that the people said, 
 " Strive no more, for Sidddrtha is the best." 
 
 And all the suitors answered " He is best ! " 
 And Suprabuddha, father of the maid, 
 Said, " It was in our hearts to find thee best. 
 Being dearest, yet what magic taught thee more 
 Of manhood 'mid thy rose-bowers and thy dreams 
 Than war and chase and world's work bring to 
 
 these ? 
 But wear, fair Prince, the treasure thou hast won." 
 Then at a word the lovely Indian girl 
 Eose from her place above the throng, and took 
 A crown of m6gra-flowers, and lightly drew 
 The veil of black and gold across her brow, 
 Proud-pacing past the youths, until she came 
 
48 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 To where Siddartha stood in grace divine, 
 New lighted from the night-dark steed, which bent 
 Its strong neck meekly underneath his arm. 
 Before the Prince lowly she bowed, and bared 
 Her face celestial beaming with glad love ; 
 Then on his neck she hung the fragrant wreath. 
 And on his breast she laid her perfect head, 
 And stooped to touch his feet with proud glad 
 
 eyes, 
 Saying, " Dear Prince, behold me, who am thine ! " 
 And all the throng rejoiced, seeing them pass 
 Hand fast in hand, and heart beating with heart, 
 The veil of black and gold drawn close again. 
 
 Long after — when enlightenment was come — 
 They prayed Lord Buddlia touching all, and why 
 She wore this black and gold, and stepped so proud. 
 And the World-honoured answered, " Unto me 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 49 
 
 This was unknown, albeit it seemed half known ; 
 For while the wheel of birth and death turns round, 
 Past things and thoughts, and buried lives come 
 
 back. 
 I now remember, myriad rains ago, 
 What time I roamed Him§,la's hanging woods, 
 A tiger, with my striped and hungry kind ; 
 I, who am Buddh, couched in the kusa grass 
 Gazing with green blinked eyes upon the herds 
 Which pastured near and nearer to their death 
 Round my day-lair ; or underneath the stars 
 I roamed for prey, savage, insatiable, 
 ' Sniffing the paths for track of man and deer, 
 Amid the beasts that were my fellows then, 
 Met in deep jungle or by reedy jheel, 
 A tigress, comeliest of the forest, set 
 The males at war ; her hide was lit with gold, 
 Black-broidered like the veil Yasddhara 
 
50 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Wore for me ; hot the strife waxed in that wood 
 With tooth and claw, while, underneath a neem 
 The fair beast watched us bleed, thus fiercely wooed. 
 And I remember, at the end she came, 
 Snarling, past this and that torn forest-lord 
 Whom I had conquered, and with fawning jaws 
 Licked my quick -heaving flank, and with me went 
 Into the wild with proud steps, amorously. 
 The wheel of birth and death turns low and high." 
 
 Therefore the maid was given unto the Prince 
 A willing spoil ; and when the stars were good — 
 Mesha, the Eed Ram, being Lord of heaven — 
 The marriage feast was kept, as Sakyas use, 
 The golden gadi set, the carpet spread, 
 The wedding garlands hung, the arm-threads tied. 
 The sweet cake broke, the rice and attar thrown, 
 The two straws floated on the reddened milk, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 
 Which, coming close, betokened " love till death ; 
 The seven steps taken thrice around the fire, 
 The gifts bestowed on holy men, the alms 
 And temple-offerings made, the mantras sung, 
 The garments of the bride and bridegroom tied. 
 Then the grey father spake : " Worshipful Prince, 
 She that was ours henceforth is only thine ; 
 Be good to her, who hath her life in thee." 
 Wherewith they brought home sweet TasSdhara, 
 With songs and trumpets, to the Prince's arms. 
 And love was all in all. 
 
 Yet not to love 
 Alone trusted the King ; love's prison-house 
 Stately and beautiful he bade them build, 
 So that in all the earth no marvel was 
 Like Yishramvan, the Prince's pleasure -place. 
 Midway in those wide palace-grounds there rose 
 A verdant hill whose base Eohini bathed, 
 
 51 
 
52 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Murmuring adown from Himalay's broad feet, 
 
 To bear its tribute into Gunga's waves. 
 
 Southward a growtb of tamarind trees and sal, 
 
 Thick set with pale sky-coloured gantki flowers, 
 
 Shut out the world, save if the city's hum 
 
 Game on the wind no harsher than when bees 
 
 Buzz out of sight in thickets. Northwards soared 
 
 The stainless ramps of huge Himala's wall, 
 
 Eanged in white ranks against the blue — untrod, 
 
 Infinite, wonderful — whose uplands vast,. 
 
 And lifted universe of crest and crag. 
 
 Shoulder and shelf, green slope and icy horn, 
 
 Kiven ravine, and splintered precipice 
 
 Led climbing thought higher and higher, until 
 
 It seemed to stand in heaven and speak with 
 
 gods. 
 Beneath the snows dark forests spread, sharp-laced 
 With leaping cataracts and veiled with clouds : 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 53 
 
 Lower grew rose-oaks and the great fir groves 
 Where echoed pheasant's call and panther's cry, 
 Clatter of wild sheep on the stones, and scream 
 Of circling eagles : under these the plain 
 Gleamed like a praying-carpet at the foot 
 Of those divinest altars. Fronting this 
 The builders set the bright pavilion up, 
 Fair-planted on the terraced hill, with towers 
 On either flank and pillared cloisters round. 
 Its beams were carved with stories of old time — 
 Radha and Krishna and the sylvan girls — 
 Sita and Hanuman and Draupadi; 
 And on the middle porch God Ganesha, 
 With disc and hook — to bring wisdom and wealth— 
 Propitious sate, wreathing his sidelong trunk. 
 By winding ways of garden and of court 
 The inner gate was reached, of marble wrought, 
 White, with pink veins ; the lintel lazuli, 
 
54 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The thresLold alabaster, and tlie doora 
 Sandal-wood, cut in pictured panelling ; 
 Whereby to lofty balls and shadowy bowers 
 Passed the delighted foot, on stately stairs, 
 Through latticed galleries, 'neath painted roofs 
 And clustering columns, where cool fountains- 
 fringed 
 With lotus and nelumbo — danced ; and fish 
 Gleamed through their crystal, scarlet, gold, and blue 
 Great-eyed gazelles in sunny alcoves browsed 
 The blown red roses ; birds of rainbow wing 
 Fluttered among the palms ; doves, green and grey, 
 Built their safe nests on gilded cornices ; 
 Over the shining pavements peacocks drew 
 The splendours of their trains, sedately watched 
 By milk-white herons and the small house-owls. 
 The plum-necked parrots swung from fruit to fruit ; 
 The yellow sunbirds whirred from bloom to bloom, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 55 
 
 The timid lizards on the lattice basked 
 Fearless, the squirrels ran to feed from hand ; 
 For all was peace : the shy black snake, that gives 
 Fortune to households, sunned his sleepy coils 
 Under the moon-flowers, where the musk-deer 
 
 played, 
 And brown-eyed monkeys chattered to the crows. 
 And all this House of love was peopled fair 
 With sweet attendance, so that in each part 
 With lovely sights were gentle faces found, 
 Soft speech and willing service ; each one glad 
 To gladden, pleased at pleasure, proud to obey ;_ 
 Till life glided beguiled, like a smooth stream 
 Banked by perpetual flow'rs, YasSdhara 
 Queen of the enchanting Court. 
 
 But, innermost, 
 Beyond the richness of those hundred halls, 
 A secret chamber lurked, where skill had spent 
 
56 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 All lovely fantasies to lull the mind. 
 The entrance of it was a cloistered square — 
 Eoofed by the sky, and in the midst a tank — 
 Of mUky marble built, and laid with slabs 
 Of milk-white marble ; bordered round the tank 
 And on the steps, and all along the frieze 
 With tender inlaid work of agate-stones. 
 Cool as to tread in summer-time on snows 
 It was to loiter there ; the sunbeams dropped 
 Their gold, and, passing into porch and niche, 
 Softened to shadows, silvery, pale, and dim, 
 As if the very Day paused and grew Eve 
 In love and silence at that bower's gate ; 
 For there beyond the gate the chamber was. 
 Beautiful, sweet ; a wonder of the world ! 
 Soffa light from perfumed lamps through windows fell, 
 Of nakre and stained stars of lucent film. 
 On golden cloths outspread, and silken beds, 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 57 
 
 And lieavy splendour of tlie purdah's fringe, 
 Lifted to take only the loveliest in. 
 Here, whether it was night or day none knew, 
 For always streamed that softened light, more 
 
 bright 
 Than sunrise, but as tender as the eve's ; 
 And always breathed sweet airs, more joy-giving 
 Than morning's, but as cool as midnight's breath ; 
 And night and day lutes sighed, and night and day 
 Delicious foods were spread, and dewy fruits. 
 Sherbets new chilled with snows of Himalay, 
 And sweetmeats made of subtle daintiness, 
 With sweet tree-milk in its own ivory cup. 
 And night and day served there a chosen band 
 Of nautch girls, cup-bearers, and cymballers, 
 Delicate, dark-browed ministers of love. 
 Who fanned the sleeping eyes of the happy Prince, 
 And when he waked, led back his thoughts to bliss 
 
58 THE UCHT OF ASIA. 
 
 With music whisperiag through the blooms, anil 
 
 charm 
 Of amorous songs and dreamy dances, linked 
 By chime of ankle-hells and wave of arms 
 And silver vina-strings ; whUe essences 
 Of musk and champak, and the blue haze spread 
 From burning spices, soothed his soul again 
 To drowse by sweet TasSdhara ; and thus 
 Siddartha lived forgetting. 
 
 Furthermore, 
 The King commanded that within those walls 
 No mention should be made of death or age, 
 Sorrow, or pain, or sickness. If one drooped 
 In the lovely Court — her dark glance dim, her feet 
 Paint in the dance — the guiltless criminal 
 Passed forth an exile from that Paradise, 
 Lest he should see and suffer at her woe. 
 Bright-eyed inteudants watched to execute 
 
BOOK THE SECOND. 59 
 
 Sentence on such as spake of the harsh world 
 Without, where aches and plagues were, tears and fears, 
 And wail of mourners, and grim fume of pyres. 
 'Twas treason if a thread of silver strayed 
 In tress of singing-girl or nautch- dancer ; 
 And every dawn the dying rose was plucked, 
 The dead leaves hid, all evil sights removed: 
 For said the King, " If he shall pass his youth 
 Far from such things as move to wistfulness. 
 And brooding on the empty eggs of thought, 
 The shadow of this fate, too vast for man. 
 May fade, belike, and I shall see him grow 
 To that great stature of fair sovereignty 
 When he shall rule all lands — if he will rule — 
 The King of kings and Glory of his time." 
 
 Wherefore, around that pleasant prison-house — 
 Where love was gaoler and delights its bars — 
 
Co THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 But far removed from sigHt, the King bade build 
 
 A massive wall, and in the wall a gate 
 
 With brazen folding-doors, which but to roll 
 
 Back on their hinges asked a hundred arms ; 
 
 Also the noise of that prodigious gate 
 
 Opening, was heard full half a yojana. 
 
 And inside this another gate he made, 
 
 And yet within another — ^through the three 
 
 Must one pass if he quit that Pleasure-house. 
 
 Three mighty gates there were, bolted and barred, 
 
 And over each was set a faithful watch ; 
 
 And the King's order said, " Suffer no man 
 
 To pass the gates, though he should be the Prince : 
 
 This on your lives — even though it be my son." 
 
Book tbe tTbirb. 
 
( 63 > 
 
 In wHcli calm home of happy life and love 
 Ligged our Lord Buddha, knowing not of woe, 
 Nor want, nor pain, nor plague, nor age, nor death. 
 Save as when sleepers roam dim seas in dreams. 
 And land awearied on the shores of day. 
 Bringing strange merchandise from that black 
 
 voyage. 
 Thus ofttimes, when he lay with gentle head 
 Lulled on the dark breasts of Yasddhara, 
 Her fond hands fanning slow his sleeping lids, 
 He wouTd start up and cry, " My world ! Oh, 
 
 world ! 
 
64 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 I hear ! I know ! I come ! " And she would ask, 
 "What ails my Lord?" with large eyes terror- 
 struck; 
 For at such times the pity in his look 
 Was awful, and his visage like a god's. 
 Then would he smile again to stay her tears. 
 And bid the vinas sound ; but once they set 
 A stringed gourd on the sill, there where the wind 
 Could linger o'er its notes and play at wiU — 
 Wild music makes the wind on silver strings — - 
 And those who lay around heard only that ; 
 But Prince Siddartha heard the Devas play. 
 And to his ears they sang such words as these : — 
 
 We are the voices of the wandering wind, 
 Which moan for rest, and rest can never find ; 
 Lo ! as the wind is, so is mortal life. 
 A moan, a sigh, a sob, a storm, a strife. 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 65 
 
 Where/ore and whence we are ye cannot know, 
 Nor where life springs, nor whither life doth go ; 
 We are as ye are, ghosts from the inane, 
 What pleasure have we of our changeful pain ? 
 
 What pleasure hast thou of thy changeless Miss ? 
 Nay, if love lasted, there were joy in this ; 
 But life's way is the wind's way, all these things 
 Are lut brief voices breathed on shifting strings. 
 
 Maya's son ! because we roam the earth 
 Moan we upon these strings : we make no mirth. 
 So many woes we see in many lands, 
 So many streaming eyes and wringing hands. 
 
 Yet mock we while we wail, for, could they know, 
 This life they cling to is but empty show ; 
 'Twere all aS well to bid a cloud to stand, 
 Or hold a running river with the hand. 
 
66 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 But thou that art to save, thine hoicr is nigh ! 
 The sad world waiteth in its misery, 
 The blind world stumUeth on its round of pain; 
 Bise, Maya's child ! wake ! slumler not again ! 
 
 We are the voices of the wandering wind : 
 Wander thou, too, Prince, thy rest to find; 
 Leave love for love of lovers, for woe's sake 
 Quit state for sorrow, and deliverance make. 
 
 So sigh vje, passing o'er the silver strings. 
 
 To thee who know'st not yet of earthly things ; 
 
 So say we ; mocking, as we pass away, 
 
 These lovely sliadows wherewith thou dost play. 
 
 Thereafter it befell lie sate at eve 
 Amid his beauteous Court, holding the hand 
 Of sweet Yas6dhara, and some maid told — 
 With breaks of music when her rich voice dropped- 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 67 
 
 An ancient tale to speed tlie hour of dusk, 
 Of love, and of a magic horse, and lands 
 Wonderful, distant, where pale peoples dwelled, 
 And where the sun at night sank into seas. 
 Then spake he, sighing, " Chitra brings me back 
 The wind's song in the strings with that fair tale : 
 Give her, Tasodhara, thy pearl for thanks. 
 But thou, my pearl ! is there so wide a world ? 
 Is there a land which sees the great sun roll 
 Into the waves, and are there hearts like ours, 
 Countless, unknown, not happy — it may be — 
 Whom we might succour if we knew of them ? 
 Ofbtimes I marvel, as the Lord of day 
 Treads from the east his kingly road of gold. 
 Who first on the world's edge hath hailed his 
 
 beam, 
 The children of the morning; oftentimes, 
 Even in thine arms and on thy breasts, bright wife, 
 
C8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Sore have I panted, at the sun's decline. 
 To pass with him into that crimson west 
 And see the peoples of the evening. 
 There must be many we should love — how else ? 
 Now have I in this hour an ache, at last, 
 Thy soft lips cannot kiss away : oh, girl ! 
 Chitra ! you that know of fairyland ! 
 Where tether they that swift steed of thy tale ? 
 My palace for one day upon his back, 
 To ride and ride and see the spread of the earthj 
 Nay, if I had yon callow vulture's plumes — 
 The carrion heir of wider realms than mine — 
 How would I stretch for topmost Himalay, 
 Light where the rose-gleam lingers on those 
 
 snows, 
 And strain my gaze with searching what is round ! 
 Why have I never seen and never sought ? 
 Tell me what lies beyond our brazen gates." 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 69 
 
 Then one replied, " The city first, fair Prince ! 
 The temples, and the gardens, and the groves, 
 And then the fields ; and afterwards fresh fields, 
 With nullahs, maidans, jungle, koss on koss ; 
 And next King BimbasS,ra's realm, and then 
 The vast flat world, with crores on crores of folk." 
 " Good," said Sidd^rtha ; " let the word be sent 
 That Channa yoke my chariot — at noon 
 To-morrow I shall ride and see beyond." 
 
 Whereof they told the King : " Our Lord, thy 
 son, 
 WiUs that his chariot be yoked at noon, 
 That he may ride abroad and see mankind." 
 
 " Tea ! " spake the careful King, " 'tis time he 
 see; 
 But let the criers go about and bid 
 
70 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 My city deck itself, so ttere be met 
 No noisome sight ; and let none blind or maimed, 
 None that is sick, or stricken deep in years. 
 No leper, and no feeble folk come forth." 
 Therefore the stones were swept, and up and down 
 The water-carriers sprinkled all the streets 
 From spirting skins, the housewives scattered fresh 
 Eed powder on their thresholds, strung new wreaths, 
 And trimmed the tulsi-bush before their doors. 
 The paintings on the walls were heightened up 
 With liberal brush, the trees set thick with flags, 
 The idols gilded ; in the four- went ways 
 Suryadeva and the great gods shone 
 'Mid shrines of leaves ; so that the city seemed 
 A capital of some enchanted land. 
 Also the criers passed, with drum and gong, 
 Proclaiming loudly, " Ho ! all citizens, 
 The King commands that there be seen to-day 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 71 
 
 No evil sight : let no one blind or maimed, 
 None that is sick, or stricken deep in years. 
 No leper, and no feeble folk go forth. 
 Let none, too, burn his dead nor bring them out 
 'Till nightfall. Thus Suddhddana commands." 
 
 So all was comely and the houses trim 
 Throughout Kapilavastu, while the Prince 
 Came forth in painted car, which two steers drew, 
 Snow-white, with swinging dewlaps, and huge 
 
 humps 
 Wrinkled against the carved and lacquered yoke. 
 Goodly it was to mark the people's joy 
 Greeting their Prince ; and glad Siddartha waxed 
 At sight of all those liege and friendly folk 
 Bright-clad and laughing as if life were good. 
 " Fair is the world," he said, " it likes me well ! 
 And light and kind these men that are not kings, 
 
72 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And sweet my sisters here, wlio toil and tend ; 
 What have I done for these to make them thus ? 
 Why, if I love them, should those children know ? 
 I pray take up yon pretty Sakya boy 
 Who flung us flowers, and let him ride with me. 
 How good it is to reign in realms like this ! 
 How simple pleasure is, if these he pleased 
 Because I come abroad ! How many things 
 I need not if such little households hold 
 Enough to make our city full of smiles ! 
 Drive, Channa ! through the gates, and let me see 
 More of this gracious world I have not known." 
 
 So passed they through the gates, a joyous crowd 
 Thronging about the wheels, whereof some ran 
 Before the oxen, throwing wreaths ; some stroked 
 Their silken flanks ; some brought them rice and cakes, 
 All crying, " Jai ! jai ! for our noble Prince ! " 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 73 
 
 Thus all the path was kept with gladsome looks 
 And filled with fair sights — for the King's word 
 
 was 
 That such should be — when midway in the road, 
 Slow tottering from the hovel where he hid, 
 Crept forth a wretch in rags, haggard and foul, 
 An old, old man, whose shrivelled skin, sun- tanned, 
 Clung like a beast's hide to its fleshless bones. 
 Bent was his back with load of many days, 
 His eyepits red with rust of ancient tears. 
 His dim orbs blear with rheum, his toothless jaws 
 Wagging with palsy and the fright to see 
 So many and such joy. One skinny hand 
 Clutched a worn staff to prop his quavering limbs, 
 And one was pressed upon the ridge of ribs 
 Whence came in gasps the heavy painful breath. 
 " Alms ! " moaned he, " give, good people ! for I die 
 To-morrow or the next day ! " then the cough 
 
74 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Choked him, but still he stretched his palm, and 
 
 stood 
 Blinking, and groaning 'mid his spasms, " Alms ! " 
 Then those around had wrenched his feeble feet 
 Aside, and thrust him from the road again. 
 Saying, " The Prince ! dost see ? get to thy lair ! " 
 But that Siddarfcha cried, " Let be ! let be ! 
 Channa ! what thing is this who seems a man, 
 Yet surely only seems, being so bowed, 
 So miserable, so horrible, so sad ? 
 Are men born sometimes thus ? What meaneth he 
 Moaning ' to-morrow or next day I die ? ' 
 Finds he no food that- so his bones jut forth ? 
 What woe hath happened to this piteous one ? " 
 Then answer made the charioteer, " Sweet Prince ! 
 This is no other than an aged man ; 
 Some fourscore years ago his back was straight, 
 His eye bright, and his body goodly : now 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 75 
 
 The tMevish years have sucked Ms sap away, 
 Pillaged Ms strength and filched his will and 
 
 wit; 
 His lamp has lost its oil, the wick bums black; 
 What life he keeps is one poor lingering spark 
 Which flickers for the finish : such is age ; 
 Why should your Highness heed ? " Then spake the 
 
 Prince : 
 " But shall this come to others, or to all, 
 Or is it rare that one should be as he ? " 
 " Most noble," answered Channa, " even as he. 
 Will all these grow if they shall live so long." 
 " But," quoth the Prince, " if I shall live as long 
 Shall I be thus ; and if Tas6dhara 
 Live fourscore years, is this old age for her, 
 Jilini, little Hasta, Gautami, 
 
 And Gunga, and the others ? " " Yea, great Sir ! " 
 The charioteer replied. Then spake the Prince : 
 
76 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 " Turn back, and drive me to my house again ! 
 I have seen that I did not think to see." 
 
 Which pondering, to his beauteous Court re- 
 turned 
 Wistful Siddartha, sad of mien and mood ; 
 Nor tasted he the white cakes nor the fruits 
 Spread for the evening feast, nor once looked up 
 While the best palace-dancers strove to charm : 
 Nor spake — save one sad thing — when wofully 
 Yasodhara sank to his feet and wept, 
 Sighing, " Hath not my Lord comfort in me ? " 
 " Ah, Sweet ! " he said, " such comfort that my 
 
 soul 
 Aches, thinking it must end, for it will end, 
 And we shall both grow old, Yas6dhara ! 
 Loveless, unlovely, weak, and old, and bowed. 
 Nay, though we locked up love and life with lips 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 77 
 
 So close tliat night and day our breaths grew one, 
 Time would thrust in between to filch away 
 My passion and thy grace, as black Night steals 
 The rose-gleams from yon peak, which fade to grey 
 And are not seen to fade. This have I found, 
 And all my heart is darkened with its dread, 
 And all my heart is fixed to think how Love 
 Might save its sweetness from the slayer, Time, 
 Who makes men old." So through that night be 
 
 sate 
 Sleepless, uncomforted. 
 
 And all that night 
 The King Suddh6dana dreamed troublous dreams. 
 The first fear of his vision was a flag 
 Broad, glorious, glistening with a golden sun, 
 The mark of Indra ; but a strong wind blew, 
 Eending its folds divine, and dashing it 
 Into the dust ; whereat a concourse came 
 
78 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Of shadowy Ones, who took the spoiled silk up 
 
 And bore it eastward from the city gates. 
 
 The second fear was ten huge elephants, 
 
 With silver tusks and feet that shook the earth, 
 
 Trampling the southern road in mighty march ; 
 
 And he who sate upon the foremost beast 
 
 Was the King's son — the others followed him. 
 
 The third fear of the vision was a car, 
 
 Shining with blinding light, which four steeds 
 
 drew, 
 Snorting white smoke and champing fiery foam ; 
 And in the car the Prince Siddartha sate. 
 The fourth fear was a wheel which turned and 
 
 turned, 
 With nave of burning gold and jewelled spokes. 
 And strange things written on the binding tire. 
 Which seemed both fire and music as it whirled. 
 The fifth fear was a mighty drum, set down 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 79 
 
 Midway between the city and the hills, 
 On which the Prince beat with an iron mace, 
 So that the sound pealed like a thunderstorm, 
 Rolling around the sky and far away. 
 The sixth fear was a tower, which rose and rose 
 High o'er the city till its stately head 
 Shone crowned with clouds, and on the top the 
 
 Prince 
 Stood, scattering from both hands, this way and 
 
 that. 
 Gems of most lovely light, as if it rained 
 Jacynths and rubies ; and the whole world came. 
 Striving to seize those treasures as they fell 
 Towards the four quarters. But the seventh fear was 
 A noLse of wailing, and behold six men 
 Who wept and gnashed their teeth, and laid their 
 
 palms 
 Upon their months, walking disconsolate. 
 
8o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 These seven fears made the vision of his sleep, 
 But none of all his wisest dream-readers 
 Could tell their meaning. Then the King was 
 
 wroth, 
 Saying, " There cometh evil to my house, 
 And none of ye have wit to help me know 
 What the great gods portend sencling me this." 
 So in the city men went sorrowful 
 Because the King had dreamed seven signs of fear 
 Which none could read; but to the gate there 
 
 came 
 An aged man, in robe of deer-skin clad. 
 By guise a hermit, known to none; he cried, 
 " Bring me before the King, for I can read 
 The vision of his sleep ; " who, when he heard 
 The sevenfold mysteries of the midnight dream. 
 Bowed reverent and said, " Maharij ! 
 I hail this favoured House, whence shall arise 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. Si 
 
 A wider- reaching splendour than the sun's ! 
 Lo ! all these seyen fears are seven joys, 
 Whereof the first, where thou didst see a flag — 
 Broad, glorious, gilt with Indra's badge — cast down 
 And carried out, did signify the end 
 Of old faiths and beginning of the new : 
 For there is change with gods not less than men. 
 And as the days pass kalpas pass — at length. 
 The ten great elephants that shook the earth 
 The ten great gifts of wisdom signify. 
 In strength whereof the Prince shall quit his state 
 And shake the world with passage of the Truth. 
 The four flame-breathing horses of the car 
 Are those four fearless virtues which shall bring 
 Thy son from doubt and gloom to gladsome light ; 
 The wheel that turned with nave of burning gold 
 Was that most precious Wheel of perfect Law 
 Which he shall turn in sight of all the world. 
 
32 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The mighty drum whereon the Prince did beat, 
 
 Till the sound filled all lands, doth signify 
 
 The thunder of the preaching of the Word 
 
 Which he shall preach ; the tower that grew to 
 
 heaven 
 The growing of the Gospel of this Buddh 
 Sets forth ; and those rare jewels scattered thence 
 The untold treasures are of that good Law 
 To gods and men dear and desirable. 
 Such is the interpretation of the tower ; 
 But for those six men weepiug with shut mouths, 
 They are the six chief teachers whom thy son 
 Shall, with bright truth and speech unanswerable, 
 Convince of foolishness. King ! rejoice ; 
 The fortune of my Lord the Prince is more 
 Than kingdoms, and his hermit-rags wiU be 
 Beyond fine cloths of gold. This was thy dream ! 
 And in seven nights and days these thiags shall fall." 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 83 
 
 So spake tlie holy man, and lowly made 
 The eight prostrations, touching thrice the ground ; 
 Then turned and passed; but when the King bade 
 
 send 
 A rich gift after him, the messengers 
 Brought word, " We came to where he entered in 
 At Chandra's temple, but within was none 
 Save a grey owl which fluttered from the shrine." 
 The gods come sometimes thus. 
 
 But the sad King 
 Marvelled, and gave command that new delights 
 Be compassed to enthral Siddartha's heart 
 Amid those dancers of his pleasure-house ; 
 Also he set at all the brazen doors 
 A doubled guard. 
 
 Yet who shall shut out Fate ? 
 
 For once again the spirit of the Prince 
 
84 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Was moved to see this world beyond his gates, 
 
 This life of man, so pleasant, if its waves 
 
 Ean not to waste and woful finishing 
 
 In Time's dry sands. " I pray yon let me view 
 
 Our city as it is," such was his prayer 
 
 To King Suddhodana. " Tour Majesty 
 
 In tender heed hath warned the folk before 
 
 To put away ill things and common sights, 
 
 And make their faces glad to gladden me, 
 
 And all the causeways gay ; yet have I learned 
 
 This is not daily life, and if I stand 
 
 Nearest, my father, to the realm and thee, 
 
 Fain would I know the people and the streets. 
 
 Their simple usual ways, and workday deeds, 
 
 And lives which those men live who are not kings. 
 
 Give me good leave, dear Lord ! to pass unknown 
 
 Beyond my happy gardens; I shall come 
 
 The more contented to their peace again. 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 85 
 
 Or wiser, father, if not well content. 
 Therefore, I pray thee, let me go at will 
 To-morrow, with my servants, through the streets.'' 
 And the King said, amidst his Ministers, 
 " Belike this second flight may mend the first. 
 Note how the falcon starts at every sight 
 New from his hood, hut what a quiet eye 
 Cometh of freedom ; let my son see all, 
 And bid them bring me tidings of his mind." 
 
 Thus on the morrow, when the noon was come. 
 The Prince and Channa passed beyond the gates. 
 Which opened to the signet of the King ; 
 Yet knew not they who rolled the great doors 
 
 back. 
 It was the King's son in that merchant's robe, 
 And in the clerkly dress his charioteer. 
 Forth fared they by the common way afoot. 
 
86 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Mingling with all the Sakya citizens, 
 Seeing the glad and sad things of the town : 
 The painted streets alive with hum of noon, 
 The traders cross-legged 'mid their spice and grain, 
 The buyers with their money in the cloth. 
 The war of words to cheapen this or that. 
 The shout to clear the road, the huge stone wheels. 
 The strong slow oxen and their rustling loads. 
 The singing bearers with the palanquins. 
 The broad-necked hamals sweating in the sun, '\ 
 
 The housewives bearing water from the well 
 With balanced chatties, and athwart their hips 
 The black-eyed babes ; the fly-swarmed sweetmeat 
 
 shops, 
 The weaver at his loom, the cotton-bow 
 Twanging, the millstones grinding meal, the dogs 
 Prowling for orts, the skilful armourer 
 With tong and hammer linking shirts of mail, 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 87 
 
 The blacksmitli with a mattock and a spear 
 Eeddening together in his coals, the school 
 Where round their Guru, in a grave half-moon, 
 The S^kya children sang the mantras through, 
 And learned the greater and the lesser gods ; 
 The dyers stretching waistcloths in the sun 
 Wet from the vats — orange, and rose, and green ; 
 The soldiers clanking past with swords and shields, 
 The camel-drivers rocking on the humps, 
 The Brahman proud, the martial Kshatriya, 
 The humble toiling Sudra^ here a throng 
 Gathered to watch some chattering snake-tamer 
 Wind round his wrist the living jewellery 
 Of asp and n^g, or charm the hooded death 
 To angry dance with drone of beaded gourd ; 
 There a long line of drums and horns, which went, 
 With steeds gay painted and silk canopies. 
 To bring the young bride home ; and here a wife 
 
88 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Stealing with cakes and garlands to the god 
 To pray her husband's safe return from trade. 
 Or beg a boy next birth ; hard by the booths 
 Where the swart potters beat the noisy brass 
 For lamps and lotas ; thence, by temple waUs 
 And gateways, to the river and the bridge 
 Under the city walls. 
 
 These had they passed 
 When from the roadside moaned a mournful voice, 
 " Help, masters ! lift me to my feet ; oh, help ! 
 Or I shall die before I reach my house ! " 
 A stricken wretch it was, whose quivering frame. 
 Caught by some deadly plague, lay in the dust 
 Writhing, with fiery purple blotches specked : 
 The chill sweat beaded on his brow, his mouth 
 Was dragged awry with twitchings of sore pain. 
 The wild eyes swam with inward agony. 
 Gasping, he clutched the grass to rise, and rose 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 89 
 
 Half-way, then sank, with quaking feeble limbs 
 And scream of terror, crying, " Ah, the pain ! 
 Good people, help ! " whereon Siddartlia ran, 
 Lifted the woful man with tender hands, 
 With sweet looks laid the sick head on his knee, 
 And, while his soft touch comforted the wretch, 
 Asked, " Brother, what is ill with thee ? what harm 
 Hath fallen ? wherefore can'st thou not arise ? 
 Why is it, Channa, that he pants and moans, 
 And gasps to speak, and sighs so pitiful ? " 
 Then spake the charioteer : " Great Prince ! this 
 
 man 
 Is smitten with some pest ; his elements 
 Are all confounded ; in his veins the blood, 
 Which ran a wholesome riyer, leaps and boils 
 A fiery flood ; his heart, which kept good time. 
 Beats like an ill-played drum- skin, quick and slow ; 
 His sinews slacken like a bowstring slipped; 
 
go THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The strength is gone from ham, and loin, and 
 
 neck, 
 And all the grace and joy of manhood fled : 
 This is a sick man with the fit upon him. 
 See how he plucks and plucks to seize his grief. 
 And rolls his bloodshot orbs, and grinds his teeth. 
 And draws his breath as if 'twere choking smoke ! 
 Lo ! now he would be dead ; but shall not die 
 Until the plague hath had its work in him, 
 Balling the nerves which die before the life ; 
 Then, when his strings have cracked with agony 
 And all his bones are empty of the sense 
 To ache, the plague will quit and Hght elsewhere. 
 Oh, sir ! it is not good to hold him so ! 
 The harm may pass, and strike thee, even thee." 
 But spake the Priuce, still comforting the man, 
 " And are there others, are there many thus ? 
 Or might it be to me as now with him ? " 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 91 
 
 " Great Lord ! " answered the charioteer, " this comes 
 In many forms to all men ; griefs and wounds, 
 Sickness and tetters, palsies, leprosies, 
 Hot fevers, watery wastings, issues, blains 
 Befall all flesh and enter everywhere." 
 " Come such ills unobserved ? " the Prince inquired. 
 And Channa said, " Like the sly snake they come 
 That stings unseen ; like the striped murderer, 
 Who waits to spring from the Karunda bush. 
 Hiding beside the jungle path ; or like 
 The lightning, striking these and sparing those. 
 As chance may send." 
 
 " Then all men live in fear ? " 
 " So live they. Prince ! " 
 
 " And none can say, ' I sleep 
 Happy and whole to-night, and so shall wake ? ' " 
 " None say it." 
 
 " And the end of many aches. 
 
92 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Which come unseen, and will come when they come, 
 Is this, a broken body and sad mind, 
 And so old age ? " 
 
 " Tea, if men last as long." 
 " But if they cannot bear their agonies, 
 Or if they will not bear, and seek a term ; 
 Or if they bear, and be, as this man is, 
 Too weak except for groans, and so still live, 
 And growing old, grow older, then — what end ? " 
 " They die, Prince." 
 
 "Die?" 
 
 " Tea, at the last comes Death, 
 In whatsoever way, whatever hour. 
 Some few grow old, most suffer and fall sick, 
 But all must die — ^behold, where comes the Dead ! " 
 
 Then did Siddartha raise his eyes, and see 
 Fast pacing towards the river-brink a band 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 93 
 
 Of wailing people ; foremost one who swung 
 An earthen bowl with lighted coals ; behind 
 The kinsmen, shorn, with mourning marks, ungirt, 
 Crying aloud, " Eama, Rama, hear ! 
 Call upon Rama, brothers ; " next the bier, 
 Knit of four poles with bamboos interlaced, 
 Whereon lay — stark and stiif, feet foremost, lean, 
 Chapfallen, sightless, hollow-flanked, a-grin. 
 Sprinkled with red and yellow dust — the Dead, 
 Whom at the four-went ways they turned head first. 
 And crying " Rama, Rama ! " carried on 
 To where a pile was reared beside the stream : 
 Thereon they laid him, building fuel up — 
 Good sleep hath one that slumbers on that bed ! 
 He shall not wake for cold, albeit he lies 
 Naked to all the airs — for soon they set 
 The red flame to the corners four, which crept, 
 And licked, and flickered, finding out his flesh 
 
91 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And feeding on it with swift hissing tongues, 
 And crackle of parched skin, and snap of joint ; 
 Till the fat smoke thinned and the ashes sank 
 Scarlet and grey, with here and there a bone 
 White midst the grey — the total of the man. 
 
 Then spake the Prince : " Is this the end which 
 comes 
 To all who live?" 
 
 " This is the end that comes 
 To all," quoth Channa ; " he upon the pyre — 
 Whose remnants are so petty that the crows 
 Caw hungrily, then quit the fruitless feast — 
 Ate, drank, laughed, loved, and lived, and liked life 
 
 well. 
 Then came — who knows? — some gust of jungle wind, 
 A stumble on the path, a taint in the tank, 
 A snake's nip, half a span of angry steel, 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 
 A chill, a fishbone, or a falling tile, 
 And life was over and the man is dead. 
 No appetites, no pleasures, and no pains 
 Hath such ; the kiss upon his lips is nought, 
 The fire-scorch nought ; he smelleth not his flesh 
 A-roast, nor yet the sandal and the spice 
 They bum ; the taste is emptied from his mouth 
 The hearing of his ears is clogged, the sight 
 Is blinded in his eyes ; those whom he loved 
 Wail desolate, for even that must go. 
 The body which was lamp unto the Hfe, 
 Or worms wiU have a horrid feast of it. 
 Here is the common destiny of flesh : 
 The high and low, the good and bad, must die, 
 And then, 'tis taught, begin anew and live 
 Somewhere, somehow — who knows ? — and so again 
 The pangs, the parting, and the lighted pile : — 
 Such is man's round." 
 
95 
 
 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 But lo ! Siddartha turned 
 Byes gleaming witli divine tears to the sky, 
 Eyes lit with heavenly pity to the earth ; 
 From sky to earth he looked, from earth to sky. 
 As if his spirit sought in lonely flight 
 Some far-ofi" vision, linking this and that, 
 Lost — past — ^but searchable, but seen, but known, 
 Then cried he, while his lifted countenance 
 Glowed with the burning passion of a love % 
 Unspeakable, the ardour of a hope 
 Boundless, insatiate : " Oh ! suffering world ; 
 Oh ! known and unknown of my common flesh, 
 Caught in this common net of death and woe. 
 And life which binds to both ! I see, I feel 
 The vastness of the agony of earth. 
 The vainness of its joys, the mockery 
 Of all its best, the anguish of its worst ; 
 Since pleasures end in pain, and youth in age, 
 
BOOK THE THIRD. 97 
 
 And love in loss, and life in hateful death, 
 
 And death, in unknown Uves, which will but yoke 
 
 Men to their wheel again to whirl the round 
 
 Of false deKghts and woes that are not false. 
 
 Me too this lure hath cheated, so it seemed 
 
 Lovely to live, and life a sunlit stream 
 
 For ever flowing in a changeless peace ; 
 
 Whereas the fooHsh ripple of the flood 
 
 Dances so lightly down by bloom and lawn 
 
 Only to pour its crystal quicklier 
 
 Into the foul salt sea. The veil is rent 
 
 Which blinded me ! I am as all these men 
 
 Who cry upon their gods and are not heard, 
 
 Or are not heeded — yet there must be aid ! 
 
 For them and me and all there must be help ! 
 
 Perchance the gods have need of help themselves, 
 
 Being so feeble that when sad lips cry 
 
 They cannot save ! I would not let one cry 
 
 a 
 
98 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Whom I could save ! How can it be that Brahm 
 
 Would make a world and keep it miserable, 
 
 Since, if, aU-powerful, he leaves it so, 
 
 He is not good, and if not powerful, 
 
 He is not God ? — Channa ! lead home again ! 
 
 It is enough ! mine eyes have seen enough ! " 
 
 Which when the King heard, at the gates he set 
 A triple guard ; and bade no man should pass 
 By day or night, issuing or entering in, 
 Until the days were numbered of that dream. 
 
Boolfe tbe Jfourtb, 
 
( loi ) 
 
 Book tbc ifourtb. 
 
 But, when the days were numhered, then befell 
 The parting of our Lord — which was to be — 
 Whereby came wailing in the Golden Home, 
 Woe to the King and sorrow o'er the land, 
 But for aU flesh deliverance, and that Law 
 Which whoso hears — the same shall make him 
 free. 
 
 Softly the Indian night sinks on the plains 
 At full moon, in the month of Chaitra Shud, 
 When mangoes redden and the as6ka buds 
 Sweeten the breeze, and Eama's birthday comes, 
 
2 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And all tlie fields are glad and all the towns. 
 Softly tliat night fell over Vishramvan, 
 Fragrant with blooms and jewelled thick with 
 
 stars, 
 And cool with mountain airs sighing adown 
 Prom snow-flats on Himala high outspread ; 
 For the moon swung above the eastern peaks, 
 Climbing the spangled vault, and lighting clear 
 Kohini's ripples, and the hiUs and vales, 
 And all the sleeping land ; and near at hand 
 Silvering those roof-tops of the pleasure-house, 
 Where nothing stirred nor sign of watching was. 
 Save at the outer gates, whose warders cried 
 Mvdra, the watchword, and the countersign 
 ATigana, and the watch-drums beat a round ; 
 Whereat the earth lay stUl, except for yelp 
 Of prowling jackals, and the ceaseless trill 
 Of crickets in the garden grounds. 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 103 
 
 "Within— 
 Where the moon glittered through the lace-worked 
 
 stone, 
 Lighting the walls of pearl-shell and the floors 
 Paved with veined marble — softly fell her beams 
 On such rare company of Indian girls, 
 It seemed some chamber sweet in Paradise 
 Where Devis rested. All the chosen ones 
 Of Prince Sidd^rtha's pleasure-home were there. 
 The brightest and most faithful of the Court ; 
 Each form so lovely in the peace of sleep, 
 That you had said " This is the pearl of all ! " 
 Save that beside her or beyond her lay 
 Fairer and fairer, till the pleasured gaze 
 Roamed o'er that feast of beauty as it roams 
 From gem to gem in some great goldsmith-work, 
 Caught by each colour till the next is seen. 
 With careless grace they lay, their soft brown limbs 
 
104 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Part hidden, part revealed ; their glossy hair 
 Bound back with gold or flowers, or flowing loose 
 In Hack waves down the shapely nape and neck. 
 Lulled into pleasant dreams by happy toUs, 
 They slept, no wearier than jewelled birds 
 Which sing and love all day, then under wing 
 Fold head, till morn bids sing and love again. 
 Lamps of chased silver swinging from the roof 
 In silver chains, and fed with perfumed oils, 
 Made with the moonbeams tender lights and shades, 
 Whereby were seen the perfect lines of grace, 
 The bosom's placid heave, the soft stained palms 
 Drooping or clasped, the faces fair and dark, 
 The great arched brows, the parted lips, the teeth 
 Like pearls a merchant picks to make a string. 
 The satin-lidded eyes, with lashes dropped 
 Sweeping the delicate cheeks, the rounded wrists, 
 The smooth small feet with bells and bangles decked, 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. Jo; 
 
 Tiakling low music where some sleeper moved, 
 Br-eaking her smiling dream of some new dance 
 Praised by the Prince, some magic ring to find, 
 Some fairy love-gift. Here one lay full-length, 
 Her vina by her cheek, and in its strings 
 The little fingers still all interlaced ■ 
 As when the last notes of her light song played 
 Those radiant eyes to sleep, and sealed her own. 
 Another slumbered folding in her arms 
 A desert-antelope, its slender head 
 Buried with black-sloped horns between her breasts, 
 Soft nestling ; it was eating — ^when both drowsed — 
 Red roses, and her loosening hand still held 
 A rose half-mumbled, while a rose-leaf curled 
 Between the deer's lips. Here two friends had 
 
 dozed 
 Together, weaving m6gra-buds, which bound 
 Their sister-sweetness in a starry chain, 
 
io6 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Linking them limb to limb and Heart to heai-t, 
 One pillowed on the blossoms, one on her. 
 Another, ere she slept, was stringing stones 
 To make a necMet — agate, onyx, sard. 
 Coral, and moonstone — round her wrist it gleamed 
 A coil of splendid colour, while she held. 
 Unthreaded yet, the bead to close it up — 
 Green turkis, carved with golden gods and scripts. 
 Lulled by the cadence of the garden stream. 
 Thus lay they on the clustered carpets, each 
 A girlish rose with shut leaves, waiting dawn 
 To open and make daylight beautiful. 
 This was the ante-chamber of the Prince ; 
 But at the purdah's fringe the sweetest slept — 
 Gunga and Gotami — chief ministers 
 In that still House of love. 
 
 The purdah hung, 
 Crimson and blue, with broidered threads of arold, 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 107 
 
 Across a portal carved in sandal-wood ; 
 Wlience by three steps tlie way was to the bower 
 Of inmost splendour, and the marriage-coucli 
 Set on a dais soft with silver cloths, 
 Where the foot fell as though it trod on piles 
 Of neem-blooms. All the walls were plates of pearl, 
 Cut shapely from the shells of Lanka's wave ; 
 And o'er the alabaster roof there ran 
 Eich inlayings of lotus and of bird, 
 Wrought in skilled work of lazulite and jade, 
 Jacynth and jasper ; woven round the dome, 
 And down the sides, and all about the frames 
 Wherein were set the fretted lattices. 
 Through which there breathed, with moonlight and cool 
 
 airs. 
 Scents from the sheU-flowers and the jasmine sprays ; 
 Not bringing thither grace or tenderness 
 Sweeter than shed from those fair presences 
 
io8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Wittin tlie place — ^the beauteous Sd,kya Prince, 
 And hers, the stately, bright Yas6dhara. 
 
 Half risen from her soft nest at his side, 
 The chuddar fallen to her waist, her brow- 
 Laid in both palms, the lovely Princess leaned 
 With heaving bosom and fast-falling tears. 
 Thrice with her lips she touched Sidd&rtha's hand, 
 And at the third kiss moaned, " Awake, my Lord ! 
 Give me the comfort of thy speech ! " Then he : 
 " What is it with thee, my life ? " but stiU 
 She moaned anew before the words would come ; 
 Then spake, " Alas, my Prince ! I sank to sleep 
 Most happy, for the babe I bear of thee 
 Quickened this eve, and at my heart there beat 
 
 That double pulse of life and joy and love 
 
 I 
 
 I Whose happy music luUed me, but — aho ! — 
 
 In slumber I beheld three sights of dread, 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 109 
 
 With thought whereof my heart is throbbing yet. 
 I saw a white bull with wide-branching horns, 
 A lord of pastures, pacing through the streets, 
 Bearing upon his front a gem which shone 
 As if some star had dropped to glitter there, 
 Or like the kantha-stone the great Snake keeps 
 To make bright daylight underneath the earth. 
 Slow through the streets towards the gates he paced, 
 And none could stay him, though there came a 
 
 voice 
 From Indra's temple, ' If ye stay him not. 
 The glory of the city goeth forth.' 
 Yet none could stay him. Then I wept aloud. 
 And locked my arms about his neck, and strove. 
 And bade them bar the gates ; but that ox-king 
 Bellowed, and, lightly tossing free his crest. 
 Broke from my clasp, and bursting through the 
 
 bars, 
 
no THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Trampled the warders down and passed away. 
 The next strange dream was this : Four Presences, 
 Splendid, with shining eyes, so beautiful 
 They seemed the Regents of the Earth who dwell 
 On Mount Sumeru, lighting from the sky 
 With retinue of countless heavenly ones, 
 Swift swept unto our city, where I saw 
 The golden flag of Indra on the gate 
 Flutter and fall ; and lo ! there rose instead 
 A glorious banner, all the folds whereof 
 Rippled with flashing fire of rubies sewn 
 Thick on the silver threads, the rays wherefrom 
 Set forth new words and weighty sentences 
 Whose message made all living creatures glad ; 
 And from the east the wind of sunrise blew 
 With tender waft, opening those jewelled scrolls 
 So that aU flesh might read; and wondrous 
 blooms — 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. iii 
 
 Plucked in what clime I know not — fell in skowers, 
 Coloured as none are coloured in our groves." 
 
 Then spake the Prince : " All this, my Lotus-flower ! 
 Was good to see." 
 
 " Ay, Lord," the Princess said, 
 " Save that it ended with a voice of fear 
 Crying, ' The time is nigh ! the time is nigh ! ' 
 Thereat the third dream came ; for when I sought 
 Thy side, sweet Lord ! ah, on our hed there lay 
 An unpressed pillow and an empty robe — 
 Nothing of thee but those ! — nothing of thee, 
 Who art my life and light, my king, my world ! 
 And, sleeping still, I rose, and sleeping saw 
 Thy belt of pearls, tied here below my breasts. 
 Change to a stinging snake ; my ankle-rings 
 Fall off, my golden bangles part and fall ; 
 The jasmines in my hair wither to dust ; 
 
112 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 While this our l)ridal-coucli sank to the ground, 
 And something rent the crimson purdah down : 
 Then far away I heard the white bull low, 
 And far away the embroidered banner flap, 
 And once again that cry, ' The time is come ! ' 
 But. with that cry — which shakes my spirit stiU — 
 I woke ! Prince ! what may such visions mean 
 Except I die, or — worse than any death — 
 Thou shouldst forsake me, or be taken ? " 
 
 Soft 
 As the last smile of sunset was the look 
 Siddartha bent upon his weeping wife. 
 " Comfort thee, dear ! " he said, " if comfort lives 
 In changeless love ! for though thy dreams may be 
 Shadows of things to come, and though the gods 
 Are shaken in their seats, and though the world 
 Stands nigh, perchance, to know some way of 
 help. 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 113 
 
 Yet, whatsoever fall to thee and me, 
 Be sure I loved and love Yasodhara. 
 Thou knowest how I muse these many moons, 
 Seeking to save the sad earth I have seen ; 
 And when the time comes, that which will be wUl. 
 But if my soul yearns sore for souls unknown, 
 And if I grieve for griefs which are not mine, 
 Judge how my high-winged thoughts must hover 
 
 here 
 O'er all these lives that share and sweeten mine — 
 So dear ! and thine the dearest, gentlest, best. 
 And nearest. Ah, thou mother of my babe ! 
 Whose body mixed with mine for this fair hope. 
 When most my spirit wanders, ranging round 
 The lands and seas — as full of ruth for men 
 As the far-flying dove is full of ruth 
 P'or her twin nestlings — ever it has come 
 L'ome with glad wing and passionate plumes to thee, 
 
 H 
 
114 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Who art tlie sweetness of my kind best seen, 
 The utmost of their good, the tenderest 
 Of all their tenderness, mine most of all. 
 Therefore, whatever after this betide. 
 Bethink thee of that lordly bull which lowed, 
 That jewelled banner in thy dream which waved 
 Its folds departing, and of this be sure. 
 Always I loved and always love thee well. 
 And what I sought for all sought most for thee. 
 But thou, take comfort ; and, if sorrow falls, 
 Take comfort still in deeming there may be 
 A way to peace on earth by woes of ours ; 
 And have with this embrace what faithful love 
 Can think of thanks or frame for benison — 
 Too little, seeing love's strong self is weak — 
 Yet kiss me on the mouth, and drink these words 
 From heart to heart therewith, that thou mays' 
 know — . 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 115 
 
 What others will not — ^that I loved thee most 
 Because I loved so well all living souls. 
 Now, Princess ! rest ; for I will rise and watch." 
 
 Then in her tears she slept, but sleeping sighed — 
 As if that vision passed again — " The time ! 
 The time is come ! " Whereat Sidd^rtha turned, 
 And, lo ! the moon shone by the Crab ! the stars 
 In that same sHver order long foretold 
 Stood ranged to say, " This is the night ! — choose thou 
 The way of greatness or the way of good : 
 To reign a King of kings, or wander lone, 
 Crownless and homeless, that the world be helped." 
 Moreover, with the whispers of the gloom, 
 Came to his ears again that warning song. 
 As when the Devas spoke upon the wind : 
 And surely Gods were round about the place 
 Watching our Lord, who watched the shining stars. 
 
!i6 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 I / "I will depart,'' he spake ; " the hour is come ! 
 
 Thy tender lips, dear Sleeper, summon me 
 
 i 
 To that which saves the earth but sunders us ; 
 
 And in the silence of yon sky I read 
 
 My fated message flashing. Unto this 
 
 Came I, and unto this all nights and days 
 
 Have led me ; for I will not have that crown 
 
 Which may be miae : I lay aside those realms 
 
 Which wait the gleaming of my naked sword : 
 
 My chariot shall not roll with bloody wheels 
 
 From victory to victory, till earth 
 
 Wears the red record of my name. I choose 
 
 To tread its paths with patient, stainless feet, 
 
 Making its dust my bed, its loneliest wastes 
 
 My dwelling, and its meanest things my mates; 
 
 Clad in no prouder garb than outcasts wear, 
 
 Fed with no meats save what the charitable 
 
 Give of their will, sheltered by no more pomp 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 117 
 
 Than tlie dim cave lends or the jungle-bush. 
 This will I do because the ■woful cry 
 Of life and all flesh living cometh up 
 Into my ears, and all my soul is fall 
 Of pity for the sickness of this world ; 
 Which I will heal, if healing may be found 
 By uttermost renouncing and strong strife. / 
 For which of all the great and lesser Gods 
 Have power or pity ? Who hath seen them — who ? 
 What have they wrought to help their worshippers ? 
 How hath it steaded man to pray, and pay 
 Tithes of the corn and oil, to chant the charms. 
 To slay the shrieking sacrifice, to rear 
 The stately fane, to feed the priests, and call 
 On Vishnu, Shiva, Surya, who save 
 None — ^not the worthiest — from the griefs that teach. 
 Those litaSiies of flattery and fear 
 Ascending day by day, like wasted smoke ? 
 
]i8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Hath any of my brothers 'scaped thereby 
 The aches of life, the stings of love and loss, 
 The fiery fever and the ague-shake, 
 The slow, dull, sinking into withered age, 
 The horrible dark death — and what beyond 
 Waits — till the whirling wheel comes up again, 
 And new lives bring new sorrows to be borne. 
 New generations for the new desires 
 Which have their end in the old mockeries ? 
 Hath any of my tender sisters found 
 Fruit of the fast or harvest of the hymn. 
 Or bought one pang the less at bearing-time 
 For white curds offered and trim tulsi-leaves ? 
 Nay ; it may be some of the Gods are good 
 And evil some, but all in action weak ; 
 Both pitiful and pitiless, and both — 
 As men are — bound upon this wheel of change, 
 Knowing the former and the after lives. 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH, 119 
 
 For so our scriptures truly seem to teach, 
 That — once, and wheresoe'er, and whence begun — 
 Life runs its rounds of living, climbing up 
 Prom mote, and gnat, and worm, reptile, and jBsh, 
 Bird and shagged beast, man, demon, deva, God, 
 To clod and mote again ; so are we kin 
 To all that is ; and thus, if one might save 
 Man from his curse, the whole wide world should 
 
 share 
 The lightened horror of this ignorance 
 Whose shadow is chill fear, and cruelty- 
 Its bitter pastime. Yea, if one might save ! 
 And means must be ! There must be refuge ! Men 
 Perished in winter-winds till one smote fire 
 From flint- stones coldly hiding what they held. 
 The red spark treasured from the kindling sun. 
 They gorged on flesh like wolves, till one sowed com. 
 Which grew a weed, yet makes the life of man ; 
 
120 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Ttey mowed and babbled till some tongue struck 
 
 speech, 
 And patient fingers framed the lettered sound. 
 What good gift have my brothers, but it came 
 Prom search and strife and loving sacrifice? 
 If one, then, being great and fortunate, 
 Rich, dowered with health and ease, froiti birth de- 
 signed 
 To rule — if he would rule — a King of kings ; 
 If one, not tired with Hfe's long day but glad 
 I' the freshness of its morning, one not cloyed 
 With love's delicious feasts, but hungry stiU ; 
 If one not worn and wrinkled, sadly sage, 
 But joyous in the glory and the grace 
 That mix with evils here, and free to choose 
 Earth's loveliest at his will : one even as I, 
 Who ache not, lack not, grieve not, save with 
 griefs 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 121 
 
 Which are not mine, except as 1 am man ; — • 
 If such a one, having so much to give, 
 Gave all, laying it down for love of men. 
 And thenceforth spent himself to search for truth, 
 Wringing the secret of deliverance forth, 
 Whether it lurk in hells or hide in heavens, 
 Or hover, unrevealed, nigh unto all : 
 Surely at last, far off, sometime, somewhere. 
 The veil would lift for his deep-searching eyes. 
 The road would open for his painful feet, 
 That should he won for which he lost the world, 
 And Death might find him conqueror of death. 
 This will I do, who have a realm to lose. 
 Because I love my realm, because my heart 
 Beats with each throb of all the hearts that ache, 
 KJiown and unknown, these that are mine and those 
 Which shall be mine, a thousand million more 
 Saved by this sacrifice I ofier now. 
 
22 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Oh, summoning stars ! I come ! Oh, mournful earth ! 
 For thee and thine I lay aside my youth, 
 My throne, my joys, my golden days, my nights. 
 My happy palace — and thine arms, sweet Queen ! 
 Harder to put aside than aU the rest ! 
 Yet thee, too, I shall save, saving this earth ; 
 And that which stirs within thy tender womb, 
 My child, the hidden blossom of our loves. 
 Whom if I wait to bless my mind will fail. 
 Wife ! child ! father ! and people ! ye must share 
 A little while the anguish of this hour 
 That light may break and all flesh learn the Law. 
 Now am I fixed, and now I will depart, 
 Never to come again, till what I seek 
 Be found — if fervent search and strife avail." 
 
 So, with his brow he touched her feet, and bent 
 The farewell of fond eyes, unutterable, 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 123 
 
 Upon her sleeping face, still wet with tears ; 
 And thrice around the bed in reverence, 
 As though it were an altar, softly stepped 
 With clasped hands laid upon his beatiug heart, 
 " For never," spake he, " lie I there again ! " 
 And thrice he made to go, hut thrice came back, 
 So strong her beauty was, so large his love : 
 Then, o'er his head drawing his cloth, he turned 
 And raised the purdah's edge : 
 
 There drooped, close-hushed, 
 In such sealed sleep as water-lilies know. 
 That lovely garden of his Indian girls ; 
 The twin dark-petalled lotus-buds of all — 
 Gunga and Gotami — on either side. 
 And those, their silk-leaved sisterhood, beyond. 
 " Pleasant ye are to me, sweet friends ! " he said, 
 "And dear' to leave; yet, if I leave ye not, 
 What else, will come to all of us save eld 
 
t24 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Without assuage and death without avail ? 
 Lo ! as ye lie asleep so must ye lie 
 A-dead ; and when the rose dies where are gone 
 Its scent and splendour ? when the lamp is drained 
 Whither is fled the flame ? Press heavy, Night ! 
 Upon their down-dropped lids, and seal their lips, 
 That no tear stay me and no faithful voice. 
 For all the brighter that these made my life, 
 The bitterer it is that they and I, 
 And all, should live as trees do — so much spring, 
 Such and such rains and frosts, such winter-times, 
 And then dead leaves, with maybe spring again, 
 Or axe-stroke at the root. This wiU not I, 
 Whose life here was a God's ! — this would not I, 
 Though all my days were godlike, while men moan 
 Under their darkness. Therefore farewell, friends! 
 While life is good to give, I give, and go 
 To seek deliverance and that unknown Light ! " 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 12; 
 
 Then, lightly treading where those sleepers lay, 
 Into the night Sidd^rtha passed : its eyes, 
 The watchful stars, looked love on him : its breath. 
 The wandering wind, kissed his rote's fluttered 
 
 fringe ; 
 The garden-blossoms, folded for the dawn, 
 Opened their velvet hearts to waft him scents 
 From pink and purple censers : o'er the land, 
 From Himalay unto the Indian Sea, 
 A tremor spread, as if earth's soul beneath 
 Stirred with an unknown hope ; and holy books — ■ 
 Which tell the story of our Lord — say, too, 
 That rich celestial musics thrilled the air 
 From hosts on hosts of shining ones, who thronged 
 Eastward and westward, making bright the night — 
 Northward and southward, making glad the ground. 
 Also those four dread Eegents of the Earth, 
 Descending at the doorway, two by two, — 
 
r26 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 With their tright legions of Invisibles 
 In arms of sapphire, silver, gold, and pearl — 
 Watched with joined hands the Indian Prince who 
 
 stood, 
 His tearful eyes raised to the stars, and lips 
 Close-set with purpose of prodigious love. 
 
 Then strode he forth into the gloom, and cried: 
 " Ohanna, awake ! and bring out Kantaka ! " 
 " What would my Lord ? " the charioteer replied — 
 Slow-rising from his place beside the gate — 
 " To ride at night when all the ways are dark ? " 
 
 "Speak low," Siddartha said: "and bring my horse, 
 For now the hour is come when I should quit 
 This golden prison, where my heart lives caged, 
 To find the truth ; which henceforth I wUl seek. 
 For all men's sake, until the truth be found." 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 127 
 
 " Alas ! dear Prince," answered the charioteer, 
 " Spake then for nought those wise and holy men 
 Who cast the stars, and bade us wait the time 
 When King Suddh6dana's great son should rule 
 Eealms upon realms, and be a Lord of lords ? 
 WUt thou ride hence and let the rich world slip 
 Out of thy grasp, to hold a beggar's bowl ? 
 Wilt thou go forth into the friendless waste 
 That hast this Paradise of pleasures here ? " 
 
 The Priuce made answer, " Unto this I came, 
 And not for thrones : the kingdom that I crave 
 Is more than many realms — and all things pass 
 To change and death. Bring me forth Kantaka ! " 
 
 " Most honoured,'* spake again the charioteer, 
 " Bethink thee of my Lord thy father's grief! 
 Bethink thee of their woe whose bliss thou art — 
 
128 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 How shalt thou help them, first undoing them ? " 
 Siddartha answered, " Friend, that love is false 
 Which clings to love for selfish sweets of love ; 
 But I, who love these more than joys of mine — 
 Yea, more than joy of theirs — depart to save 
 Them and all flesh, if utmost love avail : 
 Go, bring me Kantaka ! " 
 
 Then Channa said, 
 " Master, I go ! " and forthwith, mournfully. 
 Unto the stall he passed, and from the rack 
 Took down the sUver bit and bridle-chains, 
 Breast-cord and curb, and knitted fast the straps, 
 And linked the hooks, and led out Kantaka : 
 Whom, tethering to the ring, he combed and dressed, 
 Stroking the snowy coat to silken gloss ; 
 Next on the steed he laid the numdah square. 
 Fitted the saddle-cloth across, and set 
 The saddle fair, drew tight the jewelled girths, 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 129 
 
 Buckled the breech-bands and the martingale, 
 And made fall both the stirrups of worked gold. 
 Then over all he cast a golden net, 
 With tassels of seed-pearl and silken strings. 
 And led the great horse to the palace door, 
 Where stood the Prince ; but when he saw his 
 
 Lord, 
 Right glad he waxed and joyously he neighed, 
 Spreading his scarlet nostrils ; and the books 
 Write, " Surely all had heard Kantaka's neigh, 
 And that strong trampling of bis iron heels, 
 Save that the Devas laid soft unseen wings 
 Over their ears, and kept the sleepers deaf." 
 
 Fondly Siddartha drew the proud head down. 
 Patted the shining neck, and said, " Be still, 
 White Kantaka ! be still, and bear me now 
 The farthest journey ever rider rode ; 
 
I30 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 For this night take I horse to find the truth, 
 And where my quest will end yet know I not, 
 Save that it shall not end until I find. 
 Therefore to-night, good steed, he fierce and bold ! 
 Let nothing stay thee, though a thousand blades 
 Deny the road ! let neither wall nor moat 
 Forbid our flight ! Look ! if I touch thy flank 
 And cry, ' On, Kantaka ! ' let whirlwinds lag 
 Behind thy course ! Be fire and air, my horse ! 
 To stead thy Lord ; so shalt thou share with him 
 The greatness of this deed which helps the world ; 
 For therefore ride I, not for men alone, 
 But for all things which, speechless, share our pain 
 And have no hope, nor wit to ask for hope. 
 Now, therefore, bear thy master valorously ! " 
 
 Then to the saddle lightly leaping, he 
 Touched the arched crest, and Kantaka sprang forth 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 1.31 
 
 With armed hoofs sparkling on the stones, and ring 
 Of champing bit ; but none did hear that sound. 
 For that the Suddha Devas, gathering near, 
 Plucked the red mohra-flowers and strewed them 
 
 thick 
 Under his tread, while hands invisible 
 Muffled the ringing bit and bridle-chains. 
 Moreover, it is written when they came 
 Upon the pavement near the inner gates, 
 The Yakshas of the air laid magic cloths 
 Under the stalKon's feet, so that he went 
 Softly and still. 
 
 But when they reached the gate 
 Of tripled brass — which hardly fivescore men 
 Served to unbar and open — lo ! the doors 
 Rolled back all silently, though one might hear 
 In daytime two koss ofi" the thunderous roar 
 Of those grim hinges and unwieldy plates. 
 
132 THE LIGHT OP' ASIA. 
 
 Also tlie middle and the outer gates 
 Unfolded each their monstrous portals thus 
 In silence, as Siddartha and his steed 
 Drew near ; while underneath their shadow lay, 
 Silent as dead men, all those chosen guards — 
 The lance and sword let fall, the shields unbraced, 
 Captains and soldiers — for there came a wind, 
 Drowsier than blows o'er Malwa's fields of sleep, 
 Before the Prince's path, which, being breathed. 
 Lulled every sense aswoon : and so he passed 
 Free from the palace. 
 
 When the morning star 
 Stood half a spear's length from the eastern rim. 
 And o'er the earth the breath of morning sighed. 
 Rippling Anoma's wave, the border-stream. 
 Then drew he rein, and leaped to earth, and kissed 
 White Kantaka betwixt the ears, and spake 
 Full sweet to Channa: "This which thou hast done 
 
BOOK THE FOURTH. 133 
 
 Shall bring thee good, and bring all creatures good : 
 Be sure I love thee always for thy love. 
 Lead back my horse, and take my crest-pearl here. 
 My princely robes, which henceforth stead me not. 
 My jewelled sword-belt and my sword, and these 
 The long locks by its bright edge severed thus 
 From off my brows. Give the King all, and say 
 Siddartha prays forget him till he come 
 Ten times a Prince, with royal wisdom won 
 Prom lonely searchings and the strife for light ; 
 Where, if I conquer, lo ! all earth is mine — 
 Mine by chief service ! — tell him — mine by love ! 
 Since there is hope for man only in man, 
 And none hath sought for this as I will seek, 
 Who cast away my world to save my world." 
 
Booft tbe f iftb. 
 
c 137 ) 
 
 BooFi tbe ififtb. 
 
 Round Rajagriha five fair HUs arose, 
 
 Guarding King Bimbisara's sylvan town : 
 
 BaibMra, green with lemon-grass and palms ; 
 
 Bipulla, at whose foot thin Sarsnti 
 
 Steals with warm ripple ; shadowy Tapovan, 
 
 Whose steaming pools mirror black rocks, which oo?.e 
 
 Sovereign earth-butter from their rugged roofs ; 
 
 South-east the vulture-peak Sailjigiri ; 
 
 And eastward Eatnagiri, hill of gems. 
 
 A winding track, paven with footworn slabs, 
 
 Leads thee, by safflower fields and bamboo tufts, 
 
 Under dark mangoes and the jujube-trees, 
 
138 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Past milk-white veins of rook and jasper crags, 
 Low cliff and flats of jungle-flowers, to where 
 The shoulder of that mountain, sloping west, 
 O'erhangs a care with wild figs canopied. 
 Lo ! thou who comest thither, bare thy feet 
 And bow thy head ! for all this spacious earth 
 Hath not a spot more dear and hallowed. Here 
 Lord Buddha sate the scorching summers through, 
 The driving rains, the chilly dawns and eves ; 
 Wearing for all men's sakes the yellow robe. 
 Eating in beggar's guise the scanty meal 
 Chance-gathered from the charitable ; at night 
 Couched on the grass, homeless, alone ; while yelped 
 The sleepless jackals round his cave, or coughs 
 Of famished tiger from the thicket broke. 
 By day and night here dwelt the World-honoured, 
 Subduing that fair body born for bliss 
 With fast and frequent watch and search intense 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 139 
 
 Of silent meditation, so prolonged 
 That ofttimes while he mused — as motionless 
 As the fixed rock his seat — the squirrel leaped 
 Upon his knee, the timid quaU led forth 
 Her brood between his feet, and blue doves pecked 
 The rice-grains from the bowl beside his hand. 
 
 Thus would he muse from noontide — when the 
 land 
 Shimmered with heat, and walls and temples danced 
 In the reeking air — ^till sunset, noting not 
 The blazing globe roll down, nor evening glide. 
 Purple and swift, across the softened fields ; 
 Nor the still coming of the stars, nor throb 
 Of drum-skins in the busy town, nor screech 
 Of owl and night-jar ; wholly wrapt from self 
 In keen unravelling of the threads of thought 
 And steadfast pacing of life's labyrinths. 
 
140 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Thus would lie sit till midnight hushed the world, 
 Save where the beasts of darkness in the brake 
 Crept and cried out, as fear and hatred cry, 
 As lust and avarice and anger creep 
 In the black jungles of man's ignorance. 
 Then slept he for what space the fleet moon asks 
 To swim a tenth part of her cloudy sea ; 
 But rose ere the False-dawn, and stood again 
 Wistful on some dark platform of his hUl, 
 Watching the sleeping earth with ardent eyes 
 And thoughts embracing all its living things ; 
 WhUe o'er the waving fields that murmur moved 
 Which is the kiss of Mom waking the lands. 
 And in the east that miracle of Day 
 Gathered and grew. At first a dusk so dim 
 Night seems still unaware of whispered dawn. 
 But soon — before the jungle-cock crows twice — 
 A white verge clear, a widening, brightening white, 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 741 
 
 Higt as the herald-star, which fades in floods 
 Of silver, warming into pale gold, caught 
 By topmost clouds, and flaming on their rims 
 To fervent golden glow, flushed from the brink 
 With safiron, scarlet, crimson, amethyst ; 
 Whereat the sky bums splendid to the blue. 
 And, robed in raiment of glad light, the King 
 Of Life and Glory cometh ! 
 
 Then our Lord, 
 After the manner of a Eishi, hailed 
 The rising orb, and went — ablutions made — 
 Down by the winding path unto the town ; 
 And in the fashion of a Eishi passed 
 From street to street, with begging-bowl in hand, 
 Gathering the little pittance of his needs. 
 Soon was it filled, for all the townsmen cried, 
 " Take of our store, great sir ! " and " Take of 
 ours ! " 
 
142 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Marking his godlike face and eyes enwrapt ; 
 
 And motliers, when they saw our Lord go by, 
 
 Would bid their children fall to kiss his feet, 
 
 And lift his robe's hem to their brows, or run 
 
 To fill his jar, and fetch him milk and cakes. 
 
 And ofttimes as he paced, gentle and slow, 
 
 Eadiant with heavenly pity, lost in care 
 
 For those he knew not, save as fellow-Hves, 
 
 The dark surprised eyes of some Indian maid 
 
 Would dwell in sudden love and worship deep 
 
 On that majestic form, as if she saw 
 
 Her dreams of tenderest thought made true, and grace 
 
 Fairer than mortal fire her breast. But he 
 
 Passed onward with the bowl and yellow robe. 
 
 By mild speech paying all those gifts of hearts, 
 
 Wending his way back to the solitudes 
 
 To sit upon his hill with holy men. 
 
 And hear and ask of wisdom and its roada. 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 143 
 
 Midway on Ratnagiri's groves of calm, 
 Beyond the city, but below the caves, 
 Lodged such as hold the body foe to soul, 
 And flesh a beast which men must chain and tame 
 With bitter pains, till sense of pain is killed, 
 And tortured nerves vex torturer no more : 
 Yogis and Brahmacharis, Bhikshus, all 
 A gaunt and mournful band, dwelling apart. 
 'Some day and night had stood with lifted arms, 
 Till — drained of blood and withered by disease — 
 Their slowly wasting joints and stifiened Umbs 
 Jutted from sapless shoulders like dead forks 
 From forest trunks. Others had clenched their 
 
 hands 
 So long and with so fierce a fortitude, 
 The claw-like nails grew through the festered palm. 
 Some walked on sandals spiked j some with sharp 
 flints 
 
144 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Gashed breast and brow and thigb, scarred these with 
 
 fire, 
 Threaded their flesh with jungle thorns and spits, 
 Besmeared with mud and ashes, crouching foul 
 In rags of dead men wrapped about their loins. 
 Certain there were inhabited the spots 
 Where death-pyres smouldered, cowering defiled 
 With corpses for their company, and kites 
 Screaming around them o'er the funeral-spoils : 
 Certain who cried five hundred times a day 
 The names of Shiva, knit with hissing snakes 
 About their sun-tanned necks and hollow flanks, 
 One palsied foot drawn up against the ham. 
 So gathered they, a grievous company; 
 Crowns blistered by the blazing heat, eyes bleared. 
 Sinews and muscles shrivelled, visages 
 Haggard and wan as slain men's, five days dead ; 
 Here crouched one in the dust who noon by noon 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 145 
 
 Meted a thousand grains of millet out, 
 Ate it with famished patience, seed by seed. 
 And so starved on; there one who bruised his 
 
 pulse 
 With bitter leaves lest palate should be pleased ; 
 And next, a miserable saint self-maimed, 
 Eyeless and tongueless, sexless, crippled, deaf; 
 The body by the mind being thus stripped 
 For glory of much suffering, and the bliss 
 Which they shall win — say holy books — whose woe 
 Shames gods that send us woe, and makes men 
 
 gods 
 Stronger to suffer than Hell is to harm. 
 
 Whom sadly eyeing spake our Lord to one. 
 Chief of the woe-begones : " Much- suffering sir ! 
 These many moons I dwell upon the hill — 
 Who am a seeker of the Truth — and see 
 
146 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 My brothers here, and thee, so piteously 
 Self-anguished ; wherefore add ye ills to life 
 Which is so evil ? " 
 
 Answer made the sage : 
 " 'Tis written if a man shall mortify 
 His flesh, till pain be grown the life he lives 
 And death voluptuous rest, such woes shaU purge 
 Sin's dross away, and the soul, purified, 
 Soar from the furnace of its sorrow, winged 
 For glorious spheres and splendour past all thought." 
 
 " Yon cloud which floats in heaven," the Prince re- 
 plied, 
 " Wreathed like gold cloth around your Indra'a 
 
 throne, 
 Rose thither from the tempest- driven sea ; 
 But it must fall again in tearful drops. 
 Trickling through rough and painful water-ways 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 147 
 
 By cleft and nullah and the muddy flood, 
 To Gunga and the sea, wherefrom it sprang. 
 Know'st thou, my brother, if it be not thus, 
 After their many pains, with saints in bliss ? 
 Since that which rises falls, and that which buys 
 Is spent ; and if ye buy heav'n with your blood 
 In hell's hard market, when the bargain's through 
 The toil begins again ! " 
 
 " It may begin," 
 The hermit moaned. " Alas ! we know not this, 
 Nor surely anything ; yet after night 
 Day comes, and after turmoil peace, and we 
 Hate this accursed flesh which clogs the soul 
 That fain would rise ; so, for the sake of soul, 
 We stake brief agonies in game with Gods 
 To gain the larger joys." 
 
 "Yet if they last 
 A myriad years," he said, " they fade at length, 
 
148 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Tliose joys ; or if not, is there then some life 
 Below, above, heyond, so unlike life 
 It will hot change ? Speak ! do your Gods endure 
 For ever, brothers ? " 
 
 " Nay," the Yogis said, 
 " Only great Brahm endures : the Gods but live." 
 
 Then spake Lord Buddha: "WiLl ye, being 
 
 wise. 
 As ye seem holy and strong-hearted ones, 
 Throw these sore dice, which are your groans and 
 
 moans. 
 For gains which may be dreams, and must have 
 
 end ? 
 Will ye, for love of soul, so loathe your flesh. 
 So scourge and maim it, that it shall not serve 
 To bear the spirit on, searching for home. 
 But founder on the track before night-fall. 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 149 
 
 Like willing steed o'er-spurred ? Will ye, sad 
 
 sirs ! 
 Dismantle and dismember this fair house, 
 Where we have come to dwell by painful pasts ; 
 Whose windows give us light — ^the little light — 
 Whereby we gaze abroad to know if dawn 
 Will break, and whither winds the better road ? " 
 
 Then cried they, " We have chosen this for road 
 And tread it, Eajaputra ! till the close — 
 Though all its stones were fire — in trust of death. 
 Speak, if thou know'st a way more excellent ; 
 If not, peace go with thee ! " 
 
 Onward he passed, 
 Exceeding sorrowful, seeing how men 
 Fear so to die they are afraid to fear, 
 Lust so to live they dare not love their life. 
 But plague it with fierce penances, belike 
 
150 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 To please the Gods who grudge pleasure to man ; 
 Belike to baulk hell by self-kindled hells ; 
 Belike in holy madness, hoping soul 
 May break the better through their wasted flesh. 
 " Oh, flowerets of the field ! " Sidd^rtha said, 
 " Who turn your tender faces to the sun — 
 Glad of the light, and grateful with sweet breath 
 Of fragrance and these robes of reverence donned 
 Silver and gold and purple — none of ye 
 Miss perfect living, none of ye despoil 
 Your happy beauty. Oh, ye palms ! which rise 
 Eager to pierce the sky and drink the wind 
 Blown from Malaya and the cool blue seas, 
 What secret know ye that ye grow content, 
 From time of tender shoot to time of fruit. 
 Murmuring such sun-songs from your feathered 
 
 crowns ? 
 Ye, too, who dwell so merry in the trees — 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 15 r 
 
 Qaick-darting parrots, bee-tirds, bulbuls, doves — 
 None of ye hate your life, none of ye deem 
 To Btrain to better by foregoing needs ! 
 But man, who slays ye — being lord — ^is wise, 
 And wisdom, nursed on blood, cometh thus forth 
 In self-tormentings ! " 
 
 While the Master spake 
 Blew down the mount the dust of pattering feet, 
 White goats and black sheep winding slow their 
 
 way, 
 With many a lingering nibble at the tufts, 
 Ajid wanderings from the path, where water gleamed 
 Or wild figs hung. But always as they strayed 
 The herdsman cried, or slung his sling, and kept 
 The silly crowd still moving to the plain. 
 A ewe with couplets in the flock there was. 
 Some ' hurt had lamed one lamb, which toiled 
 
 behind 
 
152 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Bleeding, while in the front its fellow skipped, 
 And the vexed dam hither and thither ran, 
 Fearful to lose this little one or that ; 
 Which when our Lord did mark, full tenderly 
 He took the limping lamb upon his neck, 
 Saying, " Poor woolly mother, be at peace ! 
 Whither thou goest I wUl bear thy care ; 
 'Twere all as good to ease one beast of grief 
 As sit and watch the sorrows of the world 
 In yonder caverns with the priests who pray." 
 
 " But," spake he to the herdsmen, " wherefore, 
 friends ! 
 Drive ye the flocks adown under high noon, 
 Since 'tis at evening that men fold their sheep ? " 
 And answer gave the peasants : " We are sent 
 To fetch a sacrifice of goats five-score, 
 And five-score sheep, the which our Lord the King 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 153 
 
 Slayeth this niglit in worship of his gods." 
 Then said the Master : " I will also go ! " 
 So paced he patiently, hearing the lamb 
 Beside the herdsmen in the dust and sun, 
 The wistful ewe low bleating at his feet. 
 
 Whom, when they came unto the river-side 
 A woman — dove-eyed, young, with tearful face 
 And lifted hands — saluted, bending low : 
 " Lord ! thou art he," she said, " who yesterday 
 Had pity on me in the fig-grove here. 
 Where I live lone and reared my child ; but he 
 Straying amid the blossoms found a snake. 
 Which twined about his wrist, whilst he did laugh 
 And tease the quick-forked tongue and opened 
 
 mouth 
 Of that cold playmate. But, alas ! ere long 
 He turned so pale and still, I could not think 
 
154 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Why lie should cease to play, and let my breast 
 Fall from his lips. And one said, ' He is sick 
 Of poison ; ' and another, ' He will die.' 
 But I, who could not lose my precious boy, 
 Prayed of them physic, which might bring the 
 
 light 
 Back to his eyes ; it was so very small 
 That kiss-mark of the serpent, and I think 
 It could not hate him, gracious as he was, 
 Nor hurt him in his sport. And some one said, 
 ' There is a holy man upon the hill — 
 Lo ! now he passeth in the yellow robe — - 
 Ask of the Kishi if there be a cure 
 For that which ails thy son.' Whereon I came 
 Trembling to thee, whose brow is like a god's, 
 And wept and drew the face-cloth from my babe, 
 Praying thee tell what simples might be good. 
 And thou, great sir ! didst spurn me not, but gaae 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 153 
 
 With gentle eyes and toucli with patient hand ; 
 Then draw the face-cloth back, saying to me, 
 ' Yea ! little sister, there is that might heal 
 Thee first, and him, if thou couldst fetch the thing ; 
 For they who seek physicians bring to them 
 What is ordained. Therefore, I pray thee, find 
 Black mustard-seed, a tola ; only mark 
 Thou take it not from any hand or house 
 Where father, mother, child, or slave hath died: 
 It shall be well if thou canst find such seed.' 
 Thus didst thou speak, my Lord ! " 
 
 The Master smiled 
 Exceeding tenderly. " Yea ! I spake thus, 
 Dear Kisagotami! But didst thou find 
 The seed?" 
 
 " I went. Lord, clasping to my breast 
 The babe, grown colder, asking at each hut — 
 Here in the jungle and towards the town — 
 
156 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 ' I pray you, give me mustard, of your grace, 
 
 A tola — black ; ' and each who had it gave, 
 
 For all the poor are piteous to the poor ; 
 
 But when I asked, 'In my friend's household 
 
 here 
 Hath any peradventure ever died — ■ 
 Husband, or wife, or child, or slave ? ' they said : 
 ' Sister ! what is this you ask ? the dead 
 Are very many, and the living few ! ' 
 So with sad thanks I gave the mustard back. 
 And prayed of others ; but the others said, 
 ' Here is the seed, but we have lost our slave ! ' 
 ' Here is the seed, but our good man is dead ! ' 
 ' Here is some seed, but he that sowed it died 
 Between the rain-time and the harvesting ! ' 
 Ah, sir ! I could not find a single house 
 Where there was mustard-seed and none had died ! 
 Therefore I left my child — who would not suck 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 157 
 
 Nor smile — beneath the wild-vines by the stream, 
 To seek thy face and kiss thy feet, and pray 
 Where I might find this seed and find no death, 
 If now, indeed, my baby be not dead. 
 As I do fear, and as they said to me." 
 
 " My sister ! thou hast found," the Master said, 
 " Searching for what none finds — that bitter balm 
 I had to give thee. He thou lovedst slept 
 Dead on thy bosom yesterday : to-day 
 Thou know'st the whole wide world weeps with thy 
 
 woe: 
 The grief which all hearts share grows less for 
 
 one. 
 Lo ! I would pour my blood if it could stay 
 Thy tears and win the secret of that curse 
 Which makes sweet love our anguish, and which 
 
 drives — 
 
jS THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 O'er flowers and pastures to the sacrifice — 
 As these dumli beasts are driven — ^men their lords. ' 
 I seek that secret : bury thou thy child ! " 
 
 So entered they the city side by side, 
 The herdsmen and the Prince, what time the sun 
 Gilded slow Sona's distant stream, and threw 
 Long shadows down the street and through the 
 
 gate 
 Where the King's men kept watch. But when these 
 
 saw 
 Our Lord bearing the lamb, the guards stood back, 
 The market-people drew their wains aside, 
 In the bazaar buyers and sellers stayed 
 The war of tongues to gaze on that mild face ; 
 The smith, with lifted hammer in his hand. 
 Forgot to strike ; the weaver left his web. 
 The scribe his scroll, the money-changer lost 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 159 
 
 His count of cowries ; from tlie unwatclied rice 
 Shiva's white bull fed free ; the wasted milk 
 Ran o'er the lota while the milkers watched 
 The passage of our Lord moving so meek, 
 With yet so beautiful a majesty. 
 But most the women gathering in the doors 
 Asked, " Who is this that brings the sacrifice 
 So graceful and peace-giving as he goes ? 
 What is his caste ? whence hath he eyes so sweet ? 
 Can he be Sakra or the Devaraj ? " 
 And others said, " It is the holy man 
 Who dweUeth with the Rishis on the hill." 
 But the Lord paced, in meditation lost, 
 Thinking, " Alas ! for all my sheep which have 
 No shepherd ; wandering in the night with none 
 To guide them ; bleating blindly towards the knife 
 Of Death, as these dumb beasts which are their 
 kin." 
 
l6o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Then some one told the King, " There comet'i 
 here 
 A holy hermit, bringing down the flock 
 Which thou didst bid to crown thy sacrifice." 
 
 The King stood in his hall of offering, 
 On either hand the white-robed Brahmans ranged 
 Muttered their mantras, feeding still the fire 
 Which roared upon the midmost altar. There 
 From scented woods flickered bright tongues of 
 
 flame, 
 Hissing and curling as they licked the gifts 
 Of ghee and spices and the Soma juice, 
 The joy of Indra. Eound about the pile 
 A slow, thick, scarlet streamlet smoked and ran, 
 Sucked by the sand, but ever rolling down. 
 The blood of bleating victims. One such lay, 
 A spotted goat, long-homed, its head bound back 
 With munja grass ; at its stretched throat the knife 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. i6l 
 
 Pressed by a priest, who murmured, " This, dread 
 
 gods, 
 Of many yajnas cometh as the crown 
 From BimbisS,ra : take ye joy to see 
 The spirted Mood, and pleasure in the scent 
 Of rich flesh roasting 'mid the fragrant flames ; 
 Let the King's sins be laid upon this goat. 
 And let the fire consume them burning it, 
 For now I strike." 
 
 But Buddha softly said, 
 " Let him not strike, great King ! " and therewith 
 
 loosed 
 The victim's bonds, none staying him, so great 
 His presence was. Then, craving leave, he spake 
 Of life, which all can take but none can give. 
 Life, which all creatures love and strive to keep. 
 Wonderful, dear, and pleasant unto each, 
 Even to the meanest ; yea, a boon to all 
 
1 62 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Where pity is, for pity makes the world 
 Soft to the weak and noble for the strong. 
 Unto the dumb lips of his flock he lent 
 Sad pleading words, showing how man, who 
 
 prays 
 For mercy to the gods, is merciless, 
 Being as god to those ; albeit all life 
 Is linked and kin, and what we slay have given 
 Meek tribute of the milk and wool, and set 
 Fast trust upon the hands which murder them. 
 Also he spake of what the holy books 
 Do surely teach, how that at death some sink 
 To bird and beast, and these rise up to man 
 In wanderings of the spark which grows purged 
 
 flame. 
 So were the sacrifice new sin, if so 
 The fated passage of a soul be stayed. 
 Nor, spake he, shall one wash his spirit clean 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 163 
 
 By blood; nor gladden gods, being good, with 
 
 blood ; 
 Nor bribe them, being evil ; nay, nor lay 
 Upon the brow of innocent bound beasts 
 One hair's weight of that answer all must give 
 For all things done amiss or wrongfully. 
 Alone, each for himself, reckoning with that 
 The fixed arithmic of the universe, 
 Which meteth good for good and ill for ill, 
 Measure for measure, unto deeds, words, thoughts ; 
 Watchful, aware, implacable, unmoved; 
 Making all futures fruits of all the pasts. 
 Thus spake he, breathing words so piteous. 
 With such high lordliness of ruth and right. 
 The priests drew down their garments o'er the 
 
 hands 
 Crimsoned with slaughter, and the King came 
 
>4 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Standing with clasped palms reverencing Buddh ; 
 While still our Lord went on, teaching how fair 
 This earth were if all living things be linked 
 In friendliness and common use of foods, 
 Bloodless and pure ; the golden grain, bright firmts, 
 Sweet herbs which grow for all, the waters wan, 
 Sufficient drinks and meats. Which when these 
 
 heard. 
 The might of gentleness so conquered them, 
 The priests themselves scattered their altar-flames 
 And flung away the steel of sacrifice ; 
 And through the land next day passed a decree 
 Proclaimed by criers, and in this wise graved 
 On rock and column: "Thus the King's will 
 
 is: — 
 There hath been slaughter for the sacrifice 
 And slaying for the meat, but henceforth none 
 Shall spill the blood of life nor taste of flesh, / 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 165 
 
 Seeing that knowledge grows, and life is one, 
 And mercy cometh to the merciful." 
 So ran the edict, and from those days forth 
 Sweet peace hath spread between all living kind, 
 Man and the beasts which serve him, and the 
 
 birds. 
 On all those banks of Gunga where our Lord 
 Taught with bis saintly pity and soft speech. 
 
 For aye so piteous was the Master's heart 
 To all that breathe this breath of fleeting life. 
 Yoked in one fellowship of joys and pains. 
 That it is written in the holy books 
 How, in an ancient age — when Buddha wore 
 A Brahman's form, dwelling upon the rock 
 Named Munda, by the village of Dffidd — 
 Drought withered all the land : the young ric9 
 died 
 
i66 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Ere it could hide a quail ; in forest glades 
 A fierce sun sucked tlie pools ; grasses and herbs 
 Sickened, and all the woodland creatures fled 
 Scattering for sustenance. At such a time, 
 Between the hot walls of a nuUah, stretched 
 On naked stones, our Lord spied, as he passed, 
 A starving tigress. Hunger m her orhs 
 Glared with green flame ; her dry tongue lolled a 
 
 span 
 Beyond the gasping jaws and shrivelled jowl : 
 Her painted hide hung wrinkled on her ribs, 
 As when between the rafters sinks a thatch 
 Rotten with rains ; and at the poor lean dugs 
 Two cubs, whining with famine, tugged and sucked, 
 Mumbling those miUdess teats which rendered 
 
 nought; 
 While she, their gaunt dam, licked full motherly 
 The clamorous twins, and gave her flank to them 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. 167 
 
 Witli moaning throat, and love stronger than 
 
 want, 
 Softening the first of that wild cry wherewith 
 She laid her famished muzzle to the sand 
 And roared a savage thunder-peal of woe. 
 Seeing which bitter strait, and heeding nought 
 Save the immense compassion of a Bnddh, 
 Our Lord bethought : " There is no- other way 
 To help this murderess of the woods but one. 
 By sunset these will die, having no meat : 
 There is no living heart will pity her, 
 Bloody with ravin, lean for lack of blood. 
 Lo ! if I feed her, who shall lose but I, 
 And how can love lose doing of its kind 
 Even to the uttermost ? " So saying, Buddh 
 Silently laid aside sandals and stafij 
 His sacrdd thread, turban, and cloth, and came 
 forth from behind the milk-bush on the sand, 
 
1 68 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Saying, " Ho ! mother, here is meat for thee ! " 
 Whereat the perishing beast yelped hoarse and 
 
 shrill, 
 Sprang from her cubs, and, hurling to the earth 
 That willing victim, had her feast of him 
 With all the crooked daggers of her claws 
 Rending his flesh, and all her yellow fangs 
 Bathed in his blood : the great cat's burning breath 
 Mixed with the last sigh of such fearless love. 
 
 Thus large the Master's heart was long ago, 
 Not only now, when with his gracious ruth 
 ~N He bade cease cruel worship of the Gods. 
 And much King Bimbisara prayed our Lord — 
 Learning his royal birth and holy search — 
 To tarry in that city, saying ofb, 
 " Thy princely state may not abide such fasts ; 
 Thy hands were made for sceptres, not for alms. 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. t6 
 
 Sojourn with me, who have no son to rule, 
 And teach my kingdom wisdom, till I die, 
 Lodged in my palace with a beauteous bride." 
 But ever spake Siddartha, of set mind : 
 " These things I had, most noble King, and left. 
 Seeking the truth ; which still I seek, and shall ; 
 Not to be stayed though Sikra's palace ope'd 
 Its doors of pearl and Devis wooed me in. 
 I go to build the Kingdom of the Law, 
 Journeying to Gaya and the forest shades. 
 Where, as I think, the light will come to me ; 
 For nowise here among the Eishis comes 
 That light, nor from the Shasters, nor from 
 
 fasts 
 Borne till the body faints, starved by the soul. 
 Yet there is light to reach and truth to win ; 
 And surely, true Friend, if I attain 
 I will return and nuit thv love." 
 
I70 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Thereat 
 Thrice round the Prince King Bimbisara paced, 
 Keverently bending to the Master's feet, 
 And bade him speed. So passed our Lord away 
 ^ Towards ^ravilva, not yet comforted. 
 
 And wan of face, and weak with six years' quest 
 
 But they upon the hill and in the grove — 
 
 Al&ra, Udra, and the ascetics five — 
 
 Had stayed him, saying all was written clear 
 
 In holy Shasters, and that none might win 
 
 Higher than Sruti and than Smriti — nay. 
 
 Not the chief saints ! — for how should mortal man 
 
 Be wiser than the Jnana-K^nd, which tells 
 
 That Brahm is bodiless and actionless. 
 
 Passionless, calm, unqualified, unchanged, 
 
 Pure life, pure thought, pure joy? Or how should 
 
 man 
 Be better than the Karmma-K§,nd, which shows 
 
BOOK THE FIFTH. iji 
 
 How lie may strip passion and action off, 
 Break from the bond of self, and so, unsphercd, 
 Be God, and melt into the vast divine ; 
 Flying from false to true, from wars of sense 
 To peace eternal, where the Silence lives ? 
 
 But the Prince heard them, not yet comforted. 
 
Book tbe Siytb. 
 
( 17? > 
 
 Booft tbe Siytb. 
 
 Thou, who wouldst see wHere dawned the light at 
 
 last, 
 North-westwards from the "Thousand Gardens" go 
 By Gunga's valley tiU thy steps be set 
 On the green hills where those twin streamlets 
 
 spring, 
 Nilajan and Mohina ; follow them, 
 Winding beneath broad-leaved mahua-trees, 
 'Mid thickets of the sansar and the bir, 
 Till on the plain the shining sisters meet 
 In Phalgu's bed, flowing by rocky banks 
 To G^ya and the red Barabar hills. 
 
176 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Hard by that river spreads a tHomy waste, 
 Uruwelaya named in ancient days, 
 With sandhills broken ; on its verge a wood 
 Waves sea-green plumes and tassels thwart the 
 
 sky, 
 With undergrowth wherethrough a still flood steals. 
 Dappled with lotus-blossoms, blue and white. 
 And peopled with quick fish and tortoises. 
 Near it the village of Senani reared 
 Its roofs of grass, nestled amid the palms, 
 Peaceful with simple folk and pastoral toUs. 
 
 There in the sylvan solitudes once more 
 Lord Buddha lived, musing the woes of men. 
 The ways of fate, the doctrines of the books, 
 The lessons of the creatures of the brake. 
 The secrets of the silence whence all come, 
 The secrets of the gloom whereto all go. 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 177 
 
 The life which lies between, like that arch flung 
 From cloud to cloud across the sky, which hath 
 Mists for its masonry and vapoury piers, 
 Melting to void again which was so fair 
 With sapphire hues, garnet, and chrysoprase. 
 Moon after moon our Lord sate in the wood, 
 So meditating these that he forgot 
 Ofttimes the hour of food, rising from thoughts 
 Prolonged beyond the sunrise and the noon. 
 To see his bowl unfilled, and eat perforce 
 Of wild fruit fallen from the boughs o'erhead. 
 Shaken to earth by chattering ape or plucked 
 By purple parokeet. Therefore his grace 
 Faded ; his body, worn by stress of soul. 
 Lost day by day the marks, thirty and two. 
 Which testify the Buddha. Scarce that leaf, 
 Fluttering so dry and withered to his feet 
 From off the sal-branch, bore less likeliness 
 
t78 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Of spring's soft greenery than he of him 
 Who was the princely flower of all his land. 
 
 And once, at such a time, the o'erwrouglit 
 
 Prince 
 Fell to the earth in deadly swoon, aU spent. 
 Even as one slain, who hath no longer breath 
 Nor any stir of blood ; so wan he was. 
 So motionless. But there came by that way 
 A shepherd-boy, who saw Siddartha lie 
 With lids &st-closed, and lines of nameless pain 
 Fixed on his lips — ^the fiery noonday sun 
 Beating upon his head — who, plucking boughs 
 From wild rose-apple trees, knitted them thick 
 Into a bower to shade the sacred face. 
 Also he poured upon the Master's lips 
 Drops of warm milk, pressed from his she-goat's 
 
 bag. 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 179 
 
 Lest, being low caste, lie, by toucHng, wrong 
 
 one 
 So high and holy seeming. But the books 
 Tell how the jambu-branches, planted thus, 
 Shot with quick Ufe, in wealth of leaf and flower. 
 And glowing fruitage interlaced and close. 
 So that the bower grew like a tent of silk 
 Pitched for a king at hunting, decked with studs 
 Of silver-work and bosses of red gold. 
 And the boy worshipped, deeming him some God ; 
 But our Lord gaining breath, arose and asked 
 Milk in the shepherd's lota. " Ah, my Lord, 
 I cannot give thee," quoth the lad ; " thou seest 
 I am a Sudra, and my touch defiles ! " 
 Then the World-honoured spake : " Pity and need 
 Make all flesh kin. There is no caste in blood. 
 Which runneth of one hue, nor caste in tears, 
 Which trickle salt with all ; neither comes man 
 
i8o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 To birth with tilka-mark stamped on the brow, 
 Nor sacred thread on neck. Who doth right deed 
 Is twice-born, and who doeth ill deeds vile. 
 Give me to drink, my brother; when I come 
 Unto my quest it shall be good for thee." 
 Thereat the peasant's heart was glad, and gave. 
 
 And on another day there passed that road 
 A band of tinselled girls, the nautch-dancers 
 Of Indra's temple in the town, with those 
 Who made their music — one that beat a drum 
 Set round with peacock-feathers, one that blew 
 The piping bdnsuli, and one that twitched 
 A three-string sitar. Lightly tripped they down 
 From ledge to ledge and through the chequered 
 
 paths 
 To some gay festival, the silver bells 
 Chiming soft peals about the small brown feet, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. iS 
 
 Armlets and wrist-rings tattling answer shrill j 
 While he that bore the sitar thrummed and twanged 
 His threads of brass, and she beside him sang— 
 
 " Fair goes the dancing when the sitar' s tuned ; 
 Tune us the sitar neither low nor high, 
 And we will dance away the hearts of men. 
 
 The string der stretched breaks, and the music flies ; 
 The string o'erslach is dumb, and music dies ; 
 Tune us the sitar neither low nor high.'' 
 
 So sang the nautch-girl to the pipe and wires, 
 Fluttering like some vain, painted butterfly 
 From glade to glade along the forest path, 
 Nor dreamed her light words echoed on the ear 
 Of him, that holy man, who sate so rapt 
 Under the fig-tree by the path. But Buddh 
 
1 82 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Lifted his great brow as tlie wantons passed, 
 And spake : " The foolish ofttimes teach the wise ; 
 I strain too much this string of life, belike. 
 Meaning to make such music as shall save. 
 Mine eyes are dim now that they see the truth. 
 My strength is waned now that my need is most ; 
 Would that I had such help as man must have, 
 For I shall die, whose life was all men's hope." 
 
 Now, by that river dwelt a landholder 
 Pious and rich, master of many herds, 
 A goodly chief, the friend of all the poor ; 
 And from his house the village drew its name — 
 " Senani." Pleasant and in peace he lived, 
 Having for wife Sujita, loveliest 
 Of all the dark-eyed daughters of the plain ; 
 Gentle and true, simple and kind was she. 
 Noble of mien, with gracious speech to all 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 183 
 
 And gladsome looks — a pearl of womanhood — 
 Passing calm years of liouseliold happiness 
 Beside her lord in that still Indian home, 
 Save that no male child blessed their wedded love. 
 Wherefore, with many prayers she had besought 
 Lukshmi ; and many nights at full-moon gone 
 Round the great Lingam, nine- times nine, with 
 
 gifts 
 Of rice and jasmine wreaths and sandal oil 
 Praying a boy ; also Suj^ta vowed — 
 If this should be — an offering of food 
 Unto the Wood-God, plenteous, delicate, 
 Set in a bowl of gold under his tree, 
 Such as the lips of Devs may taste and take. 
 And this had been : for there was bom to her 
 A beauteous boy, now three months old, who lay 
 Between Sujdta's breasts, while she did pace 
 With grateful footsteps to the Wood-God's shrine 
 
i84 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 One arm clasping her crimson sari close 
 To wrap the babe, that jewel of her joys, 
 The other lifted high in comely curve 
 To steady on her head the bowl and dish 
 Which held the dainty victuals for the God. 
 
 But Eadha, sent before to sweep the ground 
 And tie the scarlet threads around the tree, 
 Came eager, crying, " Ah, dear Mistress ! look. 
 There is the Wood-God sitting in his place, 
 Eevealed, with folded hands upon his knees. 
 See how the light shines round about his brow ! 
 How mild and great he seems, with heavenly 
 
 eyes! 
 Good fortune is it thus to meet the gods." 
 
 So, — thinking him divine, — Suj§,ta drew 
 Tremblingly nigh, and kissed the earth and said, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. i8; 
 
 With sweet face bent, "Would tLat the Holy- 
 One 
 Inhabiting this grove. Giver of good, 
 Merciful unto me his handmaiden, 
 Vouchsafing now his presence, might accept 
 These our poor gifts of snowy curds, fresh made. 
 With milk as white as new-carved ivory ! " ■ 
 
 Therewith into the golden bowl she poured 
 The curds and milk, and on the hands of Buddh 
 Dropped attar from a crystal flask — distilled 
 Out of the hearts of roses : and he ate. 
 Speaking no word, while the glad mother stood 
 In reverence apart. But of that meal 
 So wondrous was the virtue that our Lord 
 Felt strength and life return as though the nights 
 Of watchiag and the days of fast had passed 
 In dream, as though the spirit with the flesh 
 
l86 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Shared that fine meat and plumed its wings anew, 
 Like some delighted bird at sudden streams 
 Weary with flight o'er endless wastes of sand, 
 Which laves the desert dust from neck and crest. 
 And more Suj§,ta worshipped, seeing our Lord 
 Grow fairer and his countenance more bright : 
 " Art thou indeed the God ? " she lowly asked, 
 " And hath my gift found favour ? " 
 
 But Buddh said, 
 " What is it thou dost bring me ? " 
 
 " Holy One ! " 
 Answered Sujdta, " from our droves I took 
 Milk of a hundred mothers, newly-calved. 
 And with that milk I fed fifty white cows, 
 And with their milk twenty-and-five, and then 
 With theirs twelve more, and yet again with theirs 
 The six noblest and best of all our herds. 
 That yield I boiled with sandal and fine spice 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 187 
 
 In silver lotas, adding rice, well grown 
 From chosen seed, set in new-broken ground, 
 So picked that every grain was like a pearl. 
 This did I of true heart, because I vowed 
 Under thy tree, if I should bear a boy 
 I would make offering for my joy, and now 
 I have my son, and all my life is bliss ! " 
 
 Softly our Lord drew down the crimson fold. 
 And, laying on the little head those hands 
 Which help the worlds, he said, " Long be thy bliss ! 
 And lightly fall on him the load of life ! 
 For thou hast holpen me who am no God, 
 But one, thy Brother ; heretofore a Prince 
 And now a wanderer, seeking night and day 
 These six hard years that light which somewhere 
 
 shines 
 To lighten all men's darkness, if they knew ! 
 
1 88 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And I shall find the light ; yea, now it dawned 
 Glorious and helpful, when my weak flesh failed 
 Which this pure food, fair Sister, hath restored, 
 Drawn manifold through lives to quicken life 
 As life itself passes by many births 
 To happier heights and purging off of sins. 
 Yet dost thou truly find it sweet enough 
 Only to live ? Can life and love suffice ? " 
 
 Answered Suji,ta, " Worshipful ! my heart 
 Is little, and a little rain will fill 
 The lily's cup which hardly moists the field. 
 It is enough for me to feel life's sun 
 Shine in my Lord's grace and my baby's smile. 
 Making the loving summer of our home. 
 Pleasant my days pass filled with household cares 
 From sunrise when I wake to praise the gods, 
 And give forth grain, and trim the tulsi-plant, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 189 
 
 And set my handmaids to their tasks, till noon, 
 When my Lord lays his head upon my lap 
 Lulled by soft songs and wavings of the fan ; 
 And so to supper-time at quiet eve. 
 When by his side I stand and serve the cakes. 
 Then the stars light their silver lamps for sleep. 
 After the temple and the talk with friends. 
 How should I not be happy, blest so much, 
 And bearing him thLs boy whose tiny hand 
 Shall lead his soul to Swarga, if it need ? 
 For holy books teach when a man shall plant 
 Trees for the travellers' shade, and dig a well 
 For the folks' comfort, and beget a son. 
 It shall be good for such after their death ; 
 And what the books say that I humbly take. 
 Being not wiser than those great of old 
 Who spake with gods, and knew the hymns and 
 charms, 
 
I90 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And all the ways of virtue and of peace. 
 Also I think that good must come of good 
 And ill of evil — surely — unto all — 
 In every place and time — seeing sweet fruit 
 Groweth from wholesome roots, and bitter things 
 From poison stocks; yea, seeing, too, how spite 
 Breeds hate, and kindness friends, and patience 
 
 peace 
 Even while we live ; and when 'tis willed we 
 
 die, 
 Shall there not be as good a ' Then ' as ' Now ' ? 
 Haply much better ! since one grain of rice 
 Shoots a green feather gemmed with fifty pearls, 
 And all the starry champak's white and gold 
 Lurks in those little, naked, grey spring-buds. 
 Ah, Sir ! I know there might be woes to bear 
 Would lay fond Patience with her face in dust. 
 If tliis my babe pass first I think my heart 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 191 
 
 Would break — almost I hope my heart would break ; 
 That I might clasp him dead and wait my Lord — 
 In whatsoever world holds faithful wives — 
 Duteous, attending till his hour should come. 
 My daily way, rejoicing when the torch 
 Lit the quick flame and rolled the choking smoke. 
 For it is written if an Indian wife 
 Die so, her love shall give her husband's soul 
 For every hair upon her head a crore 
 Of years in Swarga. Therefore fear I not ; 
 And therefore, Holy Sir ! my life is glad, 
 Nowise forgetting yet those other lives 
 Painful and poor, wicked and miserable, 
 Whereon the gods grant pity ! But for me. 
 What good I see humbly I seek to do. 
 And live obedient to the law, in trust 
 That what will come, and shall come, must come 
 well." 
 
(92 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Then spake our Lord, "Thou teachest them who 
 teach, 
 Wiser than wisdom in thy simple lore. 
 Be thou content to know not, knowing thus 
 Thy way of right and duty : grow, thou flower ! 
 With thy sweet kind in peaceful shade — the light 
 Of Truth's high noon is not for tender leaves 
 Which must spread broad in other suns, and Ufb 
 In later lives a crowned head to the sky. 
 Thou who hast worshipped me, I worship thee ! 
 Excellent heart ! learned unknowingly, 
 As the dove is which flieth home by love. 
 In thee is seen why there is hope for man 
 And where we hold the wheel of life at will. 
 Peace go with thee, and comfort all thy days ! 
 As thou accomplishest, may I achieve ! 
 He whom thou thoughtest God bids thee wish 
 this." 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 193 
 
 " Mayest ttou achieve ! " she said, with earnest 
 eyes 
 Bent on her bate ; who reached its tender hands 
 To Buddh — knowing, belike, as children know, 
 More than we deem, and reverencing our Lord ; 
 But he arose — made strong with that pure meat — 
 And bent his footsteps where a great Tree grew, 
 The Bodhi-tree (thenceforward in all years 
 Never to fade, and ever to be kept 
 In homage of the world), beneath whose leaves 
 It was ordained the Truth should come to Buddh : 
 Which now the Master knew ; wherefore he went 
 With measured pace, steadfast, majestical, 
 Unto the Tree of Wisdom. Oh, ye Worlds ! 
 Eejoice ! our Lord wended unto the Tree ! 
 
 Whom — as he passed into its ample shade. 
 Cloistered with columned dropping stems, and roofed 
 
 N 
 
194 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 With vaults of glistering green — the conscious earth 
 Worshipped with waving grass and sudden flush 
 Of flowers about his feet. The forest-boughs 
 Bent down to shade him ; from the river sighed 
 Cool wafts of wind laden with lotus-scents 
 Breathed by the water-gods. Large wondering 
 
 eyes 
 Of woodland creatures — panther, boar, and deer — 
 At peace that eve, gazed on his face benign 
 From cave and thicket. From its cold cleft wound 
 The mottled deadly snake, dancing its hood 
 In honour of our Lord ; bright butterflies 
 Fluttered their vans, azure and green and gold, 
 To be his fan-bearers ; the fierce kite dropped 
 Its prey and screamed; the striped palm-squin-el 
 
 raced 
 From stem to stem to see ; the weaver bird 
 Chirped from her swinging nest ; the lizard ran ; 
 
BOOK' THE SIXTH. ig; 
 
 The koil sang her hyma ; the doves flocked round ; 
 Even the creeping things were 'ware and glad. 
 Voices of earth and air joined in one song, 
 Which unto ears that hear said, " Lord and Friend ! 
 Lover and Saviour ! Thou who hast subdued 
 Angers and pi-ides, desires and fears and douhts. 
 Thou that for each and all hast given thyself,, 
 Pass to the Tree ! The sad world blesseth thee 
 Who art the Buddh that shall assuage her woes. 
 Pass, Hailed and Honoured ! strive thy last for us. 
 King and high Conqueror ! thine hour is come ; 
 This is the Night the ages waited for ! " 
 Then fell the night, even as our Master sate 
 Under that Tree. But he who is the Prince 
 Of Darkness, Mara — knowing this was Buddh 
 Who should deliver men, and now the hour 
 When he should find the Truth and save the 
 worlds — 
 
196 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Gave unto all his evil powers command. 
 Wherefore there trooped from every deepest pit 
 The fiends who war with Wisdom and the Light, 
 Arati, Trishna, Eaga, and their crew 
 Of passions, horrors, ignorances, lusts, 
 The brood of gloom and dread ; all hating Buddh, 
 Seeking to shake his mind ; nor knoweth one. 
 Not even the wisest, how those fiends of Hell 
 Battled that night to keep the Truth fi-om Buddh : 
 Sometimes with terrors of the tempest, blasts 
 Of demon-armies clouding all the wind 
 With thunder, and with blinding lightning flung 
 In jagged javelins of purple wrath 
 From splitting skies ; sometimes with wiles and 
 
 words 
 Fair-sounding, 'mid hushed leaves and softened airs 
 From shapes of witching beauty ; wanton songs, 
 Whispers of love ; sometimes with royal allures 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 197 
 
 Of proffered rule ; sometimes with mocking doubts, 
 Making truth vain. But whether these befell 
 Without and visible, or whether Buddh 
 Strove with fell spirits in his inmost heart. 
 Judge ye : — I write what ancient books have writ. 
 
 The ten chief Sins came — Mara's mighty ones, 
 Angels of evil — Attav^da first, 
 The Sin of Self, who in the Universe 
 As in a mirror sees her fond face shown, 
 And, crying " I," would have the world say " I," 
 And all things perish so if she endure. 
 " If thou be'st Buddh," she said, " let others grope 
 Lightless ; it is enough that Thou art Thou 
 Changelessly ; rise and take the bliss of gods 
 Who change not, heed not, strive not." But Buddh 
 
 spake, 
 " The right in thee is base, the wrong a curse ; 
 
)S THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Cheat such as love themselves." Then came wan 
 
 Doubt, 
 He that denies — the mocking Sin — and this 
 Hissed in the Master's ear. " All things are shows, 
 And vain the knowledge of their vanity ; 
 Thou dost hut chase the shadow of thyself; 
 Rise and go hence, there is no better Way 
 Than patient scorn, nor any help for man, 
 Nor any staying of his whirling wheel." 
 But quoth our Lord, " Thou hast no part with me. 
 False Visikitcha ! subtlest of man's foes." 
 And third came she who gives dark creeds their 
 
 power 
 Silabbat-paramS,sa, sorceress. 
 Draped fair in many lands as lowly Faith, 
 But ever juggling souls with rites and prayers ; 
 The keeper of those keys. which lock up Hells 
 And open Heavens. " Wilt thou dare," she said, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 199 
 
 " Pat by our sacred books, dethrone our gods, 
 Unpeople all the temples, shaking down 
 That law which feeds the priests and props the 
 
 realms ? " 
 But Buddha answered, " What thou bidd'st me 
 
 keep 
 Is form which passes, but the free Truth stands ; 
 Get thee unto thy darkness." Next there drew 
 Gallantly nigh a braver Tempter, he, 
 Kama, the King of passions, who hath sway 
 Over the gods themselves, Lord of all loves, 
 Ruler of Pleasure's realm. Laughing he came 
 Unto the tree, bearing his bow of gold 
 Wreathed with red blooms, and arrows of desire 
 Pointed with five-tongued delicate flame, which 
 
 stings 
 The heart it smites sharper than poisoned barb . 
 And round him came into that lonely place 
 
200 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Bands of bright shapes with heavenly eyes and lips 
 
 Singing in lovely words the praise of Love 
 
 To music of invisible sweet chords, 
 
 So witching, that it seemed the night stood still 
 
 To hear them, and the listening stars and moon 
 
 Paused in their orbits while these hymned to 
 
 Buddh 
 Of lost delights, and how a mortal man 
 Findeth nought dearer in the Three wide worlds 
 Than are the yielded loving fragrant breasts 
 Of Beauty and the rosy breast-blossoms, 
 Love's rubies; nay, and toucheth nought more 
 
 high 
 Than is that dulcet harmony of form 
 Seen in the lines and charms of loveliness, 
 Unspeakable, yet speaking, soul to soul. 
 Owned by the bounding blood, worshipped by 
 
 will 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 201 
 
 Which leaps to seize it, knowing this is best, 
 This the true heaven where mortals are like gods, 
 Makers and Masters, this the gift of gifts 
 Ever renewed and worth a thousand woes. 
 For who hath grieved when soft arms shut him 
 
 safe, 
 And all life melted to a happy sigh. 
 And all the world was given in one warm kiss ? 
 So sang they with soft float of beckoning hands, 
 Eyes lighted with love-flames, alluring smiles ; 
 In wanton dance their supple sides and limbs 
 Eevealing and concealing like burst buds 
 Which tell their colour, but hide yet their hearts. 
 Never so matchless grace delighted eye 
 As troop by troop these midnight-dancers swept 
 Nearer the Tree, each daintier than the last. 
 Murmuring " great Sidddrtha ! I am thine, 
 Taste of my mouth and see if youth is sweet ! " 
 
<2 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Also, wlieii nothing moved our Master's mind, 
 Lo ! Kama waved his magic bow, and lo ! 
 The band of dancers opened, and a shape. 
 Fairest and stateliest of the throng, came forth 
 Wearing the guise of sweet Yasodhara. 
 Tender the passion of those dark eyes seemed 
 Brimming with tears ; yearning those outspread 
 
 arms 
 Opened towards him ; musical that moan 
 Wherewith the beauteous shadow named his name, 
 Sighing, " My Prince ! I die for lack of thee ! 
 What heaven hast thou found like that we knew 
 By bright Eohini in the Pleasure-house, 
 Where all these weary years I weep for thee ? 
 Return, Sidd§,rtha ! ah ! return. But touch 
 My lips again, but let me to thy breast 
 Once, and these fruitless dreams will end ! Oh, 
 look ! 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 203 
 
 Am I not she thou lovedst ? " But Buddh said, 
 " For that sweet sake of her thou playest thus, 
 Fair and false Shadow ! is thy playing vain ; 
 I curse thee not who wear'st a form so dear. 
 Yet as thou art so are all earthly shows. 
 Melt to thy void again ! " Thereat, a cry 
 Thrilled through the grove, and all that comely 
 
 rout 
 Faded with flickering wafts of flame, and trail 
 Of vaporous robes. 
 
 Next, under darkening skies 
 And noise of rising storm, came fiercer Sins, 
 The rearmost of the Ten ; Patigha — Hate — 
 With serpents coiled about her waist, which suck 
 Poisonous milk from both her hanging dugs, 
 And with her curses mix their angry hiss. 
 Little wrought she upon that Holy One 
 Who with his calm eyes dumbed her bitter lips 
 
204 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And made her black snakes writke to hide theif 
 
 fangs. 
 Then followed Euparaga — Lust of days — 
 That sensual Sin which out of greed for life 
 Forgets to live ; and next him Lust of Fame, 
 Nobler Aruparaga, she whose spell 
 Beguiles the wise, mother of daring deeds. 
 Battles and toils. And haughty Mano came, 
 The Fiend of Pride ; and smooth Self-Eighteoiis- 
 
 ness, 
 Uddhachcha ; and — with many a hideous band 
 Of vile and formless things, which crept and flapped 
 Toad-like and bat-like — Ignorance, the Dam 
 Of Fear and Wrong, Avidya, hideous hag, 
 Whose footsteps left the midnight darker, while 
 The rooted mountains shook, the wild winds howled, 
 The broken clouds shed from their caverns streams 
 Of levin-lighted rain ; stars shot from heaven, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 205 
 
 The solid earth shuddered as if one laid 
 Flame to her gaping wounds ; the torn black air 
 "Was full of whistling wings, of screams and yells. 
 Of evil faces peering, of vast fronts 
 Terrible and majestic. Lords of Hell 
 Who from a thousand Limbos led their troops 
 To tempt the Master. 
 
 But Buddh heeded not, 
 Sitting serene, with perfect virtue walled 
 As is a stronghold by its gates and ramps ; 
 Also the Sacred Tree — the B6dhi-tree — 
 Amid that tumult stirred not, but each leaf 
 Glistened as still as when on moonlit eves 
 No zephyr spills the gathering gems of dew ; 
 For all this clamour raged outside the shade 
 Spread by those cloistered stems : 
 
 In the third watch, — 
 The earth being still, the hellish legions fled, 
 
2o6 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 A soft air breathing from the sinking moon — ■ 
 
 Our Lord attained Sammd-samhuddh ; he saw, 
 
 By light which shines beyond our mortal ken, 
 
 The line of all his lives in all the worlds ; 
 
 Far back, and farther back, and farthest yet, 
 
 Five hundred lives and fifty. Even as one, 
 
 At rest upon a mountain-summit, marks 
 
 His path wind up by precipice and crag, 
 
 Past thick-set woods shrunk to a patch; through 
 
 bogs 
 Glittering false-green ; down hollows where he toiled 
 Breathless ; on dizzy ridges where his feet 
 Had well-nigh slipped ; beyond the sunny lawns, 
 The cataract, and the cavern, and the pool. 
 Backward to those dim flats wherefrom he sprang 
 To reach the blue ; thus Buddha did behold 
 Life's upward steps long-linked, from levels low 
 Where breath is base, to higher slopes and higher 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 207 
 
 Whereon tko ten great Virtues wait to lead 
 The climber skyward. Also, Buddha saw 
 How new life reaps what the old life did sow ; 
 How where its march breaks off its march begins ; 
 Holding the gain and answering for the loss ; 
 And how in each life good begets more good, 
 Evil fresh evil ; Death but casting up 
 Debit or credit, whereupon th' account 
 In merits or demerits stamps itself 
 By sure arithmic — where no tittle drops — 
 Certaia and just, on some new-springing life ; 
 Wherein are packed and scored past thoughts and 
 
 deeds, 
 Strivings and triumphs, memories and marks 
 Of lives foregone : 
 
 And in the middle watch 
 Our Lord attained AihidjTia — insight vast 
 Hanging beyond ttds sphere to spheres unnamed. 
 
2oS THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 System on system, countless worlds and suna 
 Moving in splendid measures, band by band 
 Linked in division, one, yet separate, 
 The silver islands of a sapphire sea 
 Shoreless, unfathomed, undiminished, stirred 
 With waves which roll in restless tides of change. 
 He saw those Lords of Light who hold theii 
 
 worlds 
 By bonds invisible, how they themselves 
 Circle obedient round mightier orbs 
 Which serve profounder splendours, star to star 
 Flashing the ceaseless radiance of life 
 From centres ever shifting unto cirques 
 Knowing no uttermost. These he beheld 
 With unsealed vision, and of all those worlds, 
 Cycle on epicycle, all their tale 
 Of Kalpas, Mahakalpas — terms of time 
 Which no man grasps, yea, though he knew to count 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 209 
 
 The drops in Gunga from her springs to the sea, 
 Measureless unto speech — whereby these wax 
 And wane ; whereby each of this heavenly host 
 Fulfils its shining life, and darkling dies. 
 Sakwal by Sakwal, depths and heights he passed 
 Transported through the blue infinitudes, 
 Marking — behind all modes, above all spheres, 
 Beyond the burning impulse of each orb — 
 That fixed decree at silent work which wills 
 Evolve the dark to light, the dead to life. 
 To fulness void, to form the yet unformed, 
 Good unto better, better unto best, 
 By wordless edict ; having none to bid, 
 None to forbid ; for this is past all gods. 
 Immutable, unspeakable, supreme; 
 A Power which builds, unbuilds, and builds again, 
 Ruling all things accordant to the rule 
 Of virtue, which is beauty, truth, and use : 
 
[o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 So that all tHngs do well wliicli serve th.e Power, 
 And ill wliich hinder ; nay, the worm does well 
 Obedient to its kind ; the hawk does well 
 Which carries bleeding quarries to its young ; 
 The dewdrop and the star shine sisterly 
 Globing together in the common work ; 
 And man who lives to die, dies to live well 
 So if he guide his ways by blamelessness 
 And earnest will to hinder not but help 
 All things both great and small which suffer life. 
 These did our Lord see in the middle watch. 
 
 But, when the fourth watch came, the secret 
 came 
 Of Sorrow, which with evil mars the law, 
 As damp and dross hold back the goldsmith's fire. 
 Then was the Dukha-Satya opened him 
 First of the " Noble Truths ; " how Sorrow is 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 21 
 
 Shadow to life, movingjEhere life doth move ; 
 Not to be laid aside until one lays 
 Living aside, with all its changing states, 
 Birth, growth, decay, love, hatred, pleasure, pain, 
 Being and doing. How that none strips off 
 These sad delights and pleasant griefs who lacks 
 Knowledge to know them snares ; but he who 
 
 knows 
 Avidya — ^Delusion — sets those snares, 
 Loves life no longer, but ensues escape. 
 The eyes of such a one are wide, he sees 
 Delusion breeds Sankh^ra, Tendency 
 Perverse ; Tendency Energy — Vidnn^n — 
 Whereby comes Namarupa, local Form 
 And Name and Bodiment, bringing the man 
 With senses naked to the sensible, 
 A helpless mirror of all shows which pass 
 Across his heart ; and so Vedand grows — 
 
2 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 ' Sense-life ' — false in its gladness, fell in sad- 
 ness, 
 Bat sad or glad, the Mother of Desire, 
 Trishna, that thirst which makes the living drink 
 Deeper and deeper of the false salt waves 
 Whereon they float, pleasures, ambitions, wealth. 
 Praise, fame, or domination, conquest, love ; 
 Rich meats and rohes, and fair abodes and pride 
 Of ancient lines, and lust of days, and strife 
 To live, and sins that flow from strife, some sweet, 
 Some bitter. Thus Life's thirst quenches itself 
 With draughts which double thirst, but who is 
 
 wise 
 Tears from his soul this Trishna, feeds his sense 
 No longer on false shows, files his firm mind 
 To seek not, strive not, wrong not ; bearing meek 
 All ills which flow from foregone wrongfulness. 
 And BO constraining passions that they die 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 213 
 
 Famislied ; till all the sum of ended life — 
 The Karma — all that total of a soul 
 Which is the things it did, the thoughts it had, 
 The ' Self it wove — with woof of viewless time, 
 Crossed on the warp invisible of acts — 
 The outcome of him on the Universe, 
 Grows pure and sinless ; either never more 
 Needing to find a body and a place. 
 Or so informing what fresh frame it takes 
 In new existence that the new toils prove 
 Lighter and lighter not to be at all. 
 Thus " finishing the Path ; " free from Earth's cheats ; 
 Released from all the Skandhas of the flesh ; 
 Broken from ties — from Upadanas — saved 
 From whirling on the Wheel ; aroused and sane 
 As is a man wakened from hateful dreams. 
 Until — greater than Kings, than Gods more glad ! — 
 The aching craze to live ends, and life glides-^ 
 
214 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Lifeless — to nameless quiet, nameless joy, 
 Blessed Nirvana — sinless, stirless rest — 
 That change wtich never changes ! 
 
 Lo ! the Dawn 
 Sprang with Buddh's victory ! lo ! in the East 
 Flamed the first fires of beauteous day, poured forth 
 Through fleeting folds of Night's black drapery. 
 High in the widening blue the herald-star 
 Faded to paler silver as there shot 
 Brighter and brightest bars of rosy gleam 
 Across the grey. Far ofi" the shadowy hills 
 Saw the great Sun, before the world was 'ware, 
 
 I And donned their crowns of crimson ; flower by 
 flower 
 Felt the warm breath of Mom and 'gan unfold 
 Their tender lids. Over the spangled grass 
 Swept the swift footsteps of the lovely Light, 
 Turning the tears of Night to joyous gems, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 2i 
 
 Decking the earth with radiance, 'broidering 
 The sinking storm-clouds with a golden fringe, 
 Gilding the feathers of the palms, which waved 
 Glad salutation ; darting beams of gold 
 Into the glades ; touching with magic wand 
 The stream to rippled ruby ; in the brake 
 Fiading the mild eyes of the antelopes 
 And saying " It is day ! " in nested sleep 
 Touching the small heads under many a wing 
 And whispering " Children, praise the light of 
 
 day!" 
 Whereat there piped anthems of all the birds. 
 The Koil's fluted song, the Bulbul's hymn. 
 The " morning, morning " of the painted thrush, 
 The twitter of the sunbirds starting forth 
 To find the honey ere the bees be out. 
 The grey crow's caw, the parrot's scream, the 
 
 strokes 
 
2i6 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Of the green hammersmith, the myna's chirp, 
 
 The never-finished love-talk of the doves : 
 
 Yea ! and so holy was the iafluence 
 
 Of that high Dawn which came with victory 
 
 That, far and near, in homes of men there spread 
 
 An unknown peace. The slayer hid his knife ; 
 
 The rohber laid his plunder back ; the shroff 
 
 Counted full tale of coins ; all evU hearts 
 
 Grew gentle, kind hearts gentler, as the bahn 
 
 Of that divinest Daybreak lightened Earth. 
 
 Kings at fierce war called trace ; the sick men 
 
 leaped 
 Laughing from beds of pain ; the dying smiled 
 As though they knew that happy Mom was 
 
 sprung 
 From fountains farther than the utmost East ; 
 And o'er the heart of sad Tas6dhara, 
 Sitting forlorn at Prince Sidd&rtha's bed, 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 217 
 
 Came sudden bliss, as if love should not fail 
 Nor such vast sorrow miss to end in joy. 
 So glad the World was — ^though it wist not 
 
 why — 
 That over desolate wastes went swooniag songs 
 Of mirth, the voice of bodiless Prets and Bhuts 
 Foreseeing Buddh ; and Devas in the air 
 Cried " It is finished, finished ! " and the priests 
 Stood with the wondering people in the streets 
 Watching those golden splendours flood the sky, 
 And saying " There hath happed some mighty 
 
 thing." 
 Also in Ran and Jungle grew that day 
 Friendship amongst the creatures ; spotted deer 
 Browsed fearless where the tigress fed her cubs, 
 And cheetahs lapped the pool beside the bucks ; 
 Under the eagle's rock the brown hares scoured 
 While his fierce beak but preened an idle wing ; 
 
2i8 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The snake sunned all his jewels in the beam 
 With deadly fangs in sheath ; the shrike let pass 
 The nestling-finch ; the emerald halcyons 
 Sate dreaming while the fishes played beneath, 
 Nor hawked the merops, though the butterflies — 
 Crimson and blue and amber — ^flitted thick 
 Around his perch ; the Spirit of our Lord 
 Lay potent upon man and bird and beast, 
 Even while he mused under that B6dhi-tree, 
 Glorified with the Conquest gained for all, 
 And lightened by a Light greater than Day's. 
 
 Then he arose — radiant, rejoicing, strong — 
 Beneath the Tree, and lifting high his voice 
 Spake this, in hearing of all Times and Worlds : — 
 
 An^ajdtisangsdrang 
 Sandhdwissang anibhisanr/ 
 
BOOK THE SIXTH. 219 
 
 Gahakdrakangawesanto 
 Bulilchdjdtipunappunang. 
 
 Gahahdrakadithosi ; 
 Punagehang nakdhasi; 
 Sabhdtephdsukhdbhaggd, 
 GahaJctUangwisang hhitang ; 
 Wisangkhdragafang chittang ; 
 JanhdnaTigkhayamajhagd. 
 
 Maut a House of life 
 Hath held me — seeking ever him who wrought 
 These prisons of the senses, sorrow-fraught ; 
 
 Sore was my ceaseless strife ! 
 
 But now, 
 Thou Builder of this Tabernacle — Thou ! 
 I know Thee ! Never shalt Thou build again 
 These walls of pain, 
 
©ooli tbe Seventb. 
 
( 223 ) 
 
 Boofi tbe Seventb. 
 
 SoEROWFUL dwelt the King Sndclla6dana 
 All those long years among the Sakya Lords 
 Lacking the speech and presence of his Son ; 
 Sorrowful sate the sweet Yas6dhara 
 All those long years, knowing no joy of life, 
 Widowed of him her living Liege and Prince. 
 And ever, on the news of some recluse 
 Seen far away by pasturing camel-men 
 Or traders threading devious paths for gain. 
 Messengers from the King had gone and come, 
 Bringing account of many a holy sage 
 Lonely and lost to home ; but nought of him 
 
22-1. THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 The crown of wHte Kapilavastu's line, 
 The glory of her monarch and his hope, 
 The heart's content of sweet Yas&dhara, 
 Far-wandered now, forgetful, changed, or dead. 
 
 But on a day in the Wasanta-time, 
 When silver sprays swing on the mango-trees 
 And all the earth is clad with garb of spring, 
 The Princess sate by that bright garden-stream 
 Whose gliding glass, bordered with lotus-cups. 
 Mirrored so often in the bliss gone by 
 Their clinging hands and meeting lips. Her lids 
 Were wan with tears, her tender cheeks had thinned ; 
 Her lips' delicious curves were drawn with grief; 
 The lustrous glory of her hair was hid — 
 Close-bound as widows use ; no ornament 
 She wore, nor any jewel clasped the cloth — 
 Coarse, and of mourning- white — crossed on her breast. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 225 
 
 Slow moved and painfully those small fine feet 
 
 Which had the roe's gait and the rose-leaf's fall 
 
 In old years at the loving voice of him. 
 
 Her eyes, those lamps of love, — ^which were as if 
 
 Sunlight should shine from out the deepest dark. 
 
 Illumining Night's peace with Daytime's glow — 
 
 UnHghted now, and roving aimlessly. 
 
 Scarce marked the clustering signs of coming 
 
 Spring, 
 
 So the silk lashes drooped over their orbs. 
 
 In one hand was a girdle thick with pearls, 
 
 Siddartha's — treasured since that night he fled — 
 
 (Ah, bitter Night ! mother of weeping days ! 
 
 When was fond Love so pitiless to love. 
 
 Save that this scorned to limit love by life ?) 
 
 The other led her little son, a boy 
 
 Divinely fair, the pledge Siddirtha left — 
 
 Named Eahula — now seven years old, who tripped 
 — p 
 
226 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Gladsome beside his mother, light of heart 
 To see the spring-blooms burgeon o'er the world. 
 
 So, while they lingered by the lotus-pools. 
 And, lightly laughing, Rahula flung rice 
 To feed the blue and purple fish ; and she 
 With sad eyes watched the swiftly-flying cranes. 
 Sighing, " Oh ! creatures of the wandering wing, 
 If ye shall light where my dear Lord is hid. 
 Say that Yasddhara lives nigh to death 
 For one word of his mouth, one touch of him ! " — 
 Thus, as they played and sighed — mother and 
 
 chHd— 
 Came some among the damsels of the Court 
 Saying, " Great Princess ! there have entered in 
 At the south gate merchants of Hastinpur, 
 Tripusha called and Bhalluk, men of worth. 
 Long travelled from the loud sea's edge, who bring 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 227 
 
 Marvellous lovely webs pictured with gold, 
 Waved blades of gilded steel, wrought bowls in 
 
 brass, 
 Cut ivories, spice, simples, and unknown birds. 
 Treasures of far-off peoples ; but they bring 
 That which doth beggar these, for He is seen ! 
 Thy Lord, — our Lord, — the hope of all the land — 
 Siddartha ! they have seen him face to face, 
 Yea, and have worshipped him with knees and 
 
 brows, 
 And offered offerings ; for he is become 
 All which was shown, a Teacher of the wise, 
 World-honoured, holy, wonderful; a Buddh 
 Who doth deliver men and save all flesh 
 By sweetest speech and pity vast as Heaven : 
 And, lo ! he joumeyeth hither, these do say." 
 
 Then — while the glad blood bounded in hsr veins 
 
228 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Ab Gunga leaps when first tlie mountain snows 
 
 Melt at her springs — uprose TasSflliara 
 
 And clapped her palms, and laughed, with brimming 
 
 tears 
 Beading her lashes. " Oh ! call quick," she cried, 
 " These merchants to my purdah, for mine ears 
 Thirst like parched throats to drink their blessed 
 
 news. 
 Go bring them in, — but, if their tale be true, 
 Say I will fill their girdles with much gold. 
 With gems that Kings shall envy : come ye too, 
 My girls, for ye shall have guerdon of this 
 If there be gifts to speak my grateful heart." 
 
 So went those merchants to the Pleasure-House, 
 Pull softly paciag through its golden ways 
 With naked feet, amid the peering maids, 
 Much wondering at the glories of the Court. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 229 
 
 Whom, when they came without the purdah's folds, 
 A voice, tender and eager, filled and charmed 
 With trembling music, saying, "Te are come 
 Prom far, fair Sirs ! and ye have seen my Lord — 
 Yea, worshipped — for he is become a Buddh, 
 World-honoured, holy, and delivers men. 
 And joumeyeth hither. Speak ! for, if this be, 
 Friends are ye of my House, welcome and dear." 
 
 Then answer made Tripasha, " We have seen 
 That sacred Master, Princess ! we have bowed 
 Before his feet ; for who was lost a Prince 
 Is found a greater than the King of kings. 
 Under the B6dhi-tree by Phalgu's bank 
 That which shall save the world hath late been 
 
 wrought 
 By him, — the Friend of all, the Prince of all — 
 Thine most. High Lady ! from whose tears men win 
 
2 30 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 The comfort of this Word the Master speaks. 
 
 Lo ! he is well, as one beyond all ills, 
 
 Uplifted as a god from earthly woes. 
 
 Shining with risen Truth, golden and clear. 
 
 Moreover as he entereth town by town. 
 
 Preaching those noble ways which lead to peace. 
 
 The hearts of men follow his path as leaves 
 
 Troop to the wind or sheep draw after one 
 
 Who knows the pastures. We ourselves have heard, 
 
 By Gay a in the green Tchimika grove. 
 
 Those wondrous lips and done them reverence : 
 
 He Cometh hither ere the first rains fall." 
 
 Thus spake he, and Yas6dhara, for joy. 
 Scarce mastered breath to answer, " Be it well 
 Now and at all times with ye, worthy friends ! 
 Who bring good tidings ; but of this great thing 
 Wist ye how it befell ? " 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 231 
 
 Then Bhallak told 
 Such as the people of the valleys knew 
 Of that dread night of conflict, when the air 
 Darkened with fiendish shadows, and the earth 
 Quaked, and the waters swelled with Mara's wrath. 
 Also how gloriously that morning broke 
 Radiant with rising hopes for man, and how 
 The Lord was found rejoicing 'neath his Tree. 
 But many days the burden of release — 
 To be escaped beyond all storms of doubt. 
 Safe on Truth's shore — lay, spake he, on that 
 
 heart 
 A golden load ; for how shall men — Buddh mused — 
 Who love their sins and cleave to cheats of sense. 
 And drink of error from a thousand springs, 
 Having no mind to see, nor strength to break 
 The fleshly snare which binds them — how should 
 
 such 
 
232 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Eeceive the Twelve Nidinas and the Law 
 Redeeming all, yet strange to profit by, 
 As the caged bird oft shuns its opened door ? 
 So had we missed the helpful victory 
 If, in this earth without a refuge, Buddh, 
 Winning the way, had deemed it all too hard 
 For mortal feet and passed, none following him. 
 Yet pondered the compassion of our Lord ; 
 But in that hour there rang a voice as sharp 
 As cry of travail, so as if the earth 
 Moaned in birth-throe, " NaSyami aham thu 
 Naiyati loka ! " Surely I am lost, 
 I AND MY CREATURES : then a pause, and next 
 A pleading sigh borne on the western wind, 
 " Sruyatdm dharma, Bhagwat ! " Oh, Supreme 
 Let thy great Law be uttered ! Whereupon 
 The Master cast his vision forth on flesh, 
 Saw who should hear and who must wait to hear. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 233 
 
 As the keen Sun gilding the lotus-lakes 
 Seeth which buds will open to his beams 
 And which are not yet risen from their roots ; 
 Then spake, divinely smiling, " Tea ! I preach ! 
 Whoso will listen let him learn the Law." 
 
 Afterwards passed he, said they, by the hills 
 Unto Benares, where he taught the Five, 
 Showing how birth and death should be destroyed, 
 1^ And how man hath no fate except past deeds, 
 V_No Hell but what he makes, no Heaven too high 
 --' For those to reach^ whose passions sleep subdued. 
 This was the fifteenth day of Vaishya 
 Mid-afternooii, and that night was full moon. 
 
 But, of the Eishis, first Kaundinya 
 Owned the Four Truths and entered on the Paths ; 
 And after him Bhadraka, Asvajit, 
 
234 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Basava, Mahanama ; also there 
 Within the Deer-park, at the feet of Biiddh, 
 Yasad the Prince with nohles fifty-four, 
 Hearing the blessed word our Master spake. 
 Worshipped and followed; for there sprang up 
 
 peace 
 And knowledge of a new time come for men 
 In all who heard, as spring the flowers and grass 
 When water sparkles through a sandy plain. 
 
 These sixty — said they — did our Lord send forth, 
 X Made perfect in restraint and passion-free, 
 / To teach the Way ; but the World-honoured 
 turned 
 South from the Deer-park and Isipatan 
 To Yashti and King Bimbis^ra's realm, 
 Where many days he taught ; and after these 
 King Bimbis^ra and his folk believed, 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 235 
 
 / Learning the law of love and ordered life. 
 Also he gave the Master, of free gift, — 
 Pouring forth water on the hands of Buddh, — 
 The Bamhoo-Garden, named W^luvana, 
 Wherein are streams and caves and lovely glades ; 
 And the King set a stone there, carved with 
 this : — 
 
 JV dharma hetwpfohhawd 
 Yesan hMun Tathdgatd; 
 Aha yesan cha yo nirodhd 
 Ewan wadi Maha Samano. 
 
 " What life's course and cause sustain 
 These Tathagato made plain; 
 What delivers from life's woe 
 That our Lord hath made us know." 
 
 And, in that Garden — said they — there was held 
 
236 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 /a high. Assembly, where the Teacher spake 
 
 Wisdom and power, winning all souls which heard ; 
 7 So that nine hundred took the yellow rohe — 
 Such as the Master wears, — and spread his Law ; 
 And this the gS,tha was wherewith he closed : — 
 
 Sahha pdpassa aharanan; 
 Kusalassa upasampadd : 
 Sa chitta pariyodapanan ; 
 Utan Bvdhdnusdsanan. 
 
 " Evil swells the debts to pay, 
 Good delivers and acquits ; 
 Shun evil, follow good ; hold sway 
 Over thyself. TKis is the Way." 
 
 Whom, when they ended speaking so of him. 
 With gifts, and thanks which made the jewels 
 dull. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 237 
 
 The Princess recompensed. " But by what road 
 Wendeth my Lord ? " she asked : the merchants 
 
 said, 
 "T6jans threescore stretch from the city- walls 
 To Eajagriha, whence the easy path 
 Passeth by Sona hither, and the hills. 
 Our oxen, treading eight slow koss a day, 
 Came in one moon.'' 
 
 Then the King, hearing word, 
 Sent nobles of the Court — well-mounted lords — 
 Nine separate messengers, each embassy 
 Bidden to say, " The King Suddh6dana — 
 Nearer the pyre by seven long years of lack. 
 Wherethrough he hath not ceased to seek for 
 
 thee — 
 Prays of his son to come unto his own, 
 The Throne and people of this longing Realm, 
 Lest he shall die and see thy face no more." 
 
238 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Also nine horsemen sent Yas6d]iara 
 Bidden to say, " The Princess of thy House — 
 Eahula's mother — craves to see thy face 
 As the night-hlowing moon-flower's swelling heart 
 Pines for the moon, as pale as6ka-buds 
 Wait for a woman's foot : if thou hast found 
 More than was lost, she prays her part in this, 
 Rahula's part, but most of all thyself." 
 So sped the Sakya Lords, but it befell 
 That each one, with the message in his mouth, 
 Entered the Bamboo-Garden in that hour 
 When Buddha taught his Law ; and — ^hearing — 
 
 each 
 Forgot to speak, lost thought of King and quest, 
 Of the sad Princess even ; only gazed 
 Eye-rapt upon the Master ; only hung 
 Heart-caiight upon the speech, compassionate. 
 Commanding, perfect, pure, enlightening all, 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 239 
 
 Poured from those sacred lips. Look ! like a bee 
 Winged for the hive, who sees the m&gras spread 
 And scents their utter sweetness on the air, 
 If he be honey-filled, it matters not ; 
 If night be nigh, or rain, he will not heed ; 
 Needs must he light on those delicious blooms 
 And drain their nectar j so these messengers 
 One with another, hearing Buddha's words. 
 Let go the purpose of their speed, and mixed. 
 Heedless of all, amid the Master's train. 
 Wherefore the King bade that Udayi go — ^^ 
 Ohiefest in all the Court, and faithfuUest, 
 Siddirtha's playmate in the happier days — 
 Who, as he drew anear the garden, plucked 
 Blown tufts of tree-wool from the grove and sealed If 
 The entrance of his hearing ; thus he came 
 Safe through the lofty peril of the place, 
 And told the message of the Kiug, and hers. 
 
240 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 THen meekly bowed His Lead and spake our 
 Lord 
 Before the people, " Surely I shall go ! 
 It is my duty as it was my wiU ; 
 ■* Let no man miss to render reverence 
 To those who lend him life, whereby come means 
 ( To live and die no more, but safe attain 
 Blissful Nirvana, if ye keep the Law, 
 Purging past wrongs and adding nought thereto, 
 Complete in love and lovely charities. 
 Let the King know and let the Princess hear 
 I take the way forthwith." This told, the folk 
 Of white Kapilavastu and its fields 
 Made ready for the entrance of their Prince. 
 At the south gate a bright pavilion rose 
 With flower-wreathed pillars, and the walls of 
 
 silk 
 Wrought on their red and green with woven gold. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 241 
 
 Also the roads were laid with scented boughs 
 Of neem and mango, and full mussuks shed 
 Sandal and jasmine on the dust ; and flags 
 Fluttered ; and on the day when he should come 
 It was ordained how many elephants — 
 With silver howdahs and their tusks gold-tipped — 
 Should wait beyond the ford, and where the drums 
 Should boom " SiddSrtha cometh ! " where the 
 
 lords 
 Should light and worship, and the dancing girls 
 Where they should strew their flowers, with dance 
 
 and song, 
 So that the steed he rode might tramp knee-deep 
 In rose and balsam, and the ways be fair ; 
 While the town rang with music and high joy. 
 This was ordained, and all men's ears were pricked 
 Dawn after dawn to catch the first drum's beat 
 Announcing, " Now he cometh ! " 
 
242 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 But it fell- 
 Eager to be before — ^Tas6dliara 
 Rode in her litter to the city-walls 
 Where soared the bright pavilion. AU around 
 A beauteous garden smiled — ^Nigr6dha named — 
 Shaded with bel-trees and the green-plumed dates, 
 New-trimmed and gay with winding walks and 
 
 banks 
 Of fruits and flowers ; for the southern road 
 Skirted its lawns, on this hand leaf and bloom, 
 On that the suburb-huts where base-borns dwelt 
 Outside the gates, a patient folk and poor, 
 Whose touch for Kshatriya and priest of Brahm 
 Were sore defilement. Yet those, too, were quick 
 With expectation, rising ere the dawn 
 To peer along the road, to climb the trees 
 At far-off' trumpet of some elephant. 
 Or stir of temple-drum ; and when none came, 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 24.5 
 
 Busied with lowly chares to please the Prince ; 
 Sweeping their door-stones, setting forth their flags, 
 Stringing the fluted fig-leaves into chains, 
 New furbishing the Lingam, decking new 
 Yesterday's faded arch of boughs, but aye 
 Questioning wayfarers if any noise 
 Be on the road of great Siddartha. These 
 The Princess marked with lovely languid eyes, 
 Watching, as they, the southward plain, and bent 
 Like them to listen if the passers gave 
 News of the path. So fell it she beheld 
 One slow approaching with his head close shorn, 
 A yellow cloth over his shoulder cast. 
 Girt as the hermits are, and in his hand 
 An earthen bowl, shaped melonwise, the which 
 Meekly at each hut-door he held a space, 
 Taking the granted dole with gentle thanks 
 And all as gently passing where none gave. 
 
244 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Two followed him wearing the yellow robe, 
 But he who bore the bowl so lordly seemed, 
 So reverend, and with such a passage moved, 
 With so commanding presence filled the air, 
 With such sweet eyes of holiness smote all. 
 That, as they reached him alms the givers gazed 
 Awestruck upon his face, and some bent down 
 In worship, and some ran to fetch fresh gifts 
 Grieved to be poor ; till slowly, group by group, 
 Children and men and women drew behind 
 Into his steps, whispering with covered lips, 
 " Who is he ? who ? when looked a Eishi thus ? " 
 But as he came with quiet footfall on 
 Nigh the pavilion, lo ! the silken door 
 Lifted, and, all unveiled, Tas6dhara 
 Stood in his path crying, " Siddartha ! Lord ! " 
 With wide eyes streaming and with close-clasped hands, 
 Then sobbing fell upon his feet, and lay. 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 245 
 
 Afterwards, when this weeping lady passed 
 Into the Noble Paths, and one had prayed 
 Answer from Buddha wherefore — ^being vowed 
 Quit of all mortal passion and the touch, 
 Flower-soft and conquering, of a woman's hands — 
 He suffered such embrace, the Master said: 
 " The greater beareth with the lesser love 
 So it may raise it unto easier heights. 
 Take heed that no man, being 'scaped from bonds, 
 Vexeth bound souls with boasts of liberty. 
 Free are ye rather that your freedom spread 
 By patient winning and sweet wisdom's skill. 
 Three eras of long toil bring Bodhisdts — 
 Who will be guides and help this darkling world— 
 Unto deliverance, and the first is named 
 Of deep ' Eesolve,' the second of ' Attempt,' 
 The third of ' Nomination.' Lo ! I lived I 
 
 In era of Eesolve, desiring good, 
 
246 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 SearcMng for wisdom, but mine eyes were sealed. 
 
 Count the grey seeds on yonder castor-clump, 
 
 So many rains it is since I was Ram, 
 
 A merchant of the coast which looketh south 
 
 To Lanka and the hiding-place of pearls. 
 
 Also in that far time Tasodhara 
 
 Dwelt with me in our village by the sea, 
 
 Tender as now, and Lukshmi was her name. 
 
 And I remember how I journeyed thence 
 
 Seeking our gain, for poor the household was 
 
 And lowly. Not the less with wistful tears 
 
 She prayed me that I should not part, nor tempt 
 
 Perils by land and water. ' How could love 
 
 Leave what it loved ? ' she wailed ; yet, venturing, I 
 
 Passed to the Straits, and after storm and toil 
 
 And deadly strife with creatures of the deep, 
 
 And woes beneath the midnight and the noon. 
 
 Searching the wave I won therefrom a pearl 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 247 
 
 Moonlike and glorious, such as Kings might hnj 
 Emptying their treasury. Then came I glad 
 Unto mine hills, but over all that land 
 Famine spread sore ; ill was I stead to live 
 In journey home, and hardly reached my door — 
 Aching for food — with that white wealth of the 
 
 sea 
 Tied in my girdle. Tet no food was there ; 
 And on the threshold she for whom I toiled — 
 More than myself — lay with her speechless lips 
 Nigh unto death for one small gift of grain. 
 Then cried I, ' If there be who hath of grain, 
 Here is a kingdom's ransom for one life ; 
 Give Lukshmi bread and take my moonlight pearl.' 
 Whereat one brought the last of all his hoard, 
 Millet — three seers^and clutched the beauteous 
 
 thing. 
 But Lukshmi lived, and sighed with gathered life, 
 
248 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 ' Lo ! thou didst love indeed ! ' I spent my pearl 
 Well in that life to comfort heart and mind 
 Else quite uncomforted ; but these pure pearls, 
 My last great gain, won from a deeper wave — 
 The Twelve Md§,nas and the Law of Good — 
 Cannot he spent, nor dimmed, and most fulfil 
 Their perfect beauty being freeliest given. 
 For like as is to Meru yonder hill 
 Heaped by the little ants, and like as dew 
 Dropped in the footmark of a bounding roe 
 Unto the shoreless seas, so was that gift 
 Unto my present giving ; and so love — 
 Vaster in being free from toils of sense — 
 Was wisest stooping to the weaker heart ; 
 And so the feet of sweet Tas6dhara 
 Passed into peace and bliss, being softly led." 
 
 But when the King heard how Siddartha came 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 249 
 
 Shorn, with the mendicant's sad-coloured cloth, 
 And stretching out a bowl to gather orts 
 From base-horns' leavings, wrathful sorrow drave 
 Love from his heart. Thrice on the ground he spat, 
 Plucked at his silvered beard, and strode straight 
 
 forth 
 Lackeyed by trembling lords. Frowning he clomb 
 Upon his war-horse, drove the spurs, and dashed. 
 Angered, through wondering streets and lanes of folk 
 Scarce finding breath to say, " The King ! bow down ! 
 Ere the loud cavalcade had clattered by : 
 Which — at the turning by the Temple-wall, 
 Where the south gate was seen — encountered full 
 A mighty crowd ; to every edge of it 
 Poured fast more people, till the roads were lost, 
 Blotted by that huge company which thronged 
 And grew, close following him whose look serene 
 Met the old King's. Nor lived the father's wrath 
 
;o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Longer than while the gentle eyes of Buddh 
 Lingered. in worship on his troubled brows, 
 Then downcast sank, with his true knee, to earth 
 In proud humility. So dear it seemed 
 To see the Prince, to know him whole, to mark 
 That glory greater than of earthly state 
 Crowning his head, that majesty which brought 
 All men, so awed and silent, in his steps. 
 Nathless, the King broke forth, " Ends it in this 
 That great Siddartha steals into his realm. 
 Wrapped in a clout, shorn, sandalled, craving 
 
 food 
 Of low-borns, he whose life was as a God's ? 
 My son ! heir of this spacious power, and heir 
 Of Kings who did but clap their palms to have 
 What earth could give or eager service bring ? 
 Thou should'st have come apparelled in thy rank, 
 With shining spears, and tramp of horse and foot. 
 
BOPK THE SEVENTH. 251 
 
 Lo ! all my soldiej-s camped upon tlie road, 
 And all my city waited at the gates ; 
 Where hast thou sojourned through these evil years 
 Whilst thy crowned father mourned? and she, too, 
 
 there ' 
 Lived as the widows use, foregoing joys ; 
 Never once hearing sound of song or string, 
 Nor wearing once the festal roTbe, till now 
 When in her cloth of gold she welcomes home 
 A beggar-spoase in yellow remnants clad. 
 Son ! why is this ? " 
 
 " My Father ! " came reply, 
 " It is the custom of my race." 
 
 " Thy race," 
 Answered the King, " counteth a hundred thrones 
 From Maha Samm^t, but no deed like this." 
 
 " Not of a mortal line," the Master said, 
 
252 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 " I ppake, but of descent invisible, 
 The Buddbas wbo bave been and who sball be 
 Of tbese am I, and wbat tbey did I do, 
 And tbis, wbicb now befalls, so fell before, 
 Tbat at bis gate a King in warrior-mail 
 Should meet his son, a Prince in hermit-weeds ; 
 And tbat, by love and self-control, being more 
 Than mightiest Kings in all their puissance. 
 The appointed helper of the Worlds should bow — 
 As now do I — and with all lowly love 
 Proffer, where it is owed for tender debts. 
 The first-fruits of the treasure he hath brought ; 
 Which now I proffer." 
 
 Then the King amazed 
 Inquired " What treasure ? " and the Teacher took 
 Meekly the royal palm, and while they paced 
 Through worshipping streets — the Princess and the 
 King 
 
BOOK THE SEVENTH. 253 
 
 On either side — ^he told the things which make 
 For peace and pureness, those Four noble Truths 
 Which hold all wisdom as shores shut the seas, 
 Those eight right Eules whereby who will may 
 
 walk — 
 Monarch or slave — upon the perfect Path 
 That hath its Stages Four and Precepts Eight, 
 Whereby whoso will live — mighty or mean, 
 Wise or unlearned, man, woman, young or old — 
 Shall, soon or late, break from the wheels of life. 
 Attaining blest Nirvana. So they came 
 Into the Palace-porch, Suddh6dana 
 With brows nnknit drinking the mighty .words. 
 And in his own hand carrying Buddha's bowl, 
 Whilst a new light brightened the lovely eyes 
 Of sweet Tas6dhara and sunned her tears ; 
 And that night entered they the Way of Peace. 
 
Booft the jSigbtb, 
 
( 2S7 ) 
 
 Booft tbc jBiQbtb, 
 
 A BROAD mead spreads by swift Kohana's bank 
 
 At Nagara ; five days shall bring a man 
 
 In ox-wain thither from Benares' shrines 
 
 Eastward and northward journeying. The horns 
 
 Of white Himala look upon the place, 
 
 Which all the year is glad with blooms, and girt 
 
 By groves made green from that bright streamlet's 
 
 wave. 
 Soft are its slopes and cool its fragrant shades, 
 And holy all the spirit of the spot 
 Unto this time : the breath of eve comes hushed 
 Over the tangled thickets, and high heaps 
 
258 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Of carved red stones cloven by root and stem 
 
 Of creeping fig, and clad with waving veil 
 
 Of leaf and grass. The still snake glistens forth 
 
 From crumbled work of lac and cedar-beams 
 
 To coil his folds there on deep-graven slabs ; 
 
 The lizard dwells and darts o'er painted floors 
 
 Where Kings have paced; the grey fox litters 
 
 Under the broken thrones ; only the peaks, 
 And stream, and sloping lawns, and gentle airs 
 Abide unchanged. All else, like all fair shows 
 Of life, are fled — for this is where it stood, 
 The city of Suddh6dana, the hill 
 Whereon, upon an eve of gold and blue, 
 At sinking sun Lord Buddha set himself 
 To teach the Law in hearing of his own. 
 
 Lo ! ye shall read it in the Sacred Books • 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 255 
 
 How, being met in thiit glad pleasaunce-place — 
 A garden in old days with hanging walks, 
 Fountains, and tanks, qnd rose-banked terraces 
 Girdled by gay pavilions' and the sweep 
 Of stately palace-fronts — the Jfaster sate 
 Eminent, worshipped, all the earnest throng 
 Watching the opening of his lips to learn 
 That wisdom which hath made our Asia mild ; 
 Whereto four thousand lakhs of living souls 
 Witness this day. Upon the King's right hand 
 He sate, and round were ranged the S^kya Lords 
 Ananda, Devadatta — all the Court : 
 Behind stood Seriyut and Mugallan, chiefs 
 Of the calm brethren in the yellow garb, 
 A goodly company. Between his knees 
 Kahula smiled, with wondering childish eyes 
 Bent on the awful face, while at his feet 
 Sate sweet Yasodhara, her heartaches gone. 
 
26o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Foreseeing that fair love which doth not feed 
 
 On fleeting sense, that life which knows no age. 
 
 That blessed last of deaths when Death is dead, 
 
 His victory and hers. Wherefore she laid 
 
 Her hand upon his hands, folding around 
 
 Her silver shoulder-cloth his yellow robe, 
 
 Nearest in all the world to him whose words 
 
 The Three Worlds waited for. I cannot tell 
 
 A small part of the splendid lore which broke 
 
 From Buddha's lips : I am a late-come scribe 
 
 Who love the Master and his love of men, 
 
 And tell this legend, knowing he was wise. 
 
 But have not wit to speak beyond the books ; 
 
 And time hath blurred their script and ancient sense, 
 
 Which once was new and mighty, moving all. 
 
 A little of that large discourse I know 
 
 Which Buddha spake on the soft Indian eve ; 
 
 So, too, I know it writ that they who heard 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 261 
 
 Were more — lakhs more — crores more — than could be 
 
 seen, 
 For all the Devas and the Dead thronged there, 
 Till Heaven was emptied to the seventh zone 
 And uttermost dark Hells opened their bars ; 
 Also the daylight lingered past its time 
 In rose-leaf radiance on the watching peaks. 
 So that it seemed Night listened in the glens 
 And Noon upon the mountains ; yea ! they write, 
 The Evening stood between them like some maid 
 Celestial, love-struck, rapt ; the smooth-rolled clouds 
 Her braided hair ; the studded stars the pearls 
 And diamonds of her coronal ; the moon 
 Her forehead-jewel, and the deepening dark 
 Her woven garments. 'Twas her close-held breath 
 Which came in scented sighs across the lawns 
 While our Lord taught, and, while he taught, who 
 
 heard — 
 
262 THE LIGHT UF ASIA. 
 
 Thoagh he were stranger in tlie land, or slave, 
 High caste or low, come of the Aryan blood, 
 Or Mlech or Jungle-dweller — seemed to hear 
 What tongue his fellows talked. Nay, outside those 
 Who crowded by the river, great and small, 
 The birds and beasts and creeping things — 'tis writ- 
 Had sense of Buddha's vast embracing love 
 And took the promise of his piteous speech ; 
 So that their lives — prisoned in shape of ape. 
 Tiger, or deer, shagged bear, jackal, or wolf. 
 Foul-feeding kite, pearled dove, or peacock gemmed, 
 Squat toad, or speckled serpent, lizard, bat ; 
 Yea, or of fish fanning the river-waves — 
 Touched meekly at the skirts of brotherhood 
 With man who hath less innocence than these, 
 And in mute gladness knew their bondage broke 
 Whilst Buddha spake these things before the King :- 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 263 
 
 X)m, amitaya ! measure not with words 
 
 Th' Immeasurable ; nor sink tLe string of thought 
 Into the Fathomless. Who asks doth err, 
 Who answers, errs. Say nought ! 
 
 The Books teach Darkness was, at first of all, 
 And Brahm, sole meditating in that Night : 
 
 Look not for Brahra and the Beginning there ! 
 Nor him, nor any light 
 
 Shall any gazer see with mortal eyes. 
 Or any searcher know by mortal mind ; 
 
 Veil after veil will lift — but there must be 
 Veil upon veil behind. 
 
 Stars sweep and question not. This is enough 
 That life and death and joy and woe abide ; 
 
 And cause and sequence, and the course of time, 
 And Being's ceaseless tide, 
 
264 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Which, ever changing, runs, linked like a river 
 
 By ripples following ripples, fast or slow — 
 The same yet not the same — from far-off fountain 
 
 To where its waters flow 
 
 Into the seas. These, steaming to the Sun, 
 Give the lost wavelets back in cloudy fleece 
 
 To trickle down the hills, and glide again ; 
 Having no pause or peace. 
 
 This is enough to know, the phantasms are ; 
 
 TheHeavens, Earths, Worlds,and changes changing them, 
 A mighty whirling wheel of strife and stress 
 
 "Which none can stay or stem. 
 
 Pray not ! the Darkness will not brighten ! Ask 
 ■^ Nought from the Silence, for it cannot speak ! 
 Vex not your mournful minds with pious pains ! 
 / Ah ! Brothers, Sisters ! seek 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 265 
 
 , Nought from the helpless gods by gift and hymn, 
 y Nor bribe with blood, nor feed with friiits and cakes : 
 Within yourselves deliverance must be sought ; 
 Each man his prison makes. 
 
 Each hath such lordship as the loftiest ones ; 
 
 Nay, for with Powers above, around, below. 
 As with all flesh and whatsoever lives, 
 
 Act maketh joy and woe. 
 
 What hath been bringeth what shall be, and is, 
 Worse — better — last for first and first for last : 
 
 The Angels in the Heavens of Gladness reap 
 Emits of a holy past •. 
 
 The devils in the underworlds wear out 
 
 Deeds that were wicked in an age gone by : 
 
 Nothing endures : fair virtues waste with time, 
 Foul sins grow purged thereby. 
 
 / 
 
266 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Who toiled a slave may come anew a Prince 
 
 For gentle worthiness and merit won ; 
 Who ruled a King may wander earth in rags 
 For things done and undone. 
 
 Higher than Indra's ye may lift your lot, 
 And sink it lower than the worm or gnat ; 
 
 The end of many myriad lives is this, 
 The end of myriads that. 
 
 Only, while turns this wheel invisible, 
 
 No pause, no peace, no staying- place can be; 
 Who mounts may fall, who falls will mount ; the spokes 
 
 Go round unceasingly ! 
 
 * « • • 
 
 If ye lay bound upon the wheel of change. 
 
 And no way were of breaking from the chain, 
 The Heart of boundless Being is a curse. 
 
 The Soul of Things fell Pain.- 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 267 
 
 Ye are not bound ! the Soul of Things is sweet, 
 
 The Heart of Being is celestial rest ; 
 Stronger than woe is will : that which was Good 
 
 Doth pass to Better — Best. 
 
 I, Buddh, who wept with all my brothers' tears, 
 Whose heart was broken by a whole world's woe, 
 
 Laugh and am glad, for there is Liberty ! 
 Ho ! ye who suffer ! know 
 
 Ye suffer from yourselves. None else compels. 
 None other holds you that ye live and die. 
 
 And whirl upon the wheel, and hug and kiss 
 Its spokes of agony, 
 
 Its tire of tears, its nave of nothingness. 
 
 Behold, I show you Truth ! Lower than hell, 
 Higher than heaven, outside the utmost stars, 
 
 Farther than Brahm doth dwell, 
 
268 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Before beginning, and without an end, 
 As space eternal and as surety sure, 
 \- Is fixed a Power divine which moves to good, 
 Only its laws endure. 
 
 This is its touch upon the blossomed rose, 
 The fashion of its hand shaped lotus-leaves ; 
 
 In dark soil and the silence of the seeds 
 The robe of Spring it weaves ; 
 
 That is its paintiag on the glorious clouds. 
 
 And these its emeralds on the peacock's train ; 
 
 It hath its stations in. the stars ; its slaves 
 In lightning, wind, and rain. 
 
 Out of the dark it wrought the heart of man. 
 Out of dull shells the pheasant's pencilled neck ; 
 
 Ever at toil, it brings to loveliness 
 All ancient wrath and wreck. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 269 
 
 The grey eggs in the golden sun-bird's nest 
 
 Its treasures are, the bees' six-sided cell 
 Its honey-pot ; the ant wots of its ways, 
 
 The white doves know them well. 
 
 It spreadeth forth for flight the eagle's wings 
 
 What time she beareth home her prey ; it sends 
 
 The she-wolf to her cubs ; for unloved things 
 It findeth food and friends. 
 
 It is not marred nor stayed in any use, 
 
 All liketh it ; the sweet white milk it brings 
 
 To mothers' breasts ; it brings the white drops, too. 
 Wherewith the young snake stings. 
 
 The ordered music of the marching orbs 
 
 It makes in viewless canopy of sky ; 
 In deep abyss of earth it hides up gold, 
 
 Sards, sapphires, lazuli. 
 
^73 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Ever and ever fetching secrets forth, 
 
 It sitteth in the green of forest-glades 
 Nursing strange seedlings at the cedar's root, 
 
 Devising leaves, blooms, blades. 
 
 ^ It slayeth and it saveth, nowise moved 
 
 Except unto the working out of doom ; 
 Its threads are Love and Life ; and Death and Pain 
 The shuttles of its loom. 
 
 / It maketh and unmaketh, mending aU ; 
 
 What it hath wrought is better than had been ; 
 Slow grows the splendid pattern that it plans 
 Its wistful hands between. 
 
 This is its work upon the things ye see : 
 ' The unseen things are more ; men's hearts and minds, 
 The thoughts of peoples and their ways and wills, 
 Those, too, the great Law binds. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 271 
 
 Unseen it helpeth ye with faithful hands, 
 
 Unheard it speaketh stronger than the storm. 
 Pity and Love are man's because long stress 
 
 Moulded blind mass to form. 
 
 It will not be contemned of any one ; 
 
 Who thwarts it loses, and who serves it gains ; 
 The hidden good it pays with peace and bliss. 
 
 The hidden ill with pains. 
 
 It seeth everywhere and marketh all : 
 
 Do right — it recompenseth ! do one wrong — 
 
 The equal retribution must be made, 
 Though Dharma tarry long. 
 
 It knows not wrath nor pardon ; utter-true 
 Its measures mete, its faultless balance weighs 
 
 Times are as nought, to-morrow it will judge, 
 Or after many days. 
 
272 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 By this the slayer's knife did stab himself; 
 
 The tinjust judge hath lost his own defender ; 
 The false tongue dooms its lie ; the creeping thief 
 And spoiler rob, to render. 
 
 Such is the Law which moves to righteousness, 
 
 Which none at last can turn aside or stay ; 
 The heart of it is Love, the end of it 
 
 Is Feave and Consummation sweet. Obey! 
 * « * • 
 
 The Books say well, my Brothers ! each man's life 
 
 The outcome of his former living is ; 
 The bygone wrongs bring forth sorrows and woes, 
 
 The bygone right breeds bliss. 
 
 That which ye sow ye reap. See yonder fields ! 
 
 The sesamum was sesamum, the corn 
 Was com. The Silence and the Darkness knew ! 
 V So is a man's fate born. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 273 
 
 He Cometh, reaper of the things he sowed, 
 
 Sesamum, corn, so much cast in past birth ; 
 And so much weed and poison-stuff, which mar 
 
 Him and the aching earth. 
 
 If he shall labour rightly, rooting these, 
 
 And planting wholesome seedlings where they grew, 
 Fruitful and fair and clean the ground shall be. 
 
 And rich the harvest due. 
 
 / If he who Kveth, learning whence woe springs, 
 Endureth patiently, striving to pay 
 His utmost debt for ancient evils done 
 . In Love and Truth alway ; 
 
 / If making none to lack, he throughly purge 
 The lie and lust of self forth from his blood ; 
 Suffering all meekly, rendering for offence 
 Nothing but grace and good ; 
 
274 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 / If he shall day by day dwell merciful, 
 
 Holy and just and kind and true ; and rend 
 Desire from where it clings with bleeding roots, 
 
 Till love of life have end : 
 
 He — dying — leaveth as the sum of him 
 
 A life-count closed, whose ills are dead and quit. 
 
 Whose good is quick and mighty, far and near, 
 So that fruits follow it. 
 
 No need hath such to live as ye name life ; 
 
 That which began in him when he began 
 Is finfshed : he hath wrought the purpose through 
 
 Of what did make him Man. 
 
 Never shall yearnings torture him, nor sins 
 Stain him, nor ache of earthly joys and woes 
 
 Invade his safe eternal peace ; nor deaths 
 And lives recur. He goes 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 273 
 
 /Unto NikvAna. He is one with Life, 
 
 Yet lives not. He is blest, ceasing to be. 
 Om, mani padme, om ! tlie Dewdrop slips 
 Into the shining sea ! 
 
 • * « * 
 
 This is the doctrine of the Karma. Learn ! 
 
 Only when all the dross of sin is quit. 
 Only when life dies like a white flame spent 
 Death dies along with it. 
 
 Say not "I am," "I was," or "I shall be," 
 
 Think not ye pass from house to house of flesh 
 
 Like travellers who remember and forget. 
 Ill-lodged or well-lodged. Fresh ' 
 
 Issues upon the Universe that sum 
 
 Which is the lattermost of lives. It makes 
 
 Its habitation as the worm spins silk 
 And dwells therein. It takes 
 
276 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Function and substance as the snake's egg hatched 
 Takes scale and fang ; as feathered reed-seeds fly 
 O'er rock and loam and sand, until they find 
 Their marsh and multiply. 
 
 Also it issues forth to help or hurt. 
 
 When Death the bitter murderer doth smite. 
 Red roams the unpurged fragment of him, driven 
 
 On winds of plague and blight. 
 
 But when the mild and just die, sweet airs- breathe ; 
 
 The world grows richer, as if desert-stream 
 Should sink away to sparkle up again 
 
 Purer, with broader gleam ; 
 
 So merit won winneth the happier age 
 Which by demerit halteth short of end ; 
 
 Yet must this Law of Love reign King of all 
 Before the Kalpas end. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 277 
 
 What lets ? — Brothers ! the Darkness lets ! which breeds 
 
 Ignorance, mazed whereby ye take these shows 
 For true, and thirst to have, and, having, cling 
 
 To lusts which work you woes. 
 
 Ye that will tread the Middle Eoad, whose course 
 
 Bright Reason traces and soft Quiet smoothes ; 
 
 Ye who will take the high Nirvana-way, 
 1 
 
 List the Four Noble Truths. 
 
 ~ The First Truth is of Sorrow. Be not mocked ! 
 Life which ye prize is long-drawn agony : 
 Only its pains abide ; its pleasures are 
 As birds which light and fly. 
 
 Ache of the birth, ache of the helpless days. 
 
 Ache of hot youth and ache of manhood's prime ; 
 
 Ache of the chill grey years and choking death, 
 These fill your piteous time. 
 
2 78 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Sweet is fond Love, but funeral-flames must kiss 
 
 The breasts which pillow and the lips which cling ; 
 Gallant is warlike Might, but vultures pick 
 
 The joints of chief and King. 
 
 Beauteous is Earth, but all its forest-broods 
 Plot mutual slaughter, hungering to live ; 
 
 Of sapphire are the skies, but when men cry 
 Famished, no drops they give. 
 
 Ask of the sick, the mourners, ask of him 
 Who tottereth on his staff, lone and forlorn, 
 
 " Liketh thee life ?" — these say the babe is wise 
 That weepeth, being born. 
 
 The Second Truth is Sorrow's Cause. What grief 
 Springs of itself and springs not of Desire ? 
 
 Senses and things perceived mingle and light 
 Passion's quick spark of fire :■ 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 279 
 
 So flameth Trishna, lust and thirst of things. 
 
 Eager ye cleave to shadows, dote on dreams ; 
 A false Self in the midst ye plant, and make 
 
 A world around which seems ; 
 
 Blind to the heights beyond, deaf to the sound 
 Of sweet airs breathed from far past Indra's sky ; 
 
 Dumb to the summons of the true life kept 
 For him who false puts by. 
 
 So grow the strifes and lusts which make earth's war, 
 So grieve poor cheated hearts and flow salt tears ; 
 
 So wax the passions, envies, angers, hates ; 
 So years chase blood-stained years 
 
 With wild red feet. So, where the grain should grow, 
 Spreads the birS,n-w§ed with its evU root 
 
 And poisonous blossoms ; hardly good seeds find 
 Soil where to fall and shoot; 
 
28o THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 And, drugged with poisonous drink, the soul departs, 
 
 And, fierce with thirst to drink. Karma returns ; 
 Sense-struck again the sodden Self begins, 
 And new deceits it earns. 
 
 The Third is Sorrow's Ceasing. This is peace 
 To conquer love of self and lust of life, 
 
 To tear deep-rooted passion from the breast, 
 To still the inward strife ; 
 
 For love to clasp Eternal Beauty close ; 
 
 For glory to be Lord of self; for pleasure 
 To live beyond the gods ; for countless wealth 
 
 To lay up lasting treasure 
 
 Of perfect service rendered, duties done 
 In charity, soft speech, and stainless days : 
 
 These riches shall' not fade away in life, 
 Nor any death dispraise. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 281 
 
 Tken Sorrow ends, for Life and Death have ceased ; 
 
 How should lamps flicker when their oil is spent ? 
 The old sad count is clear, the new is clean ; 
 
 Thus hath a man content. 
 
 * ft «• * 
 
 The Fourth Truth is The Way. It openeth wide, 
 
 Plain for all feet to tread, easy and near, 
 The NdbU Eightfold Path ; it goeth straight 
 
 To peace and refuge. Hear ! 
 
 Manifold tracks lead to yon sister-peaks 
 
 Around whose snows the gilded clouds are curled ; 
 
 By steep or gentle slopes the climber comes 
 Where breaks that other world. 
 
 Strong limbs may dare the rugged road which storms, 
 Soaring and perilous, the mountain's breast ; 
 
 The weak must wind from slower ledge to ledge, 
 With many a place of rest. 
 
282 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 So is the Eightfold Path which brings to peace ; 
 
 By lower or by upper heights it goes. 
 The firm soul hastes, the feeble tarries. All 
 
 Will reach the sunlit snows. 
 
 The First good level is Right Doctrine. Walk 
 In fear of Dharma, shunning all offence ; 
 
 In heed of Karma, which doth make man's fate ; 
 In lordship over sense. 
 
 The Second is Bight Purpose. Have good -will 
 To all that lives, letting unkindness die 
 
 And greed and wrath ; so that your lives be made 
 Like soft airs passing by. 
 
 The Third is Bight Discourse. Govern the lips 
 As they were palace-doors, the King within ; 
 
 Tranquil and fair and courteous be all words 
 Which from that presence win. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 283 
 
 The Fourth is Right Behaviour. Let each act 
 
 Assoil a fault or help a merit grow : 
 Like threads of silver seen through crystal beads 
 
 Let love through good deeds show. 
 
 Four higher roadways be. Only those feet 
 
 May tread them which have done with earthly things, 
 
 Eight Purity, Bight Thought, Bight Loneliness, 
 Bight Bapture. Spread no wings 
 
 For Sunward flight, thou soul with unplumed vans ! 
 
 Sweet is the lower air, and safe and known 
 The homely levels ; only strong ones leave 
 
 The nest each makes his own. 
 
 Dear is the love, I know, of Wife and Child j 
 Pleasant the friends and pastimes of your years ; 
 
 Fruitful of good Life's gentle charities ; 
 Firm- set, though false, its fears. 
 
284 THE LIGHT OP ASIA. 
 
 Live — ^ye who must — such lives as live on these ; 
 
 Make golden, stair-ways of your weakness ; rise 
 By daily sojourn with those phantasies 
 
 To lovelier verities. 
 
 So shall ye pass to clearer heights and find 
 Easier ascents and lighter loads of sins, 
 
 And larger will to burst the bonds of sense, 
 Entering the Path. Who wins 
 
 To such commencement hath the First Stage touched, 
 He knows the Noble Truths, the Eightfold Road: 
 
 By few or many steps such shall attain 
 NikvIna's blest abode. 
 
 Who standeth at the Second Stogie, made free 
 From doubts, delusions, and the inward strife, 
 
 Lord of all lusts, quit of the priests and books, 
 Shall live but one more life. 
 
- BOOK THE EIGHTH. 285 
 
 Yet onward lies tlie Third Stage : purged and pure 
 
 Hath grown the stately spirit here, hath risen 
 To love all living things in perfect peace. 
 
 His life at end, life's prison 
 
 Is broken. Nay, there are who surely pass 
 
 Living and visible to utmost goal 
 By Fourth Stage of the Holy Ones — the Buddhs — . 
 
 And they of stainless soul. 
 
 Lo !■ like fierce foes slain by some warrior. 
 Ten sins along these Stages lie in dust. 
 
 The Love of Self, False Faith, and Doubt are three, 
 Two more Hatred and Lust. 
 
 Who of these Five is conqueror hath trod 
 Three stages out of Four : yet there abide 
 
 The Love of Life on earth. Desire for Heaven, 
 Self-Praise, Error, and Pride. 
 
285 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 As one wto stands on yonder snowy horn 
 
 Having nought o'er him but the boundless blue, 
 So, these sins being slain, the man is come 
 
 NievIna's verge uato. 
 
 Him the Gods envy A-om their lower seats ; 
 
 Him the Three Worlds in ruin should not shake ; 
 All life is lived for him, aU deaths are dead ; 
 
 Karma will no more make 
 
 New houses. Seeking nothing, he gains all ; 
 
 Foregoing self, the Universe grows " I : " 
 If any teach NIEVANA is to cease, 
 
 Say unto such they He. 
 
 If any teach NIRVANA is to live, 
 
 Say unto such they err ; not knowing this 
 
 Nor what light shines beyond their broken lamps, 
 Nor lifeless, timeless, bliss. 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 287 
 
 Enter the path ! There is no grief like Hate ! 
 
 No pains like passion, no deceit like sense ! 
 Enter the path ! far hath he gone whose foot 
 
 Treads down one fond offence. 
 
 Enter the Path ! There spring the healing streams 
 Quenching all thirst! there bloom th' immortal 
 flowers 
 Carpeting all the way with joy ! there throng 
 Swiftest and sweetest hours ! 
 
 * * * « 
 
 More is the treasure of the Law than gems ; 
 
 Sweeter than comb its sweetness ; its delights 
 Delightful past compare. Thereby to live 
 
 Hear the Five Rules aright: — 
 
 Kill not — for Pity's sake — and lest ye slay 
 The meanest thing upon its upward way. 
 
288 THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Give freely and receive, but take from none 
 By greed, or force or fraud, what is his own. 
 
 Bear not false witness, slander not, nor lie ; 
 Truth is the speech of inward purity. 
 
 Shun drugs and drinks which work the wit abuse ; 
 Clear minds, clean bodies, need no S6ma juice. 
 
 Touch not thy neighbour's wife, neither commit 
 Sins of the flesh unlawful and unfit. 
 
 These words the Master spake of duties due 
 
 To father, mother, children, fellows, friends ; 
 
 Teaching how such as may not swiftly break 
 
 The clinging chains of sense — ^whose feet are weak 
 
 To tread the higher road — should order so 
 
 This life of flesh that all their hither days 
 
 Pass blameless in discharge of charities 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 289 
 
 And first true footfalls in the Eightfold Path ; 
 Living pure, reverent, patient, pitiful ; 
 Loving all things which live even as themselves ; 
 Because what falls for ill is fruib of ill 
 Wrought in the past, and what falls well of goocl ; 
 And that by howsomuch the householder 
 Purgeth himself of self and helps the world, 
 By so much happier comes he to next stage. 
 In so much bettered being. This he spake ; 
 As also long before, when our Lord walked 
 By Eajagriha in the bamboo-grove : 
 For on a dawn he walked there and beheld 
 The householder Singala, newly bathed. 
 Bowing himself with bare head to the earth, 
 To Heaven, and all four quarters ; while he threw 
 Eice, red and white, from both hands. "Wherefore 
 
 thus 
 Bowest thou. Brother ? " said the Lord ; and he, 
 
 T 
 
29© THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 "It is tlie way, Great Sir! our fathers taught 
 
 At every dawn, before the toil begins, 
 
 To hold off evil from the sky above 
 
 And earth beneath, and all the winds which blow." 
 
 Then the World-honoured spake : " Scatter not rice, 
 
 But offer loving thoughts and acts to all : 
 
 To parents as the East, where rises light ; 
 
 To teachers as the South, whence rich gifts come ; 
 
 To wife and children as the West, where gleam 
 
 Colours of love and calm, and aU days end ; 
 
 To friends and kinsmen and all men as North ; 
 
 To humblest living things beneath, to Saints 
 
 And Angels and the blessed Dead above : 
 
 So shall aUevil be shut off, and so 
 
 The six main quarters will be safely kept." 
 
 But to his Own, Them of the yellow robe — 
 Those who, as wakened eagles, soar with scorn 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 2gt 
 
 From life's low vale, and wing towards the Sun — 
 To these he taught the Ten Observances 
 The Dasa-SU, and how a mendicant 
 Must know the Three Boors and the Triple Thoughts; 
 The Sixfold States of mind ; the Fivefold Powers ; 
 The Eight High Gates of Purity ; the Modes 
 Of Understanding ; Iddhi ; U]pelcshd ; 
 The Five Great Meditations, which are food 
 Sweeter than Amrit for the holy soul ; 
 The Jhdnas and the Tliree Chief Pefuges. 
 Also he taught his Own how they should dwell ; 
 How live, free from the snares of love and wealth ; 
 What eat and drink and carry — three plain cloths, — 
 Yellow, of stitched stuff, worn with shoulder bare — 
 A girdle, almsbowl, strainer. Thus he laid 
 The great fouadations of our Sangha well, 
 That noble Order of the Yellow Eobe 
 Which to this day standeth to help the World. 
 
1<)L THE LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 So all that nigLt he spake, teaching the Law ; 
 And on no eyes fell sleep — for they who heard 
 Rejoiced with tireless joy. Also the King, 
 When this was finished, rose upon his throne 
 And with bared feet bowed low before his Son 
 Kissing his hem ; and said, " Take me, Son ! 
 Lowest and least of all thy Company." 
 And sweet Tas6dhara, all happy now, — 
 Cried " Give to Rahula — thou Blessed One ! 
 The Treasure of the Kingdom of thy Word 
 For his inheritance." Thus passed these Three 
 Into the Path. 
 
 Here endeth what I write 
 Who love the Master for his love of us. 
 A little knowing, little havn I told 
 
BOOK THE EIGHTH. 29.1 
 
 Toucliing the Teacher and the Ways of Peace. 
 Forty-five rains thereafter showed he those 
 In many lands and many tongues, a,nd gave 
 Our Asia Light, that still is beautiful. 
 Conquering the world with spirit of strong grace 
 All which is written in the holy Books, 
 And where he passed, and what proud Emperors 
 Carved his sweet words upon the rocks and caves : 
 And how — ^in fulness of the times — it fell 
 The Buddha died, the great Tathi.gato, 
 Even as a man 'mongst men, fulfilling all : 
 And how a thousand thousand lakhs since then 
 Have trod the Path which leads whither he went 
 Unto NmvANA, where the Silence lives. 
 
294- 'TI^P- LIGHT OF ASIA. 
 
 Ah ! Blessed Loed ! Oh, High Deliverer ! 
 Forgive this feeble script, \^'HICH doth thee wrong, 
 Measuring with little wit thy lofty Love. 
 Ah ! Lover ! Brother ! Guide ! Lamp of the Law ! 
 I take my refuge m thy name and thee ! 
 I take my refuge in thy Law of Good ! 
 
 I TAKE MY REFUGE IN THY ORDER ! OM ! 
 
 The Dew is on the lotus ! — Rise, Great Sun ! 
 And lift my leaf and mix me with the wave. 
 Om mani padme hum, the Suneise comes ! 
 The Dewdrop slips into the shining Sea ! 
 
 THE end. 
 
 PRINTED BY BAI-LANTYNE, HANSON ANU CO. 
 EDINBUkCH AND LONDON. 
 
SIR EDWIN ARNOLD'S 
 WORKS. 
 
 " The perusal of Sir Edwin Arnold's pages is an intellectual 
 and humanising treat." — Asiatic Quarterly Review. 
 
Sir E&win Hrnol&'s ipoettcal Morfts. 
 
 Imperial i6mo, parchment, pp. 144, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 IN MY LADY'S PRAISE: 
 
 BEING POEMS OLD AND NEW, 
 Written to the Honour of Fanny, Lady Arnold, 
 And now Collected for Her Memory, 
 
 BY 
 
 Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., 
 
 Author of " The Light of Asia," &c. &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 ' ' Good-night ! not Good-bye ! ' 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 A Casltet of Gems — 
 
 F. Fire-opals. 
 A. Amethysts. 
 N. Nephrite, Jade. 
 N. Nacre and Pearls. 
 Y. Yacut, Topazes. 
 
 M. Moonstone. 
 
 A. Aquamarine. 
 
 B. Rubies 
 
 I. Idocrase, Garnets. 
 
 A. Agates. 
 
 A. Amber and Lazulite. 
 
 D. Diamonds. 
 
 E. Emeralds. 
 
 h. Ligure, Jacynths. 
 
 A. An Aureus. 
 
 I. lolite and Ivory. 
 
 D. Dawn-stone. 
 
 E. Euclase and Essonite. 
 2 
 
 October. 
 
 Dedication of a Volume of Trans- 
 lations. 
 
 To "Stella." 
 
 A Duet. 
 
 On a Cyclamen. 
 
 In Happy Days. 
 
 To a Sleeping Lady. 
 
 "Students' Day" in the National 
 Gallery. 
 
 Memories. 
 
 In Absence. 
 
 In the Death-Chamber. 
 
 Sic sine vita. 
 
Sir JE&win Hrnolb's "Xa&^'s ipraise." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Morning Post. — ^^ Possess considerable merit, and indicate a 
 keen appreciation of and admiration for her in whose honour 
 they were composed" 
 
 Saturday Review. — " The poet' s fancy ranges with character- 
 istic ease and buoyancy through many a rich field of legend and 
 history, and does not disdain to add to the poetic gar7iering 
 somewhat of the spoils of science^ 
 
 Academy. — " Very sweet and sacred would seem to have been 
 the love of which Sir Edwin Arnold allows us to be partakers 
 through the fellowship of grief and so7igP 
 
 Whitehall Review. — " It will be the cherished possession of 
 all Sir Edwin Arnold's friends P 
 
 Graphic. — '■^Admirers of Sir Edwin Arnold's imaginative 
 and poetical gifts will 7iot be willing to remain without the 
 •volum-e in which is enshrined the thoughts which have come of 
 the breaking up of a domestic alliance, to all seeming of idyllic 
 happiness'' 
 
 World. — ''''His dedication is an exquisite specimen of that 
 spirit of love which pervades the book'' 
 
 Society. — " This is indeed a noble addition to our store of 
 elegiac poetry!' 
 
 Observer. — " A graceful and pathetic tribute to the 7nemory 
 of one whose passing away extinguished for a time the light of 
 his heart and home!' 
 
 Literary World. — " Contains some very beautiful thoughts. 
 . . . There are passages in these poems that deserve to live. . . . 
 The ' Casket of Gems ' is well described as such, and we com,mend 
 it to all lovers of poetry!' 
 
 British Weekly. — "Necessarily m.ournful, yet rich with 
 imagination, and worthy of the poems that have preceded it 
 from, the same pen!' 
 
 Lloyd's News. — "Comes like a fresh and inspiring breeze 
 from the mountain heights, chasing the gloom of those who 
 would have us believe that there is an end of chivalry, and that 
 life is all a failure!' 
 
 Figaro. — " Some of them are very beautiful, and others in- 
 tensely apathetic!' 
 
 Scotsman. — " !Has beauties enough of its own to make it 
 heartily enjoyed by all lovers of poetry. ' 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. L™ 
 
 3 
 
Sir Ebwin arnolO's poetical XKMorfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. viii. and 375, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 POEMS: 
 
 NATIONAL AND NON-ORIENTAL. 
 
 WITH SOME NEW PIECES. 
 
 Selected from the Works of 
 
 Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., 
 
 Author of "The Light of Asia," &c. &c. &c. 
 
 The Four Crowns. 
 
 To H.R.H. the Princess 
 of Wales. 
 
 The First Distribution of 
 the Victoria Cross. 
 
 Tn Memoriam. 
 
 Florence Nightingale. 
 
 Congratulatory Address. 
 
 The Order of Valour. 
 
 On the Death of the Prin- 
 cess Alice. 
 
 Havelock in Trafalgar 
 Square. 
 
 Adelaide Anne Procter. 
 
 To America. 
 
 Armageddon. 
 
 To Matthew Arnold. 
 
 Song of the German Sol- 
 diers in Alsace. 
 
 Berhn.— The Sixteenth of 
 March. 
 
 Hero and Leander. 
 
 The Feast of Belshazzar. 
 
 The Three Roses. 
 
 He and She. 
 
 "On the th instant, 
 
 Drowned whilst Bath- 
 ing." 
 
 Dream-land. 
 
 A ma Future. 
 
 Llangollen. 
 
 The Two Wreaths. 
 
 Almond Blossom. 
 
 Sonnet, 
 
 All Saints' Day. 
 4 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Serenade. 
 
 The Emigrant. 
 
 The Three Students. 
 
 Jam Satis. 
 
 Aristippus. 
 
 Effie. 
 
 To F. C. H. 
 
 From Sappho. 
 
 From Anacreon. 
 
 Nemesis. 
 
 Love and Life. 
 
 Two Idylls of Theocritus; 
 By the Fountain, 
 The Spell. 
 
 Lament of Adonis. 
 
 Prayer to the Muses. 
 
 A Dedication. 
 
 With a Volume of Trans- 
 lations. 
 
 Dedication of a Book. 
 
 The Epic of the Lion. 
 
 Nencia. 
 
 The Stratford Pilgrims. 
 
 "Students' Day" in the 
 National Gallery. 
 
 The Knight's Tomb at 
 Swanscombe Church. 
 
 Alia Mano Delia Mia 
 Donna. 
 
 The Hymn of the Priestess 
 of Diana. 
 
 To a Sleeping Lady. 
 
 To Stella. 
 
 Inscribed upon a Skull 
 picked up on the Acro- 
 polis at .4thens. 
 
 The New Lucian. 
 
 Oxford Revisited. 
 
 .A. Duet. 
 
 The Altar of Pity. 
 
 The Cholera in Italy. 
 
 The Wreck of the " Nor- 
 thern Belle." 
 
 A Home Song. 
 
 Fond Fancies. 
 
 On a Dead Lady. 
 
 Lydia. 
 
 The Lost Pleiad. 
 
 Amadis of Gatil to Don 
 Quixote de la Mancha. 
 
 The Shadow of the Cross. 
 
 Christ Blessing Little Chil- 
 dren. 
 
 On a Cyclamen. 
 
 The Twelve Months. 
 
 In Westminster Abbey. 
 
 -■Atalanta. 
 
 Life. 
 
 Hadrian's Address to his 
 Soul. 
 
 The Depths of the Sea. 
 
 The Heavenly Secret, 
 
 An Adieu. 
 
 Jeanne. 
 
 A Farewell. 
 
 A Love-Song of Henri 
 Quatre. 
 
 In Memory of S. S. 
 
 Epitaph written for the 
 Same. 
 
 Obscure Martyrs. 
 
 Wilfred H. Arnold. 
 
 The Rhine and the Mo- 
 selle. 
 
Sir JE&wln Hrnol&'s Selecteb ipoems. 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 Daily .Telegraph. — "■Among so much that is striking in 
 thought or diction it may be difficult to select favourites, and im- 
 possible to award absolute priority of merit; but the short set 
 of verses called ' Atalanta,^ and another on Mr. Burn Jones's 
 picture of 'The Mermaid,' entitled ' The Depths of the Sea,' come 
 as near poetical perfection as any in a volwne which will delight 
 all to whom English poetry is dear'' 
 
 Morning Post. — ^' Sir Edwin Arnold, in the work under 
 notice, purposely turns from, the glowing magic of his Eastern 
 verse, and complies 'with a desire that a selection should be 
 made from his non-Oriental poems' There is consequently great 
 variety in this volume, which contai?is also m,any fine and 
 scholarly renderings from French, German, and other poets, 
 besides some ' new pieces'" 
 
 Echo. — " We thank the author for this volume of selected 
 non-Oriental poems, which contain many things which the world 
 would not willingly let die." 
 
 St. James' Gazette. — "Assuredly as Catholic as it is musical." 
 Manchester GukRD\m.— "Exceedingly pleasant verse." 
 
 Scotsman. — "A goodly volume of goodly verse. . . . These 
 poems are of uniformly exquisite workmanship, and in many 
 the verse is rich and glowing. They are all inspired by pure 
 and lofty sentiment and noble ideas. They possess unusual 
 grace of form and expression" 
 
 Saturday Review. — "As a selection the volume shows unusual 
 care and discrimination. It comprises some new poems, in 
 addition to many old favourites, sure of welcome by all lovers of 
 poetry" 
 
 Westminster Review.—" They are as refreshing as a breath 
 of air after long confinement in a crowded room" 
 
 Bookseller.^"./4 most masterly composition." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. L™ 
 
sic ]E5wfni Hrnol&'s poetical Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. x. and 212, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 WITH SA'DI IN THE GARDEN; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE BOOK OF LOVE. 
 
 Being the "Ishk" or Third Chapter of the "Bostan" of 
 the Persian Poet Sa'di. 
 
 Embodied in a Dialogue held in the Garden of the 
 Taj Mahal, at Agra. 
 
 BY 
 
 Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I. , 
 
 Author of " The Light of Asia," &c. &c. 
 
 In this work, which is dedicated to the Earl of Dufferin, 
 the Author, after minutely describing the beautiful Tomb and 
 surrounding Gardens of the Taj Mahal, introduces a group 
 composed of a learned Mirza, two singing-girls with their 
 attendant, and an Englishman, who pass the night in the 
 Mosque attached to the famous Monument, reading the 
 Chapter of Sa'di upon " Love," and conversing upon that 
 theme, with accompaniments of music and dancing. The 
 larger portion of the Book is original, and comprises, besides 
 the included translations from Sa'di, many lyrical pieces in 
 the Persian manner, sung by the accomplished musicians, 
 and also several novel Oriental Tales illustrating the dialogue. 
 
Sir E&wfn Hrnol&'s '*Mftb Sa'Df," 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Morning Post- — "J^rom first to last Sir Edwin Arnold's 
 work is rich in gems of thought, conveyed now in words of 
 brilliant imagery, sometimes of deeper import, again of exquisite 
 feeling, but testifying one and all to his absolute assimilation of 
 the genius of the EastP 
 
 Daily Telegraph. — "7%« charm of the volume is greatly en- 
 hanced by the mingling of dra7natic narrative with love, lore and 
 philosophy J and those who in this shape first become acquainted 
 with Sddi's poetry and quaint wisdom will owe a lasting debt 
 of gratitude to the accomplished translator." 
 
 Echo. — " Another volume of charming verse from, the far 
 East. . . . That they are charming there can be no question : 
 the only question is whether they are not too charming — so 
 charming as to be almost enervating'' 
 
 Academy. — ". . . The perusal of these poems has something 
 of the effect of a change of clim.ate : we open the book, and forth- 
 with leave behind our m,odern practical life, to find ourselves in 
 a spiritual region of yearning, and ecstasy and high-strung 
 devotion. We close it, and com.e back to our work-a-day with a 
 feeling as if we had been breathing a softer and purer air!' 
 
 Spectator. — " The plan of Sir Edwin Arnold's latest poem 
 is simple but ingenious. . . . He displays a considerable com- 
 mand of picturesque imagery, and a flowing narrative style. 
 His verse is often melodious." 
 
 Whitehall Review. — " We could quote and quote and quote 
 again, filling our columns with orient pearls, and yet leave the 
 treasures of this book well-nigh untouched" 
 
 British Weekly. — '■'■His verse has all its old dreamy charm; 
 one could give himself up to it in the sun for hours." 
 
 St. Stephen's Review. — "'Sddi's' poems go straight to the 
 heart. . . . It is not going too far to say, thai for captivating 
 interest, for situations on which the mind hangs spell-bound, 
 and for exquisite touches of human nature and sublimest pathos, 
 the author of ' The Light of Asia' has in this exquisite idyl 
 surpassed himself." 
 
 Literary World. — " We hope Sir Edwin Arnold will long 
 be spared to give us more of his delightful and scholarly Oriental 
 poems, instinct as they are with the truest spirit of Eastern 
 philosophy and life." 
 
 Liverpool Mercury. — '■^ Glowing with sensuousness, the light, 
 the colour of the East. . . . The ballads and love songs are 
 especially fine, and the work as a whole will add to its authors 
 already not inconsiderable fame" 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LIP 
 
 7 
 
Sir Ebwin arnolb'0 ©oetfcal Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. viii. and 264, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 LOTUS AND JEWEL. 
 
 CONTAINING 
 
 "IN AN INDIAN TEMPL E," 
 
 "A CASKET OF GEMS," 
 
 "A QUEEN'S REVENGE." 
 
 With other Poems. 
 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 In[an Indian Temple. 
 
 Laila. 
 
 
 
 In Westminster Abbey. 
 
 A Casket of Gems. 
 
 Atalanta. 
 
 
 
 Life (from Victor Hugo). 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 Hadrian's Address to his Soul. 
 
 
 
 The Depths of the Sea. 
 
 F. 
 
 Fire-opals. 
 
 The Heavenly Secret. 
 
 A. 
 
 Amethysts. 
 
 An Adieu. 
 
 N. 
 
 Nephrite, Jade. 
 
 The Indian Judge. 
 
 N. 
 
 Nacre and Pearls. 
 
 Jeanne (from Victor Hugo). 
 
 Y. 
 
 Yacut, Topazes. 
 
 A Rajpit Nurse. 
 
 M. 
 
 Moonstone. 
 
 Zanouba's Song (from the Persian). 
 
 A. 
 
 R. 
 
 Aquamarine. 
 Rubies. 
 
 The Snake and the Baby. 
 From a Sikh Hymn. 
 
 I. 
 
 Idocrase, Garnets. 
 
 A Farewell (from the French). 
 
 A. 
 
 Agates. 
 
 A Love-Song of Henri Quatre. 
 
 
 From the Sanskrit Anthology. 
 
 A. 
 
 Amber and Lazulite. 
 
 Basti Singh's Wife. 
 
 D. 
 
 Diamonds. 
 
 In Memory of S. S. 
 
 E. 
 
 Emeralds. 
 
 Epitaph on the Same. 
 
 L. 
 
 Ligure, Jacynths. 
 
 
 A. 
 
 An Aureus. 
 
 From the Sanskrit 
 
 I. 
 
 lolite and Ivory. 
 
 Grishma; or, The Season of 
 
 D. 
 
 Dawn-stone. 
 
 Heat. 
 
 £. 
 
 Euclase and Essonite. 
 
 .A Queen's Revenge. 
 
sir E&win arnol&'s "Xotus anb Jewel.' 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Daily Teleqraph. — "Steeled in the lore and penetrated with 
 the love of India, Sir Edwin Arnold has accomplished that 
 which few other men would venture to attempt. He has brought 
 to English ears and English hearts the strange and wonderful 
 meanings of the Vedas and the Puranas, blending the mystery 
 of Hinduism with the clear and noble sweetness of English 
 verse." 
 
 Daily News. — " If Sir Edwin Arnold owes his inspiration as 
 a poet to Indian air, where his imagination loves to dwell, and 
 his fancy seems radiant with all the light and colour and redolent 
 of all the perfumes of the East, he has in these pages shown that 
 a poet is a poet all the world over, wherever the still sad music 
 of humanity is heard." 
 
 Pall Mall Gazette. — "Fully maintains Sir Edwin Arnold's 
 reputation. It contains three principal poems, of which the first 
 in order, ^In an Indian Temple j' seems to us the best. The second, 
 '■A Casket of Gems,' is full of delicate and graceful fancy, its 
 diction is rich even to gorgeousness, while passages showing 
 depth of feeling occur again and again. The third, 'A Queen's 
 Revenge,' is a translation from the Sanskrit of the MahAbhdrata. 
 Powerful certainly it is, and it casts, as the author remarks, a 
 curious light on ' ancient Indian life and manners' " 
 
 Echo. — "Sir Edwin Arnold is always very pleasant read- 
 ing. He takes us out of our surroundings, and puts us down 
 in an entirely different country P 
 
 Whitehall Review. — " Sir Edwin Arnold is a poet, a scholar, 
 and a student ; he knows what he is writing about, and he 
 writes beautifully. . . , He has brought many precious Eastern 
 things to our market, and so we are very grateful to him." 
 
 Academy. — " The book is full of charm." 
 
 Bristol Mercury. — "Every one who loves poetry should get 
 this collection, and we shall be surprised if they do not say, when 
 they have read it, that the writer is a true poet P 
 
 Scotsman. — "Style and rhythm are, as in all this authoi-'s 
 poems, rich and melodious, the imagery is beautiful and appro- 
 priate, and the thoughts warm and noble." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. V'Z: 
 
 A 2 9 
 
Sir E&wfn Hrnol&'s poetical Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. xiv. and 173, cloth, price 5s. 
 
 THE SONG CELESTIAL; 
 
 Or, bhagavad-gita. 
 
 {Frovi the Mahdbhdratu.) 
 
 Being a Discourse between Arjuna, Prince of India, and the 
 Supreme Being, under the form of Krishna. 
 
 Translated from the Sanskrit. 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c &c. 
 
 CONTBN.TS. 
 
 The Distress of Arjuna. 
 
 Tlie Book of Doctrines. 
 
 Virtue in Work. 
 
 The Religion of Knowledge. 
 
 Religion of Renouncing Works. 
 
 Religion by Self- Restraint. 
 
 Religion by Discernment. 
 
 Religion by Service of the Supreme. 
 
 Religion by the Kingly Knowledge and the Kingly Mystery. 
 
 Religion by the Heavenly Perfections. 
 
 The Manifesting of the One and Manifold. 
 
 Religion of Faith. 
 
 Religion by Separation of Matter and Spirit. 
 
 Religion by Separation from the Qualities. 
 
 Religion by Attaining the Supreme. 
 
 The Separateness of tlie Divine and Undivine. 
 
 Religion by the Threefold Faith. 
 
 Religion by DeHverance and Renunciation. 
 
Sit J6&win HrnolD's "Song Celestial." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 TrMES OF India. — "Sir Edwin Arnold has, in fact, presented 
 us with a new poem of beautiful diction and splendid rhythm, as 
 indeed might have been expected from such a master of the 
 intricacies of versification!' 
 
 Morning Post. — " Sir Edwin Arnold has once more enriched 
 our literature with a treasure drawn from the mine of Indian 
 lore. . . If The Song Celestial' offers less narrative interest 
 than other works previously translated by Sir Edwin Arnold, it 
 excels them in elevation of tone, the effect of which is rendered 
 still more complete by the author's power and grace of diction!' 
 
 Literary World. — " Sir Edwin Arnold merits our warmest 
 thanks for his scholarly and highly poetic rendering of this 
 famous poem" 
 
 Liverpool Mercury. — ^^ One feels the better for a book like 
 this which Sir Edwin Arnold has given us. That fulness of 
 thought and simplicity of presentment which everywhere distin- 
 guishes Eastern literature is nowhere tnore conspicuous than in 
 this admirable translation. The blank verse is strong and yet 
 pliable, easy to read and very musical, clear and yet strenuous!' 
 
 Leeds Mercury. — "Sir Edwin Arnold has again achieved 
 a notable success in a difficult task . . . he has given us a most 
 readable and attractive metrical translation of the loftiest and 
 purest of the episodes of the huge Mahdbhdrata." 
 
 Sheffield Independent. — "In Sir Edwin Arnold's trans- 
 lations these exquisite melodies captivate the English ear, and 
 lead one to wonder what they must be like in the Sanskrit text." 
 
 Christian World. — " Far surpasses its predecessors in poetic 
 grace and attractiveness." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO, LTP 
 
Sir jEbwin arnol&'s lI^oet!cal Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. viii. and 406, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 THE SECRET OF DEATH. 
 
 {From the Sanskrit.) 
 
 WITH SOME COLLECTED POEMS. 
 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Introduction. 
 The Secret of Death. 
 Hero and Leander. 
 The Epic of the Lion. 
 Nencia. 
 
 The Rajpoot Wife. 
 The Caliph's Daughter. 
 The Stratford Pilgrims. 
 Vernier. 
 King Saladin. 
 The Rajah's Ride. 
 A Bihari Mill-Song. 
 Hindoo Funeral Song. 
 Song of the Serpent-Charmers. 
 Song of the Flour-Mill. 
 "Students' Day" in the National 
 
 Gallery. 
 The Knight's Tomb at Swanscombe 
 
 Church. 
 Adelaide Anne Procter. 
 The Three Roses. 
 Alia Mano Delia Mia Donna. 
 The Hymn of the Priestess of 
 
 Diana. 
 To a Sleeping Lady. 
 To Stella. 
 Lines Inscribed on a Skull picked 
 
 up on the Acropolis at Athens. 
 Dedication of" a Poem from the 
 
 Sanskrit. 
 The New Lucian. 
 
 On the Death of the Princess Alice. 
 Fdcies Non Omnibus Una, 
 
 Armageddon. 
 
 The Four Crowns. 
 
 Havelock in Trafalgar Square. 
 
 Oxford Revisited. 
 
 A Duet. 
 
 The Altar of Pity. 
 
 The Cholera in Italy. 
 
 Rest. 
 
 The First Distribution of the Victoria 
 
 Cross. 
 The Wreck of the " Northern Belle. ' ' 
 A Home Song. 
 Fond Fancies. 
 The Landing of the Princess of 
 
 Wales. 
 To F. C. H. 
 He and She. 
 
 On a Dead Lady (from the Italian). 
 The Three Students. 
 Serenade. 
 
 Lydia (from Horace). 
 Dante and his Verses. 
 The Lost Pleiad. 
 Amadis of Gaul to Don Quixote de 
 
 la Mancha. 
 The Shadow of the Cross. 
 Christ Blessing Little Children. 
 On a Cyclamen, Plucked at Cana of 
 
 Galilee. 
 A Discourse of Buddha. 
 The Twelve Months. 
 A Dedication. 
 Translation from the Greek. 
 
Sir ]£bwin HrnoI5's "Secret of Deatb." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Morning Post. — "Each new work of Sir Edwin Arnold's 
 shows his style to be as vigorous, his imagination as fertile as 
 ever. He is unequalled as an exponent of the treasures to be 
 found in the rich mine of Oriental literature. . . . In the first 
 three ' Vallis ' or ' Lotus Steins ^ of the'' Katha Upanishad,' the 
 purest philosophical doctrines are conveyed in a species of par- 
 ables, full of Oriental imagery and vivid colouring!' 
 
 Daily Telegraph. — " Nothing can exceed the graceful purity, 
 the sympathetic and reverent tenderness, with which ' this lovely 
 lotus-blossom ' is unfolded by its faithful admirer" 
 
 Globe. — " The story is told with a truly Oriental wealth of 
 imagery, and is no less vivid in its landscape than subtle in its 
 ■philosophy!' 
 
 Morning Advertiser. — ^^ Every poem in the present collection 
 will amply sustain Sir Edwin Arnold's reputation as a writer of 
 English verse of undoubted originality, versatility, and power" 
 
 Scotsman. — " Translations and original poems alike give 
 proof of a scholarly and cultured taste, and of grace and dignity 
 of diction; and not seldom of a fine combination of vigour of 
 phrase with delicacy of thought." 
 
 Illustrated London News. — '''He has drawn upon the 
 treasures of Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, French, and German, for 
 his varied and interesting collection; and his touch is that not 
 only of a cunning hand, but of one who feels that respect is due 
 to what he touches!' 
 
 The Whitehall Review. — " The poem is a great, almost a 
 priceless, contribution to religion, to poetry, and to thought!' 
 
 Literary World. — "/^ can hardly fail to meet with a cordial 
 welcome from those readers who never tire of the humbler 
 poetry which sings of love, and loss, and longing— themes as old 
 as life itself, but which never lose their freshness and their charm. 
 A collection of poems like this, in which are gathered together the 
 gleanings and the memories of many years, is to a sympathetic 
 reader almost like an hour of talk face to face; we expect a book 
 and we find a ?nan." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. Lt? 
 
 13 
 
Sic ]£t)win Hrnol&'s ipoetical Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. xii. and 282, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 INDIAN IDYLLS. 
 
 {From the Sanskrit of the Mahdbhdrata.) 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E,, C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 SAVITRl; OR, LOVE AND DEATH. 
 NALA AND DAMAYANTt. 
 THE ENCHANTED LAKE. 
 THE SAINT'S TEMPTATION. 
 THE BIRTH OF DEATH. 
 THE NIGHT OF SLAUGHTER. 
 THE GREAT JOURNEY. 
 THE ENTRY INTO HEAVEN. 
 
 EXTRACT FROM PREFACE. 
 
 ' ' The present volume contains (besides the two Parvas from my 
 'Indian Poetry') such translations as I have from time to time made 
 out of this prodigious epic (the Mah^bhirata), which is sevenfold greater 
 in bulk than the Iliad and Odyssey taken together. The stories here 
 extracted are new to English literature, with the exception of a few passages 
 of the ' SJvitri ' and the ' Nala and Damayantl,' which was long ago most 
 faithfully rendered by Dean Milman, the version being published side by 
 side with a clear and excellent Sanskrit text edited by Professor Monier 
 Williams, CLE. But that presentation of the beautiful and brilliant 
 legend, with all its conspicuous merits, seems better adapted to aid the 
 student than adequately to reproduce the swift march of narrative and 
 old-world charm of the Indian tale, which I also have therefore ventured 
 to transcribe, with all deference and gratitude to my predecessors." 
 14 
 
Sir jE&wtn Hrnol&'s "5n&ian 5&sns." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Daily Telegraph. — "'Nobody who reads the heart-stirring 
 epics put into magnificent rhythm which are contained in this 
 book can ever again affect to despise the people whose geniiis 
 established such an imperishable monument^' 
 
 Daily News. — "From these mighty poems the author well 
 describes these Indian epics, compared with which Homer is a 
 modem ; he has translated some beautiful and touching episodic 
 legends, and readers of ' Sdvitri; or, Love and Death' and of 
 ' Nala and Damayanti,' for example, will feel grateful to him 
 for having revealed to the somewhat jaded sensibilities of oiir 
 poets of to-day such a mine of inexhaustible spiritual fertility, 
 and such treastires of emotional tenderness and imaginative 
 freshness and simplicity!' 
 
 Globe. — "All the idylls are marked by the grace of diction 
 and tenderness of totie which are among Sir Edwin Arnold's 
 leading characteristics, while it needs scarcely to be said that 
 the style is ptire and elevated throughout. The imagery, too, 
 is full offeree and fire." 
 
 Fortnightly Review. — "In his recently published volume of 
 ^Indian Idylls^ Sir Edwin Arnold continues his task of interpret- 
 ing to English readers the tender thoughts and graceful imagery 
 of the East. The volume consists of eight graphic pieces from th e 
 ' Mahdbhdrata' one of the two colossal and unparalleled epic 
 poems of India, which were not known to Etirope even by jiame 
 till Sir William Jones announced their existence." 
 
 St. James's Gazette. — "Sir Edwin Arnold has eaten of the 
 lotus-fruit of Eastern song, and finds it hard to leave it. And 
 of this we are far from complaining, seeing that this taste of 
 his has enabled many of us to travel into ^realms of gold' 
 which we_ could hardly enter without some such skilful guide!' 
 
 New York Times. — "The ^Indian Idylls' partake of the 
 same character as his previous works, ' The Light of Asia! 
 ''Pearls of the Faith ^ and others, being deeply imbued with the 
 spirit of Oriental poetry, and having the power of rendering 
 that spirit in English language with a verisimilitude and force 
 which cannot fail to convince the reader of the truth of its 
 colouring." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LIP 
 
 IS 
 
Sir ]£&win arnol&'s poetical Morfts. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. xiv. and ^20, with green borders, 
 cloth, price 7s, 6d. 
 
 PEARLS OF THE FAITH; 
 
 Or, ISLAM'S ROSARY. 
 
 Being the Ninety-nine Beautiful Names of Allah 
 (Asm4-el-'Husn4). 
 
 With Comments in Verse from, various Oriental Sources. 
 As made by an Indian Mussulman. 
 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 Allah. 
 
 Ar-Rahman. 
 Ar-Raheem. 
 Al-Maiik. 
 Al-Kuddfls. 
 As-Saiam. 
 Al-Mautnin. 
 Al-Muhaimin. 
 Al-Hathim. 
 Al-JabMr. 
 Al-Mutakabbir. 
 Al-Khalik. 
 Al-Bari. 
 Al-Muzaw\vir. 
 Al-Ghaffar. 
 Ai-Kahhar. 
 Al-Wahhab. 
 Ar-Razzak. 
 Al-Fati'h. 
 Al-'Alim. 
 Al-Kabiz. 
 Al-Basit. 
 Al-Khafiz. 
 Ar-Rafi. 
 Al-Muhizz. 
 Al-Muzlll. 
 As-Sami'li. 
 Al-Bazlr. 
 Al-Hakim. 
 Al-HSdil. 
 Al-Lat!f. 
 Al-Khabtr. 
 Al-Hailm. 
 Al-'Aziz. 
 16 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Al-GhSiir. 
 
 Ash-Shakir. 
 
 Al-'Alee. 
 
 Al-Kablr. 
 
 AI-Hafiz. 
 
 Al-Muklt. 
 
 Al-Hasib. 
 
 Al-Jamll. 
 
 Al-Karim. 
 
 Ar-Raklb. 
 
 Al-Mujib. 
 
 Al-Was'ih. 
 
 Al-Hakim al Mutlak. 
 
 Al-Wadood. 
 
 Al-Majid. 
 
 Al-Bahith. 
 
 Ash-Shahid. 
 
 AI-Hakk. 
 
 Al-Wak!l. 
 
 Al-Kawi. 
 
 Al-Mateen. 
 
 Al-Wali. 
 
 Al-Hamld. 
 
 Al-Mfihsi. 
 
 Al-Mubdi. 
 
 Al-Mu'hld. 
 
 Al-Mo'hyi. 
 
 AI-Mumlt. 
 
 Al-Haiy. 
 
 Al-Kalyllm. 
 
 Al-Wajid. 
 
 Al-Wahid. 
 
 As-Samad. 
 
 Al-Kadar. 
 
 Al-Muktadir. 
 
 Al-Mukaddim. 
 
 Al-Mflakhkhir. 
 
 Al-Awwal. 
 
 Al-Akhir. 
 
 Ath-Thahir. 
 
 Al-Batin. 
 
 Ai-waii. 
 
 Al-Mutahaii. 
 
 Al-Barr. 
 
 Al-Tawwab. 
 
 Al-Muntakim. 
 
 Al-Ghafoor. 
 
 Al-Rawflf. 
 
 Maiik-ul-Mulki. 
 
 Dhu'l jaiai wa Ikram. 
 
 Al-Muksit. 
 
 Al-Jami'h. 
 
 Al-Ghanl. 
 
 Al-Mughni. 
 
 Al-Mu'hti. 
 
 Al-MSni'h. 
 
 An-Nafi'h. 
 
 Az-Zarr. 
 
 An-Noor. 
 
 Al-Hadi. 
 
 Al-Azali. 
 
 Al-Baki. 
 
 Al-Warith. 
 
 Ar-Raschid. 
 
 Az-Zaboor. 
 
 Notes. 
 
Sir Ebwin Hrnolb's "ipearls of tbe jfaitb." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Times. — "Sir Edwin Arnold has succeeded in producing a 
 delightful collection of Oriental stories in verse!' 
 
 Illustrated London News (G. A. Sala). — " / am reading 
 Sir Edwin Arnolds book with intense delight, for the sake of 
 its majesty and eloquence, its wealth and beauty of imagery, and 
 its sweet and harmonious num,ber,s" 
 
 Daily Telegraph. — "/if will take its place in contemporary 
 literature as of the highest class." 
 
 Standard. — " Sir Edwin Arnold has caught the spirit of the 
 Eastern original, so childlike and yet so sage, so simple yet so 
 profound, so tender in feeling yet so strong in sense" 
 
 Daily News. — " In the present poem he sets to musical words 
 the rosary of an Indian Mussulman, and really displays an 
 astonishing wealth and variety of mystical and devotional 
 imagery and allegory, not without a keen perception of the finer 
 and larger human feeling and instinct which has given to the 
 faith of the Moslem its fascination, and is, perhaps, the secret 
 of its power" 
 
 Daily Chronicle. — " The subject is invested with fascinating 
 beauty by the wealth of Oriental illustrations displayed'' 
 
 Scotsman. — " Sir Edwin Arnold brings to the performance 
 of his task peculiar qualifications — great poetic gifts, broad 
 sympathies, and extensive knowledge of Oriental tongues, ideas, 
 and methods of thought'' 
 
 Society. — " There is such a delightful imagery and rhyth- 
 mical cade7ice in every line that it positively thrills one with a 
 feeling of abounding pleasure. The air of pure devotion, the 
 unsurpassable power of description, the inimitable eloquence and 
 wonderful grace, displayed with a lavish profusion, render this 
 work almost peerless" 
 
 Vanity Fair. — " We cordially- recommend this book to those 
 who know the world of Islam and to those who do not. The 
 former will be pleased to see in an English dress that which 
 they have admired in its Eastern garb ; the latter will be sur- 
 prised to find how much the Mohammedan traditions resemble 
 those which they have been accustomed to revere both in the Old 
 Testament and the New, and \to admire in some of the more 
 solemn portions of the ^Arabian Nights'" 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. L™ 
 
 17 
 
Sir E&win Hrnol&'s poetical TKHorfts. 
 
 Post 8vo, pp. viii. and 270, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 INDIAN POETRY: 
 
 Containing " The Indian Song of Songs," 
 
 From the Sanskrit of the " Gita Govinda " ofjayadeva; Two 
 
 Books from " The Iliad of India" {Mahdbhdrata), "Proverbial 
 
 Wisdom" from the Shlokas of the Hitopadesa, 
 
 and other Oriental Poems. 
 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 The Indian Song of Songs — 
 Introduction. 
 Hymn to Vislinu. 
 
 Sarga the First — The Sports of Krishna. 
 Sarga the Second — The Penitence of Krishna. 
 Sarga the Third — Krishna Troubled. 
 Sarga the Fourth — Krishna cheered. 
 Sarga the Fifth — The Longings of Krishna. 
 Sarga the Sixth — Krishna made bolder. 
 Sarga the Seventh — Krishna supposed False, 
 Sarga the Eighth— The Rebuking of Krishna. 
 Sarga the Ninth — The End of Krishna's TriaL 
 Sarga the Tenth — Krishna in Paradise. 
 Sarga the Eleventh — The Union of Radha and Krishna. 
 
 Miscellaneous Oriental Poems — 
 The Rajpoot Wife. 
 King Saladin. 
 The Caliph's Draught. 
 Hindoo Funeral Song. 
 Song of the Serpent Charmers. 
 Song of the Flour-Mill. 
 Taza ba Taza. 
 The Mussulman Paradise. 
 Dedication of a Poem from the Sanskrit. 
 The Rajah's Ride. 
 
 Two Books from the " Iliad of India." 
 The Great Journey. 
 The Entry into Heaven. 
 
 The Night of Slaughter. 
 
 The Morning Prayer. 
 
 Proverbial Wisdom from the Shlokas of the Hitopadesa. 
 
Sit JE&win arnol&'s "Jnfcfan iPoetrs." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 Times.— "/« (h's new volume Sir Edwin Arnold does good 
 service by illustrating, through the medium of his musical 
 English melodies, the power of Indian poetry to stir European 
 emotions. ' The Indian Song of Songs ' is not unknown to 
 scholars. Sir Edwin Arnold will have introduced it arnong 
 popular English poems" 
 
 Morning Post. — " Complete mastery of the English language, 
 combined with genuine poetic fervour, has enabled the translator 
 of ^ The Indian Song of Songs' to spread before his readers a 
 feast of dulcet sounds and lyrical language. Music seems tofloiii 
 from his pen as naturally as rain from the cloud or song from 
 the throat of the thrush." 
 
 Standard. — " The poem abounds with imagery of Eastern 
 luxuriousness and sensuousness j the air seetns laden with the 
 spicy odours of the tropics, and the verse has a richness and a 
 melody sufficient to captivate the senses of the dullest!' 
 
 Scotsman. — "5z>- Edwin Arnold has translated into English 
 verse, from, the original Sanskrit, the ' Gita Govinda, or Song of 
 Govind,' a sort of Indian parallel to the Hebrew song so called 
 of Solomon. . . . Sir Edwin Arnold exhibits himself a m.aster of 
 the accomplishment of verse. . . . The volume furnishes an hour's 
 very agreeable and refined poetical reading!' 
 
 Academy. — "/if has been reserved to Sir Edwin Arnold to 
 give us such a version as can convey to the European reader an 
 adequate idea of the beauty of Jayadevds verse. It is the best 
 yet published, and is not likely to be soon surpassed!' 
 
 London Quarterly Review. — " Sir Edwin Arnold has be- 
 stowed his unquestionable poetic talents on a very worthy object 
 in translating the Sanskrit idyll, ' Gita Govind^ into English 
 verse. . . . ' The Indian Song of Songs' is distinctly a new pos- 
 session for the lovers of English exotic poetry!' 
 
 Overland Mail. — " The translator, while producing a very 
 enjoyable poem, has adhered with tolerable fidelity to the original 
 text!'' 
 
 The Englishman (Calcutta). — ''^ In Sir Edwin Arnold this 
 beautiful composition has found at once a7t elegant translator. 
 He has contrived to present the '■ Song of Songs' i7t a dress, while 
 it preserves the spirit of the original, that can hardly fail to 
 fascinate the English reader. It has none of the stiffness of a 
 translation, and no more of strangeness than necessarily belongs 
 to Oriental metaphor and imagery!' 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LT^ 
 
 19 
 
Sir E&wfn arnolC>'s iPoctical MorFss. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. xii. and 294, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 Ekevir 8vo, printed on hand-made paper, 6s. 
 
 Pott 8vo, cloth gilt, or half parchment uncut, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 THE LIGHT OF ASIA; 
 
 Or, the great RENUNCIATION. 
 
 {Mahabhinishkramana.) 
 
 Being the Life and Teaching of Gautama, Prince of India, and 
 
 Founder of Buddhism. 
 
 (As told in Verse by an Indian Buddhist.) 
 
 By Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 An Illustrated Edition is also published, 
 Small 4to cloth, price 21s. 
 
 EXTRACT FROM PREFACE. 
 
 " In the following poem I have sought, by the medium of an imaginary 
 Buddhist votary, to depict the life and character and Indicate the philosophy 
 of that noble herojandj reformer, Prince Gautama of India, the founder of 
 Buddhism, 
 
 " A generation ago little or nothing was known In Europe of this great 
 faith of Asia, which had nevertheless existed during twenty-four centuries, 
 and at this day surpasses, in the number of its followers and the area of 
 its prevalence, any other form of creed. Four hundred and seventy millions 
 of our race live and die in the tenets of Gautama ; and the spiritual domi- 
 nions of this ancient teacher extend, at the present time, from Nepaul and 
 Ceylon, over the whole Eastern Peninsula, to China, Japan, Thibet, Cen- 
 tral Asia, Siberia, and even Swedish Lapland. India itself might fairly be 
 included in this magnificent Empire of Belief ; for though the profession of 
 Buddhism has for the most part passed away from the land of its birth, 
 the mark of Gautama's sublime teaching is stamped ineffaceably upon 
 modern Brahmanlsm, and the most characteristic habits and convictions of 
 the Hindus are clearly due to the benign influence of Buddha's precepts. 
 More than a third of mankind, therefore, owe their moral and reUglous 
 ideas to this illustrious prince ; whose personality, though imperfectly re- 
 vealed in the existing sources of information, cannot but appear the highest, 
 gentlest, holiest, and most beneficent, with one exception, in the history of 
 thought, . . . To Gautama has consequently been granted this stupendous 
 conquest of humanity ; and — though he discountenanced ritual, and de- 
 clared himself, even when on the threshold of Nirvana, to be only what 
 all other men might become — the love and gratitude of Asia, disobeying 
 his mandate, have given him fervent worship. Forests of flowers are daily 
 laid upon his stainless shrines, and countless millions of lips daily repeat 
 the formula, ' I take refuge in Buddha ! ' 
 
 "The Buddha of this poem — if, as need not be doubted, he really existed 
 — was born on the borders of Nepaul about 620 B.C., and died about 
 543 B.C. at Kusinagara in Oudh. In point of age, therefore, most other 
 creeds are youthful compared with this venerable religion, which has in it 
 the eternity of a universal hope, the immortality of a boundless love, an 
 indestructible element of faith in final good, and the proudest assertion ever 
 made of human freedom. . . . My purpose has been attained if any just 
 conception be here conveved of the loftv character o" iliis noble prince, and 
 of the general purport of his doctrines. " 
 20 
 
Sic jE&win HrnolS's "Xigbt ot asfa." 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 kNTERNATIONAL REVIEW (OLIVER WENDELL HoLMES). — " // IS 
 
 a work of great beauty. It tells a story of intense interest, which 
 never flags for a moment; its descriptions are drawn by the 
 hand of a master with the eye of a poet and the familiarity of 
 an expert with the objects described; its tone is so lofty that 
 there is nothing with which to compare it but the New Testa- 
 ment; it is full ^.of variety, now picttiresgtte, now pathetic, 
 now rising into the noblest realms of thought and aspiration; 
 it finds language penetrating, fluent, elevated, impassioned, musi- 
 cal always, to clothe its varied thoughts and sentiments." 
 
 MoRNiNQ Post. — " Sir Edwin Arnold, one of the most musical 
 and thoughtful of modern writers of verse, has given to the 
 world in ' The Light of Asia' a poem, which is for many reasons 
 remarkable. . . . Not the least of his merits is that he writes 
 such pure and delicious English. . . . ' The Light of Asia' is a 
 noble and worthy poejii." 
 
 Spectator. — "Perhaps the only poetic account in a European 
 tongue of an Asiatic faith which is at all adequate, and which 
 seems destined to bring its author a singular fate. It is being 
 translated into Asiatic tongues ; and it is quite possible that 
 two hundred years hence Sir Edwin Arnold, half forgotten at 
 home, except by students, may amongst the innumerable peoples 
 who profess Buddhism be regarded as a psalmist'' 
 
 Bookseller. — " The subtle m,elody of Sir Edwin Arnolds 
 verse, apart from the absorbing interest of his theme, is more 
 than sufficient to account for the sustained favour with which 
 his wonderful poem is regarded" 
 
 Calcutta Englishman. — "/« Sir Edwin Arnold, Indian 
 poetry and Indian thought have at length found a worthy Eng- 
 lish exponent. He brings to his work the facility of a ready pen, a 
 thorough knowledge of his subject, a great sympathy for the people 
 of this country, and a com.mand of public attention at home" 
 THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION. 
 
 Times. — " 7%e volume differs agreeably from most modern 
 editions de luxe in being of a portable size!' 
 
 Athen/eum. — "Our notice of the illustrated edition of the 
 ''Light of Asia' may be confined to the neat and careful wood- 
 cuts which illustrate the text— almost all Buddhist sculptures 
 selected to suit the poem, some of them being 2000 years old, and 
 representing scenes in the life of Gautcnna Buddha, the founder 
 of Buddhism and hero of Sir Edwin Arnold's verse." 
 
 Saturday Review. — " Admirers of Sir Edwin Arnold! s suave 
 and melodious verse will welcome the illustrated edition de luxe 
 of the '■Light of Asia,' which is handsome in paper and print, 
 and of convenient bulk!' 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LI? 
 
Sir E&win HrnoI6's ©riental ipoetr?. 
 
 UNIFORM EDITION. 
 
 The following Eight Volumes may be had, uniform in size 
 and binding, price £2, 8s. Sold only in Sets. 
 
 THE LIGHT OF ASIA; 
 
 Or, the great RENUNCIATION. 
 
 INDIAN POETRY: 
 
 THE INDIAN SONG OF SONGS, &c. 
 
 PEARLS OF THE FAITH; 
 
 Or, ISLAM'S ROSARY. 
 
 JNDIAN IDYLLS. 
 
 FROM THE SANSKRIT. 
 
 THE SECRET OF DEATH. 
 
 FROM THE SANSKRIT. 
 
 THE SONG CELESTIAL; 
 
 Or, BHAGAVAD-GITA. From the Sanskrit. 
 
 LOTUS AND JEWEL. 
 
 With Translations from the Sanskrit. 
 
 WITH SA'DI IN THE GARDEN; 
 
 Or, the book OF LOVE. 
 
 For description of the separate volumes, see previous pages. 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LTP 
 22 
 
3Bs tbe same autbor. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. 324, cloth, price 7s. 6d. 
 
 INDIA REVISITED. 
 
 BY 
 
 Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c. 
 
 With Thirty-two Full-Page Illustrations, from Photographs 
 selected by the Author. 
 
 "/^ is beyond all comparison the very best description of 
 India, as it looks to the intelligent European traveller, that ever 
 was written. Numbers of us have seen India as Sir Edwin 
 Arnold saw itj but only a tnan of genius could have thrown 
 his impressions upon paper i7t the way that he has done. No 
 one, whether he knows the country or does not know it, will rise 
 from the perusal of the volume without a quickened sense of 
 the vast responsibilities which we have undertaken in India, 
 and a quickened affection for the Indian people." — The Right 
 Hon. Sir M. E. Grant-Duff, ex-Governor of Madras, in the 
 " Contemporary Review." 
 
 Spectator. — "No one who takes it up will lay it down 
 unfinished, and no one will lay it down without knowing that 
 he has obtained something he never possessed before, that he has 
 solidly benefited in some way which even to himself he can 
 hardly explain. . . . The reader has seen India, or part of it, as 
 if he had been there himself." 
 
 Morning Post. — " The most graphic account of the peoples, 
 ideas, and aspects of contemporary India which has hitherto been 
 produced!^ 
 
 Athen/eum. — " A series of glowing word-pictures. The illus- 
 trations, copied seemingly froTn photographs, are numerous and 
 well-chosen, especially the architectural views." 
 
 Birmingham Daily Post. — " We know of no book of so unpre- 
 tending a nature which imparts so much valuable information 
 on India." 
 
 Manchester Examiner. — " We cannot help unconsciously 
 identifying ourselves, until we almost believe that we are 
 indeed hearing and seeing the things of which we are reading." 
 
 Scotsman. — " Written in a charming style. . . . Scenes and 
 characters are brought before the mind with a wondrous reality" 
 
 Asiatic Quarterly Review.—" The perusal of Sir Edwin 
 Arnold's pages is an intellectual and humanising treat." 
 
 Indian Daily N ews (Calcutta).— "T'.^oj-^ of us who have had 
 experience of Indian life can follow him, and live our lives 
 again in his pages" 
 
 Times of India. — "/4 charming book." 
 
 LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. L™ 
 
 23 
 
352 tbe same Hutbor. 
 
 Crown 8vo, pp. 62, cloth, price is. 6d. ; paper, is. 
 
 DEATH-AND AFTERWARDS. 
 
 m 
 Sir EDWIN ARNOLD, M.A., K.C.I.E., C.S.I., &c. &c.. 
 
 Author of " The Light of Asia," &c. 
 
 Reprinted, with Supplementary Comments, from the 
 Fortnightly Review. 
 
 Morning Post. — '^ Its views are novel, and often consoling, 
 and the vmnner in which they are expressed has the refined 
 grace of all which proceeds from Sir Edwin Arnold's pen^' 
 
 Globe. — '■^ There is much matter for reflection in these thought- 
 fulpages.'' 
 
 Echo. — " Profoundly interesting." 
 
 Westminster Review. — "Has no doubt been read with plea- 
 sure by many'' 
 
 Manchester Guardian. — "A notable essay on the problem of 
 immortality. . . . Sir Edwin Arnold^ s booklet is likely to attract 
 attention." 
 
 Bristol Mercury. — " There are, undoubtedly, many original 
 and quaint ideas set forth in the book." 
 
 Aberdeen Daily Free Press. — "This subtle and suggestive 
 essay on the immortality of the soul, by one of the most cultured 
 of living poets . . . is inspired by a pure and emphatic faith, 
 based on thorough scholarship and poetic insight." 
 
 British Weekly. — "Sir Edwin Arnold has been wisely 
 advised in reprinting from the Fortnightly Review his article, 
 ^ Death — and Afterwards' It effectually breaks windows 
 through the prison walls which materialism and unbelief build 
 aroMttd us, and suffers us to breathe an ampler air. Nothing 
 could surpass these few pages in felicity of statement or in 
 persuasiveness." 
 
 LONDON: KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER, & CO. LT? 
 
 24