§22 
Mr. Good on Oriental Poetrys 
{Jan. 145 
Fach but a little duft at lat fupplies, 
Then why build, proudly, manfions to the fkies ? 
But, though the moral fentiments in- 
terfperfed throughout the gazels of Ha- 
fiz, and indeed thofe of all Perfian poets, 
of whom Mohammed Hafiz is unquef- 
tionably the firft in the lyric department, 
be more frequent than in the odes of 
. Anacreon ; the fubjects of both poets are 
alike confined to the pleafures of love and 
wine. The term gaze/ means, in reality, 
an amouret, or love-fong, and in its ori- 
ginal fignification’ was applied by the 
Arabians, from whom it is borrowed, to 
the young and playful fawn, which con- 
ftituted among themfelves a favourite 
companion for the fportive and juvenile 
fair, whom they may alfo have conceived 
it refembled on account of its timidity and 
innocence. From this jocund but tre- 
mulous animal the damfels of Arabia 
and Perfia derived fome of their moft 
elegant names. Thus the graceful Na- 
vara, which is a term of fimilar import, 
was the maid on whom the languifhing 
Lebid had beftowed, all his heart. “ A 
company of maidens (fays he, in his 
Alaameriyyo,) were feated in thofe car- 
riages, with full black eyes, and graceful 
attitude, like the wild nrirers of Tedah, 
or the Rozs of Wegera, tenderly gazing 
on their young. 
* In that tribe (fays Tarafa, in his Al- 
becriyyo, another paftoral of equal merit, 
and which, like the former, conftitutes 
one of the’ Moallakat, or feven poems 
tranfcribed in letters of gold, and fuf- 
pended in the temple of Mecca,) in that 
tribe was.a lovely FAWN, with black eyes, 
deeply crimfoned lips, and a beautiful 
neck elegantly raifed to crop the frefh 
berries of Erac; a neck adorned with a 
double ftring of pearls and topazes.” 
In like manner, in the inimitable pafto- © 
ral fong of Solomon, cap. it. 8. “The 
voice of my beloved! behold he cometh 
Jeaping upon the mountains, fkipping 
‘upon the hills——My beloved is like a roe, 
or a young bart.’ ‘To which the Arabic 
verfion adds, with a happy appropriation 
-of the landfcape, “ upon mount Bethel.” . 
This tender and elegant fimile is not, 
I confefs, common among the Greek 
poets; and yet there is a fragment at-- 
tributed to Anacreon, in which the fame 
idea is introduced with much beauty : 
©Oc ey VAN HEPOET ONS 
Arorsipbass 040 nT pose 
Which is thus admirably paraphrafed by 
Mr. Moore, in his fpirited verfion of this 
poet: 
"4 
The nurfling fawn that in fome fhade 
Its antler’'d mother leaves behind, 
Is not more wantonly afraid, 
More timid of the ruftling wind. 
The “ black and languifhing eye,” 
which is depicted in the above extracts 
both by Lebid and Tarafa, was, and ftill 
continues to be, one of the chief charac~ 
teriftics of beauty in the Eaft. Different 
nations, however, have judged differentl 
upon this fubje&t; and the brifk a 
lively eye, the PAE. yrAavxoy, feems 
to have been chiefly in vogue among the 
Greeks, and was the peculiar property 
of Minerva. Anacreon, however, than 
whom no poet cr painter was ever better 
{killed in the true lineaments of female 
attraction, improves confiderably upon 
the tafte of his countrymen in the fol- 
lowing inftructions to his painter, in 
which, if we do not perceive the Arabian 
EAlmwTic, or “ black and languifhing 
eye,” we neverthelefs are put into pof= 
feffion of fomething that anfwers the 
purpofe: ode xxvii, 
To de BrAcuma voy adrydus 
ATO Tv Wugos Wolyroyy 
SAua yrauxay ws Abnvysy 
‘Awa Coypov ws Kubysys--- 
Of which the reader may accept the 
following interpretation : 
Give her the eye of keen defire, 
Like that of Pallas, fill’d with fire; 
Yet mix the foft, and humid beam 
From gentler Venus wont to ftreame 
The different verfes or ftanzas of which 
the gazel confifts, comprife but two lines 
alone, and are called 4eits,a term derived 
from the fecond letter of the alphabet 
(_») ufed, in precife fimilarity to the 
cuftom of the Greeks, numerically; and 
is confequently a perfect fynonym for the 
Englifh word “ couplets.” The frequent 
infraG@ion and want of connection of 
thefe different eits has been often noticed 
by Perfian poets themfelves, and is ad- 
mirably compared by the bard of Shiraz, 
in a gazel that has had the honour of 
being tranflated into Latin metre by the 
Baron Reviski, and into Englifh by Sir 
Wm. Jones, to “a fet of pearls ftrung 
for a necklace; and the ftars fprinkled 
over the heavens:”—the former of which 
is an idea not very diffimilar to, though 
infinitely exceeding in elegance, the ap- 
plication of the term rofary to a collec- 
tion of Roman Catholic prayers for pri- 
wate ufe; a term which has war 
om 
