Chapter VII

Alternate hope and fear my days divide:
I courted grief, and anguish was my bride.
Flow on, sad stream of life! I smile secure:
_Thou_ livest; _thou_, the purest of the pure.

THE MASNAVI.

While Kazim was engaged, shortly after sunrise, the following morning, writing, from the dictation of Seirami, letters addressed to the chieftains of Arjun, and the other hill-districts in its neighbourhood, soliciting their aid on behalf of Suleiman, in the war against Mirtas, two persons were seen at a distance on the plain, following the tracks which the horde had left the day before. The wanderers were driving before them a small herd of goats, and as they approached nearer to the tents, they appeared quite overcome with fatigue. Three or four horsemen galloped out towards them from the encampment, offering them every assistance which the huts afforded. But the strangers, an old man and his daughter, seemed unwilling to make any delay on their road, exhausted as they were. They stated that they were proceeding to Karaman, whither one of their near relatives, as they had learned from some straggling followers of Suleiman, had been sent as a captive; and that they would gladly exchange their little herd for a horse, which might enable them to perform their journey with greater certainty and expedition.

They were then informed, that Suleiman himself was in the camp, and as he possibly might have it in his power to give them further information, they were recommended to pay him a visit in the first instance. To this suggestion they acceded, with considerable reluctance, as they feared that every moment might be of consequence which contributed to detain them on their journey. They added, that they had been travelling the whole of the previous night, guided only by the stars, until they found the traces of what they supposed to be a large army, and they thanked Providence for their good fortune, not doubting but that, at all events, they might learn some intelligence of the troops who had been engaged in the late disastrous battle.

The old man, tottering with weariness and grief, was conducted into one of the poorer huts at the outskirts, where he was placed on a mat near the fire, trembling with the night-cold, which seemed to have chilled his heart. As his daughter bent over him, rubbing his temples, entreating him to take a little broth, which was readily made for the invalid, she bitterly reproached herself for allowing him to leave his home at such a period of life. But he motioned to her to dry the big tears that rolled down her cheek, and to seek Suleiman without delay, in order that they might pursue their journey. The affectionate girl, recommending her father to the care of the kind people by whom he was surrounded, went forth, accompanied by the matron of the hut, having first thrown a veil over her head, from a feeling bordering on fear, as she had never before appeared in the presence of a chieftain.

The matron, raising the cover of the doorway, tapped gently before she entered the hut of Suleiman, when, receiving no prohibition against her further progress, she pushed open the folding doors, and, with her companion, stood before him. He was sitting near the fire, describing, with the point of an arrow, various lines in the ashes, in which he was shadowing out the plan of a battle in an open plain. So deeply was he absorbed in the subject of his meditation, that he took no notice whatever of the strangers. Behind him were seated, on the floor, Seirami reading over the letters which Kazim had written, while the latter was engaged in folding and directing them as they were handed back to him. “I have never seen before such hand-writing as yours,” said Seirami, “it ought to be of itself sufficient to persuade those mountain chiefs that we are no ordinary supplicants for assistance.” Both were turned from the door, looking intently on the papers, which they were obliged to hold close to their eyes, on account of the dim light that fell into the hut from the narrow aperture in the roof.

“Your highness will, I hope, pardon me,” said the matron, “for presenting to you this unhappy young female, who understands that she can receive from you some intelligence of her husband.”

“If there should be only one thousand of them,” pursued the warrior, still drawing his lines, “and they should be tempted from the town into the plain, a few pit-falls here--there an ambush--yes, with quarter the number we shall beat them.”

“Some of your men, she has heard, were taken prisoners and sent to Karaman.”

“Defeat abroad--at home, conspiracy after conspiracy--I have had to fight for my throne since the very moment I mounted it. Though a mere youth then, I am already grown grey in troubles. Fate!--fate! what art thou that thus sportest with men, making them thy playthings--casting them from the palace to the hut--from the hut to the palace--as if they were no better than the stubble of the field blown about in the storm!”

The matron and her companion shuddered at the fierce look of the chieftain, while, throwing down the arrow he clasped his hands together, and seemed writhing with indignation.

“No--I shall never quit these mountains until I make those Mogul satraps tremble at my name. After breaking asunder the base confederation, in which envy of my glory, more than the sense of their own interests, has bound them against a prince who feels their own best blood in his veins,--I can return with renovated fame, the victor of a hundred battles. But should I----fail Seirami!”

“I am here.”

“Are those letters yet despatched?”

“They are nearly ready for the couriers.”

“What! not yet gone?”

“The couriers are not yet come.”

“Go forth and find them. This is not a time for delay, when the loss of an empire may be the consequence.”

“Empires may be lost by precipitance--seldom by deliberation. It required time to frame letters calculated to awaken in the hearts of these chieftains an interest in your behalf. The season of disaster is not the time to issue commands. It was necessary to show that their own fortunes were at hazard.”

“True--you have done wisely;--would that I had always conformed to your admonitions,--had I done so, we should now have been crossing the Himalas on our way home.”

“We may be soon, if these missives be successful. There are only two now to be finished,--I shall go to summon the couriers. Is it not time also that you should see the prince?”

“Aye!--I had forgotten his imperial majesty,” said Suleiman, sneeringly, as he led the way from the hut, followed by his able and faithful minister, neither of them taking any particular notice of their female visitors, who, they supposed, had come in through mere curiosity.

The matron, seeing one person still employed in a remote part of the hut, went to him, and touching his shoulder, requested that he would inform her whether he knew any thing of the followers of Suleiman, who were now captives at Karaman.

“Not much,” answered Kazim, raising his head and turning towards the matron; “I saw very little of them, and not one of them do I know.”

While he was yet speaking, the matron was surprised to see her timid trembling companion advance suddenly across the floor, and fall on the neck of Kazim, whom she almost suffocated with kisses.

“Mangeli!” he exclaimed, “my own Mangeli!” folding her to his breast.

“Kazim!” she rejoined, breathless with astonishment and joy, that she should thus have found her husband. “But, my poor father,” she added, bursting into tears.

“Is he here also?”

“Alas! he lies upon the bed of death, in this good matron’s hut. Oh! let us go to him. The sight of you will restore him to life.”

“So--so--Kazim! flirting with your new friends already,” exclaimed Seirami, as he re-entered; “what would your beautiful Mangeli say to all this?”

“You may put that question to herself,” answered Kazim, “for here she is!” proudly presenting her to him all radiant with blushes.

“I must say that you have not at all exaggerated her charms. I hope we shall know each other much better by and by, Mangeli,” said Seirami, as he collected the epistles which were now all prepared. “You may consider yourself free for the day,” he added, kindly looking back at Kazim as he went out with the letters in his hand, “unless you be disposed to assist at the banquet, which the prince has ordered in honour of Suleiman.”

Gulbeg had already asked several times for his daughter, wondering why she had left him to die on the hearth of a stranger. The people of the hut attended to him with as much anxiety as if he had been a member of their tribe. Skilful in the use of herbs, they administered to him a potion which appeared to revive him for a while. But again his pulse beat slowly, his breath was scarcely heard, and the spark of life seemed to be nearly extinct, when Kazim entered.

His voice brought a slight flush into the emaciated cheek of Gulbeg, who looked wildly around him.

“You know me, father, do you not?” asked Kazim, deeply affected by the helpless situation in which he beheld the venerable old man. Gulbeg made no answer; but stretching out his hand, he passed it over Kazim’s face several times, and seemed occasionally to feel a dim return of consciousness. He still breathed, however, with difficulty, and at length sunk into a stupor, in which he remained for some hours. The hospitable owners of the hut had the good feeling to leave it entirely in possession of the distressed family.

“I foresaw it all,” observed Mangeli, frequently, in the course of the day--“I foresaw that some dreadful misfortune was impending over us; for the morning after you left home, I found our beautiful falcon lifeless on the floor!”

This incident, slight as it was, struck Kazim to the heart. He affected, indeed, to ascribe the death of the bird to some injury which it must have received in its late conflict with the quail; but while he thus endeavoured to support the spirits of Mangeli, the state of his own was too perceptible to her, from the frequency with which he referred to the habits of their favourite, its brilliant eyes and elegant plumage.

Towards evening the old man, once more recognizing the unhappy pair, who never left his side, gave thanks to Allah that he beheld his son again. Sitting up between them, he took their hands and spoke, with regret, of their cottage on the Ilamish. “I built it,” he said, “entirely myself--you were born in it, Mangeli--your sainted mother loved her home, though far away from the world, and I had the hope that it would still be to you both, and to your children, an undisturbed retreat from the folly and misery of the crowds who collect in tribes and cities. But I foresee that you will return to it no more: nor, indeed, perhaps, would it be safe at present, while war is going on so near. These friendly people will afford you both protection, until the danger is over, and then, oh! my children,” he added, in accents becoming each moment more and more feeble--“clouds--desert--famine--alas! I see before you a long train of adversity, ending, perhaps, in great dignities; but as to happiness--ah! that you have left on the flowery banks of the Ilamish!”

Kazim and Mangeli wept aloud, and the aged man’s heart bled within him, while these words were forced from his lips by some irresistible impulse. They looked at each other, as if to renew, under the seal of misfortune, the bonds by which they were united, resolved that no event short of death itself should ever separate them again. They moved not from the side of the invalid, from whom they expected some further communications. But his spirit had already taken its departure, before Kazim or Mangeli was sensible that the hands in which theirs were held had become icy cold. Kazim at length rose to administer to him the medicated drink, which was kept warm for him near the fire; when he discovered the change that had taken place. The grief of Mangeli rendered her frantic; she could not believe that her parent had ceased to live. She called upon him by every tender name that affection could inspire, to look at her--to answer her--if it were even only once, to convince Kazim of his error. She summoned all the beautiful smiles with which her lovely countenance was endowed, in order to win some token of recognition from her father. Then she chided him for his indifference--spoke of his little herd--reminded him that it was the time for milking them--wondered he did not remember it himself--desired Kazim to speak to him--parted the silver locks on his forehead--and contended that he was only asleep!--Poor Mangeli!--the season of her joys was already passed--that of her sorrows had begun.

The intelligence of the death of the stranger was speedily circulated throughout the encampment, and produced universal sympathy on behalf of his now orphan children. The prince of the tribe sent them a most friendly message, stating that he should adopt them for his own, and that he had directed the funeral of Gulbeg to be conducted with all due honour, according to the customs of his people. Suleiman and Seirami also hastened to assure Kazim of their participation in his grief, and to render him every assistance which the occasion required.

Upon both these individuals the cultivated mind, the clear intelligence, the modest discourse, and agreeable manners of Kazim, had already produced a highly favourable impression. Though unskilled in the use of arms, yet he displayed no want of personal firmness on the field of battle. Before he was captured, he defended himself with much bravery, wresting from the hand of the enemy a sabre, which he wielded with effect, until he was overpowered by numbers. In prison he had given himself up to no unmanly apprehensions; and when asked his opinion on any point of policy, he expressed himself in terms which indicated deep reflection and a sound judgment. Seirami hinted to him, more than once, that the proper sphere for talents such as his, could only be found in Hindostan--then the most brilliant empire in the world, though much disturbed by civil wars, that were raging in almost every one of its provinces. It would be surprising if such flattering encouragement had not rekindled in Kazim’s breast the sparks of ambition, which he had endeavoured to extinguish when first he felt them on the banks of the Ilamish. But the dying words of Gulbeg, his death, and the grief of Mangeli, now threw a deep gloom over his prospects; though at times he found himself again unconsciously painting them in all the colours of the rainbow.