their future fortunes: they did so, and met with passages equally ominous to each. That of the King was the following "At bello audacis populi vexatus et armis, "Harrassed by wars that wage th' audacious race, See unrevenged his dearest subjects fall; To Lord Falkland, whose son, it must be remembered, fell at the battle of Newbury, the following passage presented itself: "Non hæc, ô Palla, dederas promissa parenti. Haud ignarus eram, quantum nova gloria in armis, ÆNEID, lib. xi. v. 152. "Not thus, O Pallas! thou thy promise gave, 66 O curst essay !-O blighted unripe age! Of wars to come, the dire, the sad presage! Vain every vow—nor heard one fervent prayer!* Nor has this superstition been confined to Europe, or the borders of the Mediterranean; it is equally to be met with in Arabia and Persiafor Credula mens hominis, et fabulis erectæ aures," the mind of man is every where equally credulous, and the ears equally open, in all parts of the world, to receive fables. Superstitious practices are therefore never lost: but where the slightest intercourse exists, the first things bartered for are these. We need not, then, be surprised to find, that a precisely similar custom prevails in the East, where this sortilege is termed J -"tefau-ool." Hafiz is the chief poet whom they consult. So great is the veneration the Persians entertain for him, that they have given him the title of "divine," and on every remarkable occasion, his book of odes is opened for oracular information. When Hafiz himself died, several of the Ulemas violently objected to granting him the usual rites of sepulture, on account of the licentiousness of his poetry: but, at length, after much dispute, it was agreed that the matter should be decided by the words of * The reader will, I hope, excuse the above hastily-written translations. Hafiz himself. For this purpose, his Deewan (or collection of poems) was brought, and being opened at random, the first passage that presented itself was read,-it proved to be the following: قدم دریغ مدار از جنازه حافظ اگرچه غرق گناه هست میرود بهشت "Turn not thy steps from Hafiz' mournful grave, Of course every funeral honour was immediately ordered to be paid him; he was buried at his favourite Mosella: a magnificent tomb was raised over his almost adored remains, shadowed (as Capt. Franklin tells us) by the poet's beloved cypresses in this, a remarkably fine copy of his odes was continually placed, for the purpose of being used in divinations of this kind. This old tomb is to be seen in a sketch of Kæmpfer's. A new one, of white marble, has since been raised to his memory by Kerim Khan, a prince of most elegant taste, the Augustus, indeed, of Shiraz; having adorned it with numerous beautiful public buildings, and being still celebrated in Persia for his munificence in rewarding merit of every kind. The epitaph is a very singular one, and I propose communicating it to you in a future letter, on another subject. When the great Nadir Shah and his officers were passing by this tomb, near Shiraz, they were shown the copy of the poet's works, and one of the company opening it, the first passage that met their eyes was the following-which of course they immediately applied to the conqueror:-"It is but just that thou shouldst receive a tribute from all fair youths, since thou art the sovereign of all the beauties in the universe: thy two piercing eyes have thrown Khater (Scythia) and Khoten (Tartary) into confusion; India and China pay homage to thy curled locks: thy graceful mouth gave the 'streams of life' to Kher,— thy sugared lip renders the sweet reeds of Misr (Egypt) contemptible." Of the hero, sage, or prophet Khezr, above-mentioned, the Persian romances give a very strange account. He was the vizier of Secunder, or Caicobad, (not the Macedonian) and is said to have gained immortality by drinking the (Aubi-Hyaut) fountain of life. He is generally confounded with the prophet Elias, and, what is more singular, with our St. George of England, whom they call Khexr Elias, imagining that the same soul animated both, by transmigration. Nadir Shah again visited the place when he was about to set out on his expedition against Tauris; and recollecting how favourably the poet had before addressed him, he again consulted his poems. Upon opening the volume he found this couplet عراق و پارس گرفتي بشعر خويش حافظ بیا که نوبت بغداد ووقت تبریز است "Irak and Pars already own thy sway, O thou, who The celebrated Haroun Alraschid is also said to have once opened a book of poetry, and to have read the following passage-"Where are the Kings, and where the rest of the world? They are gone the way which thou shalt go. choosest a perishable world, and callest him happy whom it glorifies,-take all the world can give thee, but death is at the end!" At these words, he, who had murdered Yahia and the virtuous Barmecides, was so much affected, that he wept aloud. This subject is by no means exhausted: I doubt not but many of your readers, who are well skilled in Arabic and Persian lore, can communicate to you numerous other similar anecdotes; and as I think the subject is really curious, they would by so doing oblige-Yours, &c. NUGARUM AMATOR. CRITICISM ON A PASSAGE IN THOMSON. SIR,-In Thomson's beautiful and well-known episode of Palemon and Lavinia, there is a passage which I am much surprised no critic has observed on, I must, however, confess, that I have read it myself an hundred times without perceiving that there was a fault, and I am even now rather angry |