Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers | Page 3

hundred years,
thirty of which were passed in the acquisition of knowledge, thirty

more in travelling through different countries, and the rest of his life he
spent in retirement and acts of devotion. He died, in his native city,
about the year 1291.
[1] One reason, doubtless, for Persian and Turkish poets adopting a
takhallus is the custom of the poet introducing his name into every
ghazal he composes, generally towards the end; and as his proper name
would seldom or never accommodate itself to purposes of verse he
selects a more suitable one.
At one period of his life Saádí took part in the wars of the Saracens
against the Crusaders in Palestine, and also in the wars for the faith in
India. In the course of his wanderings he had the misfortune to be taken
prisoner by the Franks, in Syria, and was ransomed by a friend, but
only to fall into worse thraldom by marrying a shrewish wife. He has
thus related the circumstances:
"Weary of the society of my friends at Damascus, I fled to the barren
wastes of Jerusalem, and associated with brutes, until I was made
captive by the Franks, and forced to dig clay along with Jews in the
fortress of Tripoli. One of the nobles of Aleppo, mine ancient friend,
happened to pass that way and recollected me. He said: 'What a state is
this to be in! How farest thou?' I answered: 'Seeing that I could place
confidence in God alone, I retired to the mountains and wilds, to avoid
the society of man; but judge what must be my situation, to be confined
in a stall, in company with wretches who deserve not the name of men.
"To be confined by the feet with friends is better than to walk in a
garden with strangers."' He took compassion on my forlorn condition,
ransomed me from the Franks for ten dínars,[2] and took me with him
to Aleppo.
[2] A dínar is a gold coin, worth about ten shillings of our money.
"My friend had a daughter, to whom he married me, and he presented
me with a hundred dínars as her dower. After some time my wife
unveiled her disposition, which was ill-tempered, quarrelsome,
obstinate, and abusive; so that the happiness of my life vanished. It has
been well said: 'A bad woman in the house of a virtuous man is hell

even in this world.' Take care how you connect yourself with a bad
woman. Save us, O Lord, from the fiery trial! Once she reproached me,
saying: 'Art thou not the creature whom my father ransomed from
captivity amongst the Franks for ten dínars?' 'Yes,' I answered; 'he
redeemed me for ten dínars, and enslaved me to thee for a hundred.'
"I heard that a man once rescued a sheep from the mouth of a wolf, but
at night drew his knife across its throat. The expiring sheep thus
complained: 'You delivered me from the jaws of a wolf, but in the end I
perceive you have yourself become a wolf to me.'"
Sir Gore Ouseley, in his Biographical Notices of Persian Poets, states
that Saádí in the latter part of his life retired to a cell near Shíráz, where
he remained buried in contemplation of the Deity, except when visited,
as was often the case, by princes, nobles, and learned men. It was the
custom of his illustrious visitors to take with them all kinds of meats, of
which, when Saádí and his company had partaken, the shaykh always
put what remained in a basket suspended from his window, that the
poor wood-cutters of Shíráz, who daily passed by his cell, might
occasionally satisfy their hunger.
* * * * *
The writings of Saádí, in prose as well as verse, are numerous; his best
known works being the _Gulistán_, or Rose-Garden, and the _Bustán_,
or Garden of Odours. Among his other compositions are: an essay on
Reason and Love; Advice to Kings; Arabian and Persian idylls, and a
book of elegies, besides a large collection of odes and sonnets. Saádí
was an accomplished linguist, and composed several poems in the
languages of many of the countries through which he travelled. "I have
wandered to various regions of the world," he tells us, "and everywhere
have I mixed freely with the inhabitants. I have gathered something in
each corner; I have gleaned an ear from every harvest." A deep insight
into the secret springs of human actions; an extensive knowledge of
mankind; fervent piety, without a taint of bigotry; a poet's keen
appreciation of the beauties of nature; together with a ready wit and a
lively sense of humour, are among the characteristics of Saádí's
masterly compositions. No writer, ancient or modern, European or

Asiatic, has excelled, and few have