ose enameled page unrolled
Like autumn's gilded pageant, 'neath a sun
That withers not for ancient kings undone
Or gods decaying in their shrines of gold--

Where were thy vaunted princes, that of old
Trod thee with thunder--of thy saints was none
To rouse thee when the onslaught was begun,
That shook the tinseled sceptre from thy hold?

Dead--though behind thy gloomy citadels
The fountains lave their baths of porphyry;
Dead--though the rose-trees of thy myriad dells
Breathe as of old their speechless ecstasy;
Dead--though within thy temples, courts, and cells,
Their countless lamps still supplicate for thee.

Translated by Thomas Walsh, for 'A Library of the World's Best Literature.'

ANTAR

(About 550-615)

BY EDWARD S. HOLDEN

Arabia was opened to English readers first by Sale's translation of the
'Kuran,' in 1734; and by English versions of the 'Arabian Nights' from
1712 onward. The latter were derived from Galland's translation of the
'Thousand and One Nights,' which began to appear, in French, in 1704.
Next to nothing was generally known of Oriental literature from that
time until the end of the eighteenth century. The East India Company
fostered the study of the classics of the extreme Orient; and the first
Napoleon opened Egypt,--his _savans_ marched in the centre of the
invading squares.

The flagship of the English fleet which blockaded Napoleon's army
carried an Austro-German diplomatist and scholar,--Baron von
Hammer-Purgstall,--part of whose mission was to procure a complete
manuscript of the 'Arabian Nights.' It was then supposed that these
tales were the daily food of all Turks, Arabians, and Syrians. To the
intense surprise of Von Hammer, he learned that they were never recited
in the coffee-houses of Constantinople, and that they were not to be
found at all outside of Egypt.

His dismay and disappointment were soon richly compensated, however, by
the discovery of the Arabian romance of 'Antar,' the national classic,
hitherto unknown in Europe, except for an enthusiastic notice which had
fallen by chance into the hands of Sir William Jones. The entire work
was soon collected. It is of interminable length in the original, being
often found in thirty or forty manuscript volumes in quarto, in seventy
or eighty in octavo. Portions of it have been translated into English,
German, and French. English readers ca