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Thomas Chandler Haliburton - "The Clockmaker"

Louise de la Ramee - "Bimbi"

Henry James - "The Golden Bowl, Volume II"

Frederick Niecks - "Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician, Volume 1"

The Shaving of Shagpat, Complete

G >> George Meredith >> The Shaving of Shagpat, Complete




As he was thus debating he regarded the old woman stealthily, and she was
in agitation, so that her joints creaked like forest branches in a wind,
and the puckers of her visage moved as do billows of the sea to and fro,
and the anticipations of a fair young bride are not more eager than what
was visible in the old woman. Wheedlingly she looked at him, and shaped
her mouth like a bird's bill to soften it; and she drew together her
dress, to give herself the look of slimness, using all fascinations. He
thought, ''Tis a wondrous old woman! Marriage would seem a thing of
moment to her, yet is the profit with me, and I'll agree to it.' So he
said, ''Tis a pact between us, O old woman!'

Now, the eyes of the old woman brightened when she heard him, and were as
the eyes of a falcon that eyeth game, hungry with red fire, and she
looked brisk with impatience, laughing a low laugh and saying, 'O youth,
I must claim of thee, as is usual in such cases, the kiss of contract.'

So Shibli Bagarag was mindful of what is written,

If thou wouldst take the great leap, be ready for the little jump,

and he stretched out his mouth to the forehead of the old woman. When he
had done so, it was as though she had been illuminated, as when light is
put in the hollow of a pumpkin. Then said she, 'This is well! this is a
fair beginning! Now look, for thy fortune will of a surety follow. Call
me now sweet bride, and knocker at the threshold of hearts!'

So Shibli Bagarag sighed, and called her this, and he said, 'Forget not
my condition, O old woman, and that I am nigh famished.'

Upon that she nodded gravely, and arose and shook her garments together,
and beckoned for Shibli Bagarag to follow her; and the two passed through
the gates of the city, and held on together through divers streets and
thoroughfares till they came before the doors of a palace with a pillared
entrance; and the old woman passed through the doors of the palace as one
familiar to them, and lo! they were in a lofty court, built all of
marble, and in the middle of it a fountain playing, splashing silvery.
Shibli Bagarag would have halted here to breathe the cool refreshingness
of the air, but the old woman would not; and she hurried on even to the
opening of a spacious Hall, and in it slaves in circle round a raised
seat, where sat one that was their lord, and it was the Chief Vizier of
the King.

Then the old woman turned round sharply to Shibli Bagarag, and said, 'How
of thy tackle, O my betrothed?'

He answered, 'The edge is keen, the hand ready.'

Then said she, ''Tis well.'

So the old woman put her two hands on the shoulders of Shibli Bagarag,
saying, 'Make thy reverence to him on the raised seat; have faith in thy
tackle and in me. Renounce not either, whatsoever ensueth. Be not
abashed, O my bridegroom to be!'

Thereupon she thrust him in; and Shibli Bagarag was abashed, and played
foolishly with his fingers, knowing not what to do. So when the Chief
Vizier saw him he cried out, 'Who art thou, and what wantest thou?'

Now, the back of Shibli Bagarag tingled when he heard the Vizier's voice,
and he said, 'I am, O man of exalted condition, he whom men know as
Shibli Bagarag, nephew to Baba Mustapha, the renowned of Shiraz; myself
barber likewise, proud of my art, prepared to exercise it.'

Then said the Chief Vizier, 'This even to our faces! Wonderful is the
audacity of impudence! Know, O nephew of the barber, thou art among them
that honour not thy art. Is it not written, For one thing thou shaft be
crowned here, for that thing be thwacked there? So also it is written,
The tongue of the insolent one is a lash and a perpetual castigation to
him. And it is written, O Shibli Bagarag, that I reap honour from thee,
and there is no help but that thou be made an example of.'

So the Chief Vizier uttered command, and Shibli Bagarag was ware of the
power of five slaves upon him; and they seized him familiarly, and placed
him in position, and made ready his clothing for the reception of fifty
other thwacks with a thong, each several thwack coming down on him with a
hiss, as it were a serpent, and with a smack, as it were the mouth of
satisfaction; and the people assembled extolled the Chief Vizier, saying,
'Well and valiantly done, O stay of the State! and such-like to the
accursed race of barbers.'

Now, when they had passed before the Chief Vizier and departed, lo! he
fell to laughing violently, so that his hair was agitated and was as a
sand-cloud over him, and his countenance behind it was as the sun of the
desert reflected ripplingly on the waters of a bubbling spring, for it
had the aspect of merriness; and the Chief Vizier exclaimed, 'O Shibli
Bagarag, have I not made fair show?'

And Shibli Bagarag said, 'Excellent fair show, O mighty one!' Yet knew he
not in what, but he was abject by reason of the thwacks.

So the Vizier said, 'Thou lookest lean, even as one to whom Fortune oweth
a long debt. Tell me now of thy barbercraft: perchance thy gain will be
great thereby?'

And Shibli Bagarag answered, 'My gain has been great, O eminent in rank,
but of evil quality, and I am content not to increase it.' And he broke
forth into lamentations, crying in excellent verse:--

Why am I thus the sport of all--
A thing Fate knocketh like a ball
From point to point of evil chance,
Even as the sneer of Circumstance?
While thirsting for the highest fame,
I hunger like the lowest beast:
To be the first of men I aim
And find myself the least.

Now, the Vizier delayed not when he heard this to have a fair supply set
before Shibli Bagarag, and meats dressed in divers fashions, spiced, and
coloured, and with herbs, and wines in golden goblets, and slaves in
attendance. So Shibli Bagarag ate and drank, and presently his soul arose
from its prostration, and he cried, 'Wullahy! the head cook of King
Shamshureen could have worked no better as regards the restorative
process.'

Then said the Chief Vizier, 'O Shibli Bagarag, where now is thy tackle?'

And Shibli Bagarag winked and nodded and turned his head in the manner of
the knowing ones, and he recited the verse:

'Tis well that we are sometimes circumspect,
And hold ourselves in witless ways deterred:
One thwacking made me seriously reflect;
A SECOND turned the cream of love to curd:
Most surely that profession I reject
Before the fear of a prospective THIRD.

So the Vizier said, ''Tis well, thou turnest verse neatly' And he
exclaimed extemporaneously:

If thou wouldst have thy achievement as high

As the wings of Ambition can fly:
If thou the clear summit of hope wouldst attain,
And not have thy labour in vain;
Be steadfast in that which impell'd, for the peace
Of earth he who leaves must have trust:
He is safe while he soars, but when faith shall cease,
Desponding he drops to the dust.

Then said he, 'Fear no further thwacking, but honour and prosperity in
the place of it. What says the poet?--

"We faint, when for the fire
There needs one spark;
We droop, when our desire
Is near its mark."

How near to it art thou, O Shibli Bagarag! Know, then, that among this
people there is great reverence for the growing of hair, and he that is
hairiest is honoured most, wherefore are barbers creatures of especial
abhorrence, and of a surety flourish not. And so it is that I owe my
station to the esteem I profess for the cultivation of hair, and to my
persecution of the clippers of it. And in this kingdom is no one that
beareth such a crop as I, saving one, a clothier, an accursed one!--and
may a blight fall upon him for his vanity and his affectation of solemn
priestliness, and his lolling in his shop-front to be admired and
marvelled at by the people. So this fellow I would disgrace and bring to
scorn,--this Shagpat! for he is mine enemy, and the eye of the King my
master is on him. Now I conceive thy assistance in this matter, Shibli
Bagarag,--thou, a barber.'

When Shibli Bagarag heard mention of Shagpat, and the desire for
vengeance in the Vizier, he was as a new man, and he smelt the sweetness
of his own revenge as a vulture smelleth the carrion from afar, and he
said, 'I am thy servant, thy slave, O Vizier!' Then smiled he as to his
own soul, and he exclaimed, 'On my head be it!'

And it was to him as when sudden gusts of perfume from garden roses of
the valley meet the traveller's nostril on the hill that overlooketh the
valley, filling him with ecstasy and newness of life, delicate visions.
And he cried, 'Wullahy! this is fair; this is well! I am he that was
appointed to do thy work, O man in office! What says the poet?--

"The destined hand doth strike the fated blow:
Surely the arrow's fitted to the bow!"

And he says:

"The feathered seed for the wind delayeth,
The wind above the garden swayeth,
The garden of its burden knoweth,
The burden falleth, sinketh, soweth."'

So the Vizier chuckled and nodded, saying, 'Right, right! aptly spoken, O
youth of favour! 'Tis even so, and there is wisdom in what is written:

"Chance is a poor knave;
Its own sad slave;
Two meet that were to meet:
Life 's no cheat."'

Upon that he cried, 'First let us have with us the Eclipser of Reason,
and take counsel with her, as is my custom.'

Now, the Vizier made signal to a slave in attendance, and the slave
departed from the Hall, and the Vizier led Shibli Bagarag into a closer
chamber, which had a smooth floor of inlaid silver and silken hangings,
the windows looking forth on the gardens of the palace and its fountains
and cool recesses of shade and temperate sweetness. While they sat there
conversing in this metre and that, measuring quotations, lo! the old
woman, the affianced of Shibli Bagarag--and she sumptuously arrayed, in
perfect queenliness, her head bound in a circlet of gems and gold, her
figure lustrous with a full robe of flowing crimson silk; and she wore
slippers embroidered with golden traceries, and round her waist a girdle
flashing with jewels, so that to look on she was as a long falling water
in the last bright slant of the sun. Her hair hung disarranged, and
spread in a scattered fashion off her shoulders; and she was younger by
many moons, her brow smooth where Shibli Bagarag had given the kiss of
contract, her hand soft and white where he had taken it. Shibli Bagarag
was smitten with astonishment at sight of her, and he thought, 'Surely
the aspect of this old woman would realise the story of Bhanavar the
Beautiful; and it is a story marvellous to think of; yet how great is the
likeness between Bhanavar and this old woman that groweth younger!'

And he thought again, 'What if the story of Bhanavar be a true one; this
old woman such as she--no other?'

So, while he considered her, the Vizier exclaimed, 'Is she not fair--my
daughter?'

And the youth answered, 'She is, O Vizier, that she is!'

But the Vizier cried, 'Nay, by Allah! she is that she will be.' And the
Vizier said, ''Tis she that is my daughter; tell me thy thought of her,
as thou thinkest it.'

And Shibli Bagarag replied, 'O Vizier, my thought of her is, she seemeth
indeed as Bhanavar the Beautiful--no other.'

Then the Vizier and the Eclipser of Reason exclaimed together, 'How of
Bhanavar and her story, O youth? We listen!'

So Shibli Bagarag leaned slightly on a cushion of a couch, and narrated
as followeth.




AND THIS IS THE STORY OF BHANAVAR THE BEAUTIFUL

Know that at the foot of a lofty mountain of the Caucasus there lieth a
deep blue lake; near to this lake a nest of serpents, wise and ancient.
Now, it was the habit of a damsel to pass by the lake early at morn, on
her way from the tents of her tribe to the pastures of the flocks. As she
pressed the white arch of her feet on the soft green-mossed grasses by
the shore of the lake she would let loose her hair, looking over into the
water, and bind the braid again round her temples and behind her ears, as
it had been in a lucent mirror: so doing she would laugh. Her laughter
was like the falls of water at moonrise; her loveliness like the very
moonrise; and she was stately as a palm-tree standing before the moon.

This was Bhanavar the Beautiful.

Now, the damsel was betrothed to the son of a neighbouring Emir, a youth
comely, well-fashioned, skilled with the bow, apt in all exercises; one
that sat his mare firm as the trained falcon that fixeth on the plunging
bull of the plains; fair and terrible in combat as the lightning that
strideth the rolling storm; and it is sung by the poet:

When on his desert mare I see
My prince of men,
I think him then
As high above humanity
As he shines radiant over me.

Lo! like a torrent he doth bound,
Breasting the shock
From rock to rock:
A pillar of storm, he shakes the ground,

His turban on his temples wound.

Match me for worth to be adored
A youth like him
In heart and limb!
Swift as his anger is his sword;
Softer than woman his true word.

Now, the love of this youth for the damsel Bhanavar was a consuming
passion, and the father of the damsel and the father of the youth looked
fairly on the prospect of their union, which was near, and was plighted
as the union of the two tribes. So they met, and there was no voice
against their meeting, and all the love that was in them they were free
to pour forth far from the hearing of men, even where they would. Before
the rising of the sun, and ere his setting, the youth rode swiftly from
the green tents of the Emir his father, to waylay her by the waters of
the lake; and Bhanavar was there, bending over the lake, her image in the
lake glowing like the fair fulness of the moon; and the youth leaned to
her from his steed, and sang to her verses of her great loveliness ere
she was wistful of him. Then she turned to him, and laughed lightly a
welcome of sweetness, and shook the falls of her hair across the blushes
of her face and her bosom; and he folded her to him, and those two would
fondle together in the fashion of the betrothed ones (the blessing of
Allah be on them all!), gazing on each other till their eyes swam with
tears, and they were nigh swooning with the fulness of their bliss.
Surely 'twas an innocent and tender dalliance, and their prattle was that
of lovers till the time of parting, he showing her how she looked
best--she him; and they were forgetful of all else that is, in their
sweet interchange of flatteries; and the world was a wilderness to them
both when the youth parted with Bhanavar by the brook which bounded the
tents of her tribe.

It was on a night when they were so together, the damsel leaning on his
arm, her eyes toward the lake, and lo! what seemed the reflection of a
large star in the water; and there was darkness in the sky above it,
thick clouds, and no sight of the heavens; so she held her face to him
sideways and said, 'What meaneth this, O my betrothed? for there is
reflected in yonder lake a light as of a star, and there is no star
visible this night.'

The youth trembled as one in trouble of spirit, and exclaimed, 'Look not
on it, O my soul! It is of evil omen.'

But Bhanavar kept her gaze constantly on the light, and the light
increased in lustre; and the light became, from a pale sad splendour,
dazzling in its brilliancy. Listening, they heard presently a gurgling
noise as of one deeply drinking. Then the youth sighed a heavy sigh and
said, 'This is the Serpent of the Lake drinking of its waters, as is her
wont once every moon, and whoso heareth her drink by the sheening of that
light is under a destiny dark and imminent; so know I my days are
numbered, and it was foretold of me, this!' Now the youth sought to
dissuade Bhanavar from gazing on the light, and he flung his whole body
before her eyes, and clasped her head upon his breast, and clung about
her, caressing her; yet she slipped from him, and she cried, 'Tell me of
this serpent, and of this light.'

So he said, 'Seek not to hear of it, O my betrothed!'

Then she gazed at the light a moment more intently, and turned her fair
shape toward him, and put up her long white fingers to his chin, and
smoothed him with their softness, whispering, 'Tell me of it, my life!'

And so it was that her winningness melted him, and he said, 'Bhanavar!
the serpent is the Serpent of the Lake; old, wise, powerful; of the brood
of the sacred mountain, that lifteth by day a peak of gold, and by night
a point of solitary silver. In her head, upon her forehead, between her
eyes, there is a Jewel, and it is this light.'

Then she said, 'How came the Jewel there, in such a place?'

He answered, ''Tis the growth of one thousand years in the head of the
serpent.'

She cried, 'Surely precious?'

He answered, 'Beyond price!'

As he spake the tears streamed from him, and he was shaken with grief,
but she noted nought of this, and watched the wonder of the light, and
its increasing, and quivering, and lengthening; and the light was as an
arrow of beams and as a globe of radiance. Desire for the Jewel waxed in
her, and she had no sight but for it alone, crying, ''Tis a Jewel
exceeding in preciousness all jewels that are, and for the possessing it
would I forfeit all that is.'

So he said sorrowfully, 'Our love, O Bhanavar? and our hopes of
espousal?'

But she cried, 'No question of that! Prove now thy passion for me, O
warrior! and win for me that Jewel.'

Then he pleaded with her, and exclaimed, 'Urge not this! The winning of
the Jewel is worth my life; and my life, O Bhanavar--surely its breath is
but the love of thee.'

So she said, 'Thou fearest a risk?'

And he replied, 'Little fear I; my life is thine to cast away. This Jewel
it is evil to have, and evil followeth the soul that hath it.'

Upon that she cried, 'A trick to cheat me of the Jewel! thy love is
wanting at the proof.'

And she taunted the youth her betrothed, and turned from him, and
hardened at his tenderness, and made her sweet shape as a thorn to his
caressing, and his heart was charged with anguish for her. So at the
last, when he had wept a space in silence, he cried, 'Thou hast willed
it; the Jewel shall be thine, O my soul!'

Then said he, 'Thou hast willed it, O Bhanavar! and my life is as a grain
of sand weighed against thy wishes; Allah is my witness! Meet me
therefore here, O my beloved, at the end of one quarter-moon, even
beneath the shadow of this palm-tree, by the lake, and at this hour, and
I will deliver into thy hands the Jewel. So farewell! Wind me once about
with thine arms, that I may take comfort from thee.'

When their kiss was over the youth led her silently to the brook of their
parting--the clear, cold, bubbling brook--and passed from her sight; and
the damsel was exulting, and leapt and made circles in her glee, and she
danced and rioted and sang, and clapped her hands, crying, 'If I am now
Bhanavar the Beautiful how shall I be when that Jewel is upon me, the
bright light which beameth in the darkness, and needeth to light it no
other light? Surely there will be envy among the maidens and the widows,
and my name and the odour of my beauty will travel to the courts of far
kings.'

So was she jubilant; and her sisters that met her marvelled at her and
the deep glow that was upon her, even as the glow of the Great Desert
when the sun has fallen; and they said among themselves, 'She is covered
all over with the blush of one that is a bride, and the bridegroom's kiss
yet burneth upon Bhanavar!'

So they undressed her and she lay among them, and was all night even as a
bursting rose in a vase filled with drooping lilies; and one of the
maidens that put her hand on the left breast of Bhanavar felt it full,
and the heart beneath it panting and beating swifter than the ground is
struck by hooves of the chosen steed sent by the Chieftain to the city of
his people with news of victory and the summons for rejoicing.

Now, the nights and the days of Bhanavar were even as this night, and she
was as an unquiet soul till the appointed time for the meeting with her
lover had come. Then when the sun was lighting with slant beam the green
grass slope by the blue brook before her, Bhanavar arrayed herself and
went forth gaily, as a martial queen to certain conquest; and of all the
flowers that nodded to the setting,--yea, the crimson, purple, pure
white, streaked-yellow, azure, and saffron, there was no flower fairer in
its hues than Bhanavar, nor bird of the heavens freer in its glittering
plumage, nor shape of loveliness such as hers. Truly, when she had taken
her place under the palm by the waters of the lake, that was no
exaggeration of the poet, where he says:

Snows of the mountain-peaks were mirror'd there
Beneath her feet, not whiter than they were;
Not rosier in the white, that falling flush
Broad on the wave, than in her cheek the blush.

And again:

She draws the heavens down to her,
So rare she is, so fair she is;
They flutter with a crown to her,
And lighten only where she is.

And he exclaims, in verse that applieth to her:

Exquisite slenderness!
Sleek little antelope!
Serpent of sweetness!
Eagle that soaringly
Wins me adoringly!
Teach me thy fleetness,
Vision of loveliness;
Turn to my tenderness!

Now, when the sun was lost to earth, and all was darkness, Bhanavar fixed
her eyes upon an opening arch of foliage in the glade through which the
youth her lover should come to her, and clasped both hands across her
bosom, so shaken was she with eager longing and expectation. In her
hunger for his approach, she would at whiles pluck up the herbage about
her by the roots, and toss handfuls this way and that, chiding the
peaceful song of the nightbird in the leaves above her head; and she was
sinking with fretfulness, when lo! from the opening arch of the glade a
sudden light, and Bhanavar knew it for the Jewel in the fingers of her
betrothed, by the strength of its effulgence. Then she called to him
joyfully a cry of welcome, and quickened his coming with her calls, and
the youth alighted from his mare and left it to pasture, and advanced to
her, holding aloft the Jewel. And the Jewel was of great size and purity,
round, and all-luminous, throwing rays and beams everywhere about it, a
miracle to behold,--the light in it shining, and as the very life of the
blood, a sweet crimson, a ruby, a softer rose, an amethyst of tender
hues: it was a full globe of splendours, showing like a very kingdom of
the Blest; and blessed was the eye beholding it! So when he was within
reach of her arm, the damsel sprang to him and caught from his hand the
Jewel, and held it before her eyes, and danced with it, and pressed it on
her bosom, and was as a creature giddy with great joy in possessing it.
And she put the Jewel in her bosom, and looked on the youth to thank him
for the Jewel with all her beauty; for the passion of a mighty pride in
him who had won for her the Jewel exalted Bhanavar, and she said sweetly,
'Now hast thou proved to me thy love of me, and I am thine, O my
betrothed,--wholly thine. Kiss me, then, and cease not kissing me, for
bliss is in me.'

But the youth eyed her sorrowfully, even as one that hath great yearning,
and no power to move or speak.

So she said again, in the low melody of deep love-tones, 'Kiss me, O my
lover! for I desire thy kiss.'

Still he spake not, and was as a pillar of stone.

And she started, and cried, 'Thou art whole? without a hurt?' Then sought
she to coax him to her with all the softness of her half-closed eyes and
budded lips, saying, ''Twas an idle fear! and I have thee, and thou art
mine, and I am thine; so speak to me, my lover! for there is no music
like the music of thy voice, and the absence of it is the absence of all
sweetness, and there is no pleasure in life without it.'

So the tenderness of her fondling melted the silence in him, and
presently his tongue was loosed, and he breathed in pain of spirit, and
his words were the words of the proverb:

He that fighteth with poison is no match for the prick of a thorn.

And he said, 'Surely, O Bhanavar, my love for thee surpasseth what is
told of others that have loved before us, and I count no loss a loss that
is for thy sake.' And he sighed, and sang:

Sadder than is the moon's lost light,
Lost ere the kindling of dawn,
To travellers journeying on,

The shutting of thy fair face from my sight.
Might I look on thee in death,
With bliss I would yield my breath.

Oh! what warrior dies
With heaven in his eyes?
O Bhanavar! too rich a prize!
The life of my nostrils art thou,
The balm-dew on my brow;

Thou art the perfume I meet as I speed o'er the plains,
The strength of my arms, the blood of my veins.

Then said he, 'I make nothing matter of complaint, Allah witnesseth! not
even the long parting from her I love. What will be, will be: so was it
written! 'Tis but a scratch, O my soul! yet am I of the dead and them
that are passed away. 'Tis hard; but I smile in the face of bitterness.'

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