SELECTIONS IN ENGLISH POETRY
The Tartars of Ferghana, from the banks
Of the Jaxartes, men with scanty beards
And close-set skull-caps; and those wilder hordes 130
Who roam o'er Kipchak and the northern waste,
Kalmucks and unkemp'd Kuzzaks, tribes who stray
Nearest the Pole, and wandering Kirghizzes,
Who come on shaggy ponies from Pamere;
These all filed out from camp into the plain. 135
And on the other side the Persians form'd;—
First a light cloud of horse, Tartars they seem'd
The Ilyats of Khorassan; and behind,
The royal troops of Persia, horse and foot,
Marshall'd battalions bright in burnish'd steel . 140
But Peran-Wisa with his herald came,
Threading the Tartar squadrons to< the front,
And with his staff kept back the foremost ranks.
And when Ferood, who led the Persians, saw
That Peran-Wisa kept the Tartars back, i 45
He took his spear, and to the front he came,
And checkJd his ranks, and fix'd them where they
stood:
And the old Tartar came upon the sand
Betwixt the silent hosts, and spake, and said: —
"Ferood, and ye, Persians and Tartars, hear! 150
Let there be truce between the hosts to-day.
But choose a champion from the Persian lords
To fight our champion Sohrab, man to man/'
As, in the country, on a morn in June,
When the dew glistens on the pearled ears, 155
A shiver runs through the deep corn for joy—'
So, when they heard what Peran-Wisa said,
A thrill through all the Tartar squadrons ran
Of pride and hope for Sohrab, whom they loved,
Efot as a troop of pedlars, from Qabool, 160