المعلقات السبع (The Seven Suspended Odes — Arabic text with English)

ing combination of gallant devotion, and the assertion of a princely privilege to command submission to his will. He is a stranger to mortification and humiliation, even in love. With all his polite attention to his lady-love he would never tamely submit to coquetry, if strained too far, but would prepare himself to withdraw his attentions the moment they should be disregarded or treated with undue haughtiness. On the other hand, his amiable character in society and his civil manners win him the hearts of ladies, who wait on his will and sacrifice their own conveniences to his wishes. His beloved is a lady of high position and rank. Her bed is strewn with finely powdered musk, she keeps in bed luxuriously till late in the morning, and is never known to do any menial domestic drudgery. His beast of riding is a princely and a stately horse of the noblest breed. He is deeply interested in natural views, fine landscapes, sylvan sports and knightly adventures. He has many noble virtues, among which faithfulness in love and ready attention to the needy in spite of the risk of its impoverishing his means, stand out prominently.

Imra-ul-Qais is best known for his clever and ingenious images, insomuch so that he has won the surname of khallāq al-ma‘ānī the Creator of Images. He deserves the honour amply and justly, since it is he who shewed the proper way to use the power of imagination. His similes and images are his own, and are always, as a rule, quite apt and suitable. They are generally selected from objects of daily sight, so highly coloured by his imagination as to surprise by their bright novel appearance.

His attention to ladies, and his poetical pursuits, which were regarded by his royal father as inferior to his rank, exposed him to the paternal wrath and to banishment.

POEM II.

The opening lines represent the poet as standing at the old ruined abodes of his friends, ruminating on the old associations,