the poet in the above lines decreed that his work should be preserved
and handed down to posterity in a wrapping of tobacco. The Editor is
inclined to the belief that there is much truth in both opinions, for
the parchment, when it came to hand, was stained and scented from its
wrappings of Virginia and Perique; and the manner of the poet's death
marks Number XCI as another remarkable instance of the clairvoyance of
the Muse. To quote from the quaint words of the native chronicler: -

"For while the Volcanic Singer was seated one day in the shade of a
banyan tree, fresh cigars and abandoned stumps surrounding him like the
little hills that climb the mountain, he nodded and fell asleep, still
puffing lustily at a panatella, sweet and black. Now the poet's beard
was long and his sleep deep, and as the weed grew shorter with each
ecstatic puff, the little brand of fire drew closer and closer to the
beautiful hairy mantle that fell from the poet's chin. That day the
Island was wrapped in a light gauze of blue mist, an exotic smoke that
was a blessing to the nostrils. It suffused the whole Island from end to
end, and reminded the happy inhabitants of the Cigars of Nirvana, grown
in some Plantation of the Blessed. When the smoke had passed and our
heads were cleared of the narcotic fumes, we hastened to the spot where
our good master had loved to sit; but there naught remained but a great
heap of white ashes, sitting among the pipes and cigars that had
inspired his song. Thus he died as he lived, an ardent smoker." W. I.



[1] "Sohrab and Rustam'' being a fragment of the Persian epic.