that of Mejnoun the Arabian; and that of Yussuf and Zuleika the sacred.
The first presents a picture of happy love and female excellence in
Shireen; Mejnoun is a representation of unfortunate love carried to
madness; the third romance contains the ideal of perfection in Yussuf
(Joseph) and the most passionate and imprudent love in Zuleika (the wife
of Potiphar), and exhibits in strong relief the power of love and beauty,
the mastery of mind, the weakness of overwhelming passion, and the
victorious spirit of holiness.

8. PERSIAN POETS.--The first of Persian poets, the Homer of his country,
is Abul Kasim Mansur, called Ferdusi or "Paradise," from the exquisite
beauty of his compositions. He flourished in the reign of the Shah Mahmud
(940-1020 A.D.). Mahmud commissioned him to write in his faultless verse a
history of the monarchs of Persia, promising that for every thousand
couplets he should receive a thousand pieces of gold. For thirty years he
studied and labored on his epic poem, "the Shah Namah," or Book of Kings,
and when it was completed he sent a copy of it, exquisitely written, to
the sultan, who received it coldly, and treated the work of the aged poet
with contempt. Disappointed at the ingratitude of the Shah, Ferdusi wrote
some satirical lines, which soon reached the ear of Mahmud, who, piqued
and offended at the freedom of the poet, ordered sixty thousand small
pieces of money to be sent to him, instead of the gold which he had
promised. Ferdusi was in the public bath when the money was given to him,
and his rage and amazement exceeded all bounds when he found himself thus
insulted. He distributed the paltry sum among the attendants of the bath
and the slaves who brought it.

He soon after avenged himself by writing a satire full of stinging
invective, which he caused to be transmitted to the favorite vizier who
had instigated the sultan against him. It was carefully sealed up, with