Vis and Ramin

CHAPTER XXIX 155
I
MOABAD'S WANDERINGS IN SEARCH OF vis
MOABAD, all alone, went forth into the lands to seek Vis.
Of all his great wealth he took but a sword and a horse,
which he chose for their excellence, 1 and set out. He
wandered alone in the lands. With pain and love in his
heart he unceasingly thought of Vis. He journeyed over
the whole face of the earth : desert and hamlet, sea and
land, India, 2 Th'urket'h, Greece, China, 3 Ban, and Eraq.
He asked for signs and news of Vis. He could neither meet
her nor find any trace of her. Sometimes he wandered on
the mountains and rocks like a wild sheep, 4 sometimes he
roamed in the reeds 5 and thickets 6 like a lion, sometimes
like a wild goat he stayed in the plains, sometimes he was
in caves 7 like a serpent. There remained no place where
he did not seek.
For five months, like a mad and crazy man, he rode on
Vis's track. Sometimes he was oppressed by heat, some-
times he was helpless from cold ;
sometimes he ate bread
from wayfarers, 8 sometimes he ate bread with shepherds ;
on what came to him by chance, on that he lived. He
could not lie down 9 to sleep. The king, the quondam
autocrat, had the earth for mattress and his own arm for a
1
Buncba, 209. R., 1087.
2 Indoethi, 158,212.
Chini-Machini. Cf. ChweVhi, 161 ; Chin, 160.
4 Ami, 204.
*
Lertsami, 174. R., 176.
Tevri, R., 219, 222. 1
Khhureli, 160, 178.
Mgzavr
Graf "
: says DerMonche Fastenspeise." ? were
monks (dervishes) common in the time of Al Gurgani ? Cf. II and
R., 1194. Kue, 146, 176.
187