POEMS.

1467

THE HERMITAGE.

AN EASTERN TALE.

(Boston Miscellany, October, 1842.]

THE following Poem may be considered, so far as the substance, is concerned, as a sort of literary curiosity. The fable on which it is founded, is an episode in a Sanscrit work, entitled the Brahma Purana, supposed to be, at least, as ancient as the period of the Trojan war. The tale is, therefore, the oldest specimen of comic poetry known to be extant. The translation from the original Sanscrit was made by the late M. de Chézy, one of the greatest oriental scholars of our time in France, and read by him at a public meeting of the French Academy. The manuscript was afterwards communicated to the Baron Augustus W. von Schlegel, Professor of Oriental Literature at the University of Bonn, on the Rhine, by whom it was translated into German, and published in a periodical work called the Indian Library. The French translation of M. de Chézy has, we believe, never been published; the German one of Schlegel has been used for the present purpose. We are not aware that the tale has appeared in any form in England.

The plot turns upon the well-known principle of the Indian mythology, which supposed, that by a sufficiently long and severe course of penance and sacrifice, a man might acquire superhuman powers, and even obtain in time, a right to a seat in the Celestial Synod, in which case some one of the previous tenants was under the necessity of vacating his place in order to make room for the new comer. The gods could not of course, look with much satisfaction upon the efforts of these candidates for admission into the sacred college, and were in the habit of throwing in their way such temptations as they thought most likely to interrupt the course of their devout exercises, and thus frustrate their plans. These ideas, as the reader will recollect, are employed by Southey as the basis of the machinery of the Curse of Kehama. In the following tale they are ridiculed by the native author in a tone of pleasantry, not less pointed, but more graceful and chastened than that of the similar efforts of the Lucians, Ariostos, Voltaires and Wielands of later periods. It is not perhaps, to be wondered at, that specimens of this kind of writing, which is one of the natural products of certain periods in the progress of opinion in all communities,- should be

found among the copious remains of Sanscrit literature. It is rather more singular that a lively and pointed satire on the then prevailing superstitions should be imbedded,- so to speak,- in a bulky commentary on the sacred books; for such is the nature of the work from which the tale is extracted.

PROLOGUE.

I.

The Grecian gods possessed their heavenly state,
(If rightly ancient bards the story tell,)
On solid tenures, fore-ordained by fate,
In modern language, indefeasible.
In order first the great Triumvirate,

That ruled the realm of ocean, earth and hell,
And under these the immortal House of Peers,
But all secure from change by force, or lapse of years.

II.

If Jove, provoked, not without cause, (at times
The gods, God knows, were worse than indiscreet,)
Compelled some one, in penance for his crimes,
To vacate for a while his golden seat;

Tossed Vulcan headlong down to earthly climes,
Or hung out Juno, dangling by the feet;
The offender still returned,- his penance o'er,—
And all went on smoothly as before.

III.

And when some lucky wight by special grace
Or high desert a seat among them won;
Like that young Trojan by his blooming face,
Or by his valiant deeds Alcmena's glorious son,
The God Elect assumed an equal place,

But trenched not on the rights of any one;

Each eye grew brighter,- every tongue ran glibber,To welcome the new fellow-nectar-bibber.

IV.

But customs change with climes.

The Hindoo gods

Acquir'd and held their thrones in different guise:
Mere mortals there might reach the blest abodes
By constant penance, pain and sacrifice.

To starve,

to freeze,

to scourge one's self with rods,

Were deeds of such esteem in Brahma's eyes, That they would change, if kept up long enough, Poor human nature to celestial stuff.

V.

But mark the rest. The Hindoo destinies,
Lest over-population should encumber
The heavens, had order'd that their deities

Should never rise above a certain number;
And that whene'er a mortal reach'd the skies
By dint of pain, and loss of food and slumber,
Some former occupant, a serious case,

Should forthwith quit the field, and give him up his place.

VI.

In short, the Hindoo heavenly constitutions,
Although divine, were somewhat democratic,
Resembling much our modern institutions
Of Congresses or Diets diplomatic,
Whose members, still in constant revolutions,
Pursue each other's steps in course erratic;
As sovereigns order, or the people chooses:
And what one gains another always loses.

VII.

So stood the law. To me, I freely own,
The Grecian system seems by far the better;
Fitted to introduce a friendly tone,

And sentiments of kindness and good-nature