But Mirza-Schaffy’s main charm lay in his thorough genuineness, his earnestness of purpose and the tranquillity of his whole being.  Misfortune and sorrow had visited him in many forms, leaving their impress on his brow, yet he had not been crushed; and thoroughly as he appreciated the refined enjoyments of life, he could most gracefully renounce luxuries attainable only by Fortune’s favorites.  So long as he could have his tschibuq filled with good tobacco and his goblet with good wine, both of which were plentiful in Tiflis, he seemed content with the entire dispensation of the world.  Highly as he prized, however, the beneficent effects of wine, he was an enemy to excess, having made moderation in all things the law of his life.

The whole atmosphere surrounding the man produced a deep and lasting impression on Bodenstedt, who, longing to immortalize the name of one who had unfolded to him the treasures of Eastern lore, and from whom he had derived so much pleasure and profit, conceived the idea of representing his teacher in his public characterization with poetic freedom, as a type of the Eastern poet and man of learning.  Poet, Mirza-Schaffy was not in reality, for although he was skilled in the art of rhyming, and could translate with ease any simple song from the Persian into the Tartar language, Bodenstedt found only one of his original efforts which was worthy of preservation.  The song referred to was one hurled, as it were, at the head of an offending mullah who had derided Mirza-Schaffy for his tenderness to wine, and reads as follows: 

  Mullah! pure is our wine: 
    It to revile were sin. 
  Shouldst thou censure my word,
    May’st find truth therein!

  No devotion hath me
    To thy mosque led to pray: 
  Through wine render’d free,
    I have chanced there to stray.

All other poems introduced into the Thousand and One Days in the Orient are entirely of Bodenstedt’s own composition, were designed to add flavor to the picture of an Eastern divan of wisdom, and were usually written while the impression was fresh of intercourse with the wise man of Gjaendsha.  Shortly after the appearance of the book, which was well received by the public, the publisher proposed to Bodenstedt to issue separately the poems contained in it; and this was finally done in an attractive volume entitled The Songs of Mirza-Schaffy, many additions being made to the original collection.  Of these, one of the most fresh and sparkling is a spring song, which has never before appeared in English, and which we present as a fitting introduction: 

  When young Spring up mountain-peaks doth hie,
    And the sunbeams scatter stores of snow—­
  When the trees put forth their leaflets shy,
    And amid grass the first wild flower doth blow—­
      When in yonder vale
      Fleeth in a gale
    All the dolesome rain and wintry wail,
      Rings from upland air
        Forth to many a clime,
      “Oh, how wond’rous fair
        Is the glad spring-time!”