Dr. Johnson has remarked that “there is scarcely any poet of eminence who has not left some testimony of his fondness for the flowers, the zephyrs, and the warblers of the spring.”  This is pre-eminently the case of Oriental poets, from Solomon downwards:  “Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away,” exclaims the Hebrew poet in his Book of Canticles:  “for lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone:  the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds has come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.  The fig-tree putteth forth her green fruits, and the vines with the tender grapes give forth a good smell.  Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”

In a Persian poem written in the 14th century the delights of the vernal season are thus described:  “On every bush roses were blowing; on every branch the nightingale was plaintively warbling.  The tall cypress was dancing in the garden; and the poplar never ceased clapping its hands with joy.  With a loud voice from the top of every bough the turtle-dove was proclaiming the glad advent of spring.  The diadem of the narcissus shone with such splendour that you would have said it was the crown of the Emperor of China.  On this side the north wind, on that, the west wind, were, in token of affection, scattering dirhams at the feet of the rose.[3] The earth was musk-scented, the air musk-laden.”

    [3] Referring to the custom of throwing small coins among
        crowds in the street on the occasion of a wedding.  A
        dirham is a coin nearly equal in value to sixpence of
        our money.

But it would be difficult to adduce from the writings of any poet, European or Asiatic, anything to excel the charming ode on spring, by the Turkish poet Mesihi, who flourished in the 15th century, which has been rendered into graceful English verse, and in the measure of the original, by my friend Mr. E. J. W. Gibb, in his dainty volume of Ottoman Poems, published in London a few years ago.  These are some of the verses from that fine ode: 

Hark! the bulbul’s[4] lay so joyous:  “Now have come the days of spring!” Merry shows and crowds on every mead they spread, a maze of spring; There the almond-tree its silvery blossoms scatters, sprays of spring:  Gaily live! for soon will vanish, biding not, the days of spring![5]

Once again, with flow’rets decked themselves have mead and plain; Tents for pleasure have the blossoms raised in every rosy lane; Who can tell, when spring hath ended, who and what may whole remain? Gaily live! for soon will vanish, biding not, the days of spring!

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