"Brings round to all men
Some undimm'd hours."
we did not feel that lie afforded us any broad ground for self-complacency.
The same key is struck with more firmness in that strange poem, The Sick King in Bokhara, where the vizier can find no better remedy for his master's troubled mind than by pointing out to him the vast burden of misery which rests upon the world, and which he is utterly powerless to avert. It is hardly worth while, so runs the vizier's argument, for the king to vex his soul over the sufferings of one poor criminal, whom his pity could not save, when the same tragic drama is being played with variations in every quarter of the globe. Behold, thousands are toiling for hard masters, armies are laying waste the peaceful land, robbers are harassing the mountain shepherds, and little children are being carried into captivity.
"The Kaffirs also (whom God curse!)
Vex one another night and day;
There are the lepers, and all sick;
There are the poor, who faint away.
