Golden friend, and dearest brother,
Brother dear of mine in childhood,
Come and sing with me the stories,
Come and chant with me the legends,
Legends of the times forgotten,
Since we now are here together,
Come together from our roamings.
Seldom do we come for singing,
Seldom to the one, the other,
O'er this cold and cruel country,
O'er the poor soil of the Northland.
Let us clasp our hands together
That we thus may best remember.
Join we now in merry singing,
Chant we now the oldest folk-lore,
That the dear ones all may hear them,
That the well-inclined may hear them,
Of this rising generation.
These are words in childhood taught me,
Songs preserved from distant ages;
Legends they that once were taken
From the belt of Wainamoinen,
From the forge of Ilmarinen,
From the sword of Kaukomieli,
From the bow of Youkahainen,
From the pastures of the Northland,
From the meads of Kalevala.
These my dear old father sang me
When at work with knife and hatchet:
These my tender mother taught me
When she twirled the flying spindle,
When a child upon the matting
By her feet I rolled and tumbled.
Incantations were not wanting
Over Sampo and o'er Louhi,
Sampo growing old in singing,
Louhi ceasing her enchantment.
In the songs died wise Wipunen,
At the games died Lemminkainen.
There are many other legends,
Incantations that were taught me,
That I found along the wayside,
Gathered in the fragrant copses,
Blown me from the forest branches,
Culled among the plumes of pine-trees,
Scented from the vines and flowers,
Whispered to me as I followed
Flocks in land of honeyed meadows,
Over hillocks green and golden,
After sable-haired Murikki,
And the many-colored Kimmo.
Many runes the cold has told me,
Many lays the rain has brought me,
Other songs the winds have sung me;
Many birds from many forests,
Oft have sung me lays in concord;
Waves of sea, and ocean billows,
Music from the many waters,
Music from the whole creation,
Oft have been my guide and master.
Sentences the trees created,
Rolled together into bundles,
Moved them to my ancient dwelling,
On the sledges to my cottage,
Tied them to my garret rafters,
Hung them on my dwelling-portals,
Laid them in a chest of boxes,
Boxes lined with shining copper.
Long they lay within my dwelling
Through the chilling winds of winter,
In my dwelling-place for ages.
Shall I bring these songs together?
From the cold and frost collect them?
Shall I bring this nest of boxes,
Keepers of these golden legends,
To the table in my cabin,
Underneath the painted rafters,
In this house renowned and ancient?
Shall I now these boxes open,
Boxes filled with wondrous stories?
Shall I now the end unfasten
Of this ball of ancient wisdom?
These ancestral lays unravel?
Let me sing an old-time legend,
That shall echo forth the praises
Of the beer that I have tasted,
Of the sparkling beer of barley.
Bring to me a foaming goblet
Of the barley of my fathers,
Lest my singing grow too weary,
Singing from the water only.
Bring me too a cup of strong beer;
It will add to our enchantment,
To the pleasure of the evening,
Northland's long and dreary evening,
For the beauty of the day-dawn,
For the pleasure of the morning,
The beginning of the new day.
Often I have heard them chanting,
Often I have heard them singing,
That the nights come to us singly,
That the Moon beams on us singly,
That the Sun shines on us singly;
Singly also, Wainamoinen,
The renowned and wise enchanter,
Born from everlasting Ether
Of his mother, Ether's daughter.
These beautiful lines from the prologue may aptly be followed by the last lines from the rune of Mariatta, which describe the passing of the hero, Wainamoinen.
As the years passed, Wainamoinen
Recognized his waning powers:
Empty-handed, heavy-hearted,
Sang his farewell song to Northland,
To the people of Wainola;
Sang himself a boat of copper.
Beautiful his bark of magic;
At the helm sat the magician,
Sat the ancient wisdom-singer.
Westward, westward, sailed the hero
O'er the blue-black of the waters,
Singing as he left Wainola,
Bring anew the harp of joyance,
Bring again the golden moonlight,
Bring again the silver sunshine,
Peace and plenty to the Northland."
Thus the ancient Wainamoinen,
In his copper-banded vessel,
Left his tribe in Kalevala,
Sailing o'er the rolling billows,
Sailing through the azure vapors,
Sailing through the dusk of evening,
Sailing to the fiery sunset,
To the higher-landed regions,
To the lower verge of heaven;
Quickly gained the far horizon,
Gained the purple-colored harbor.
There his bark he firmly anchored,
Rested in his boat of copper;
But he left his harp of magic,
Left his songs and wisdom-sayings,
To the lasting joy of Suomi.
Truly, Wainamoinen has left his songs and wisdom-sayings in the heart and in the brain of his people, of which the 'Kalevala' is the mirror.
Willian Sharpe
(Presumably, Sixth Century A. D.)
BY A. V. WILLIAMS JACKSON
ĀLIDĀSA is the poet in Sanskrit literature whose name may best be compared with Shakespeare. No less an authority than Sir William Jones styled him "the Indian Shakespeare" when he made Kālidāsa's name known to the Western World by translating his romantic play Çakuntala' into English. Çakuntala' has ever been a magic word for enchantment since Goethe, with somewhat of a poet's ecstasy, wrote those oft-quoted lines which may be rendered:
"Would'st thou tell of the blossoms of Spring, and paint the ripe fruits of the Autumn,
All that may charm and delight with fullness and joy manifold;
Would'st thou combine in one word the enchantments of Earth and of
I'll name, O Çakuntalā, thee; in thy name alone all is told."
Or as the original stanza runs:—
"Willst du die Blüthe des frühen, die Früchte des späteren Jahres,
Willst du was reizt und entzückt, willst du was sättigt und nährt,
Willst du den Himmel, die Erde mit Einem Namen begreifen,
Nenn ich, Sakuntala, dich, und so ist Alles gesagt."
The same enthusiasm for Kālidāsa and 'Çakuntalā' is echoed in the writings of Schiller, and by many writers who have since found much to admire in this poet of medieval India.
Respecting the life of this gifted playwright and lyrical writer, however, we have little if any authentic information. The era in which he lived has been the subject of much discussion. The native tradition favors the first century B. C. as the time when he flourished; but the consensus of scholarly opinion points to the middle of the sixth century A. D. as probably the time when Kālidāsa lived and wrote at the court of King Vikramaditya. Vikrama's reign was a renaissance period in Sanskrit letters, and Kālidāsa's name is spoken of as one of "the nine jewels" of Vikrama's throne; and his work is closely associated with the literary revival, as is shown under 'Indian
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