The Gilded Age - Mark Twain [227]
Semi-Saxon:
“The richest women all—that were in the land,
And the higher men’s daughters—
There was many a rich garment—on the fair folk,
There was mickle envy—from [all parts of the country],
For each weened to be—better than others.”
CHAPTER 34
Danish proverb: One hair of a maiden’s head pulls stronger than ten yoke of oxen.
CHAPTER 35
Quiché (Guatemalan), from a native drama, published by Brasseur de Bourbourg:
“I have snared and caught him, I have taken and bound him, with my brilliant snares, with my white noose, with my bracelets of chiseled gold, with my rings, and with my enchantments.”
Old French proverb: Every one has the palms of his hands turned toward himself.
CHAPTER 36
Chippeway: “My books are many and they are all good.” “Although his books are good, he does not much look into them.”
Tamul: “Books.”
CHAPTER 37
Assyrian (from Smith’s Assurbanipal): “Ni-ni-id [dag]-ga ra a-ha-mis,” “We will (help) each other.”
[Note. The fourth group varies in different copies of the cuneiform record. Mr. Smith puts dag, marking it as a variant, and translates by “help.” Others may prefer to read gul, “to cheat.” As philological criticism would have been out of place in The Gilded Age, and as the passage is a familiar one, it seemed best to omit the questionable group—leaving it to the reader to fill the blank as in his better judgment he might determine.]
Italian, from the Jerusalem Delivered, c. iv., st. 78:
“All arts the enchantress practised to beguile
Some new admirer in her well-spread snare;
Nor used with all, nor always, the same wile,
But shaped to every taste her grace and air.”
CHAPTER 39
Provençal: Dear friend, return, for pity’s sake, to me, at once.
Basque (Souletin dialect); from a popular song, published by Vallaberry: “You gave me your word—not once only twice—that you would be mine. I am the same as in other times; I have not changed, for I took it to my heart, and I loved you.”—Chants populaires du pays Basque, pp. 6, 7.
CHAPTER 41
Arabic:
“And her denying increased his devotion in love:
For lovely, as a thing, to man, is that which is denied him.”
From an Arabic poet quoted in the Táj el-’Aroos (of the Seyyid Murtada),
which, as everybody knows, is a commentary on the Kámoos— the Arabic “Webster’s Unabridged.”
Basque. From the Poésies Basques of Bernard d’Echeparre (Bordeaux, 1545), edited by G. Brunet, 1847:
“Was there ever any one so unfortunate as I am?
She whom I adore does not love me at all,
and yet I cannot renounce her.”
CHAPTER 42
Efik (or Old Calabar) proverb: “The rat enters the trap, the trap catches him; if he did not go into the trap, the trap would not do so.” From R. F. Burton’s Wit and Wisdom of West Africa, p. 367.
CHAPTER 43
Arrawak version of Acts xix. 23: “And the same time there arose no small stir (Gr. τάραχος ούκ όλίγος) about that way.”
CHAPTER 44
Latin (Seneca): “In an evil career a reckless downward course is inevitably taken.”
Latin (Cicero): “For men are subject to their own impulses as soon as they have once parted company with reason; and their very weakness gives way to itself, incautiously sails into deep water and finds no place of anchorage.”
CHAPTER 45
Quiché (Guatemalan), from the Popol Vuh, or Sacred Book, edited by Brasseur de Bourbourg, p. 222:
—“ ‘What will you give us, then, if we will take pity on you?’ they said. ‘Ah, well we will give you silver,’ responded the associate [petitioners].”
CHAPTER 46
Italian proverb: “Strong is the vinegar of sweet wine.”
Anglo-Saxon: “Such is no feminine usage
for a woman to practise,
although she be beautiful,—
that a peace-weaver
machinate to deprive of life,
after burning anger,
a man beloved.”
—Thorpe’s Translation, 3885–91.
CHAPTER 47
Quiché (from a native drama): “My bravery and my power have availed me nothing! Alas, let heaven and earth hear me! Is it true that I must die, that I must die here, between earth and sky?”
CHAPTER 48
“A poison-toothed