The Book of Akbar 228.1

228.1

’Tis ever the way of noble grantors of desires and auspicious-minded lords to seize opportunities for liberality, and to fulfil a choice-worship, whose acme is the conquest of affections, under the guise of Use and Wont—a course whereby they are protected from the dulled vision of blear-eyed mortals. Accordingly now that fortune’s breeze was blowing afresh, and the rose-garden of attainment had bloomed anew, the custom of circumcision, as applied to the new growth of fortune’s garden, and fresh offshoot of the palm of glory and grandeur, was made an occasion for the contentment and enrichment of mankind. In the prime of spring, when the spirit of plants was in motion and the nightingale of delight was on the wing— Verse. “Violets raised their head from the stream’s lip Earth was ambergris-perfumed from the fragrance of flowers, The fragrant breeze of morn, let us say Carried a thousand musk-bags in her bosom.”