Penny Dreadfuls, 1900 · page 31 of 142
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, and the Salaman and Absal of Jami — page 31: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a text page from a Victorian edition, likely a penny dreadful or similar serialized publication, presenting four quatrains (XVI-XIX) from *The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám*. The verses meditate on mortality and transience—worldly hopes turning to ash, successive rulers passing through time's caravanserai, wild animals inhabiting ruined courts of ancient Persian kings, and flowers nourished by the blood of the dead. The page number indicates this is page 5 of the work. The ornamental borders and period typography are typical of Victorian book production.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
XVI. The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon \| \,/ Turns Ashes—or it prospers ; and anon, Like Snow upon the Desert’s dusty Face, Lighting a little hour or two—was gone. XVII. Think, in this batter’d Caravanserai Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day, How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp Abode his destin’d Hour, and went his way. XVIII. They say the Lion and the Lizard keep The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep : And Bahram, that great Hunter—the Wild Ass Stamps o’er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep. XIX. I sometimes think that never blows so red The Rose as where some buried Cesar bled ; That every Hyacinth the Garden wears Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head. OMAR KHAYYAM. 5 | COMIClLOo Sy (C@