After lamenting the departure of his beloved the poet bids himself think no more about her: he will ride swiftly away from the spot. Naturally, he must praise his camel, and he introduces by way of comparison two wonderful pictures of animal life. In the former the onager is described racing at full speed over the backs of the hills when thirst and hunger drive him with his mate far from the barren solitudes into which they usually retire. The second paints a wild-cow, whose young calf has been devoured by wolves, sleeping among the sand-dunes through a night of incessant rain. At daybreak "her feet glide over the firm wet soil." For a whole week she runs to and fro, anxiously seeking her calf, when suddenly she hears the sound of hunters approaching and makes off in alarm. Being unable to get within bowshot, the hunters loose their dogs, but she turns desperately upon them, wounding one with her needle-like horn and killing another.
Then, once more addressing his beloved, the poet speaks complacently of his share in the feasting and revelling, on which a noble Arab plumes himself hardly less than on his bravery:--
"Know'st thou not, O Nawár, that I am wont to tie The cords of love, yet also snap them without fear? That I abandon places when I like them not, Unless Death chain the soul and straiten her career? Nay, surely, but thou know'st not I have passed in talk Many a cool night of pleasure and convivial cheer, And often to a booth, above which hung for sign A banner, have resorted when old wine was dear. For no light price I purchased many a dusky skin Or black clay jar, and broached it that the juice ran clear; And many a song of shrill-voiced singing-girl I paid, And her whose fingers made sweet music to mine ear."[244]
Continuing, he boasts of dangerous service as a spy in the enemy's country, when he watched all day on the top of a steep crag; of his fearless demeanour and dignified assertion of his rights in an assembly at Ḥíra, to which he came as a delegate, and of his liberality to the poor. The closing verses are devoted, in accordance with custom, to matters of immediate interest and to a panegyric on the virtues of the poet's kin.
Besides the authors of the _Mu‘allaqát_ three poets may be mentioned, of whom the two first-named are universally acknowledged to rank with the greatest that Arabia has produced--Nábigha, A‘shá, and ‘Alqama.