Note 133 — Chapter II
Edward Rehatsek translation
It is the common belief in the East that pearls are formed in the oyster out of drops of rain falling into it when the shells are open. This notion is the subject of a mystical poem in Sa’dí’s Bustán, or Garden of Odours, Book iv, which has been thus translated:
“A drop of rain trickled from a cloud into the ocean; when it beheld the breadth of its waters it was utterly confounded.
‘What a place this sea is, and what am I? If it is existent, verily I am non-existent.’
Whilst it was thus regarding itself with the eye of contempt, an oyster received it into its bosom.
Fortune preferred it to a place of honour; for it became a renowned royal pearl.
Because it was humble, it found exaltation;—it knocked at the door of nonentity, that it might arise into being.”—Robinson’s Persian Poetry for English Readers, p. 328.