And woman, more than man, when death or woe,
Or even Disgrace, would lay her lover low,
Sunk in the lap of Luxury will shame-
Away suspicion !-not Zuleika's name!
But life is hazard at the best; and here
No more remains to win and much to fear.
Yes, fear! the doubt, the dread of losing thee,
By Osman's power, and Giaffir's stern decree."
That dread shall vanish with the favouring gale,
Which Love to-night hath promised to my sail :
No danger daunts the pair his smile hath blest,
Their steps still roving, but their hearts at rest.
With thee all toils are sweet, each clime hath
charms;

Earth-sea alike—our world within our arms!
Ay-let the loud winds whistle o'er the deck,
So that those arms cling closer round my neck;
The deepest murmur of this lip shall be,
No sigh for safety, but a prayer for thee!
The war of elements no fears impart
To Love, whose deadliest bane is human Art:
There lie the only rocks our course can check ;
Here moments menace-there are years of wreck!
But hence ye thoughts that rise in Horror's
shape!

This hour bestows, or ever bars escape.

Few words remain of mine my tale to close; Of thine but one to waft us from our foes: Yea-foes-to me will Giaffir's hate decline? And is not Osman, who would part us, thine?

XXI.

'His head and faith from doubt and death
Return'd in time my guard to save;
Few heard, none told, that o'er the wave
From isle to isle I roved the while :
And since, though parted from my band
Too seldom now I leave the land,

No deed they've done, nor deed shall do,
Ere I have heard and doom'd it too:
I form the plan, decree the spoil,
'Tis fit I oftener share the toil.
But now too long I've held thine ear;
Time presses, floats my bark, and here
We leave behind but hate and fear.
To-morrow Osman with his train
Arrives-to-night must break thy chain:
And wouldst thou save that haughty Bey,-
Perchance his life who gave thee thine,-
With me this hour away-away!

But yet, though thou art plighted mine,
Wouldst thou recall thy willing vow,
Appall'd by truths imparted now,
Here rest I-not to see thee wed:
But be that peril on my head!'

XXII.

Zuleika, mute and motionless, Stood like that statue of distress, When, her last hope for ever gone, The mother harden'd into stone; All in the maid that eye could see Was but a younger Niobe.

But ere her lip, or even her eye,
Essay'd to speak, or look reply,
Beneath the garden's wicket porch
Far flash'd on high a blazing torch!
Another-and another-and another-

'Oh! fly-no more-yet now my more than brother!'

Far, wide, through every thicket spread,
The fearful lights are gleaming red;
Nor these alone-for each right hand
Is ready with a sheathless brand.
They part, pursue, return, and wheel
With searching flambeau, shining steel;
And last of all, his sabre waving,
Stern Giaffir in his fury raving:
And now almost they touch the cave-
Oh! must that grot be Selim's grave?

XXIII.

Dauntless he stood--''Tis come-soon pastOne kiss, Zuleika-'tis my last :

But yet my band not far from shore
May hear this signal, see the flash ;

Yet now too few-the attempt were rash:
No matter-yet one effort more.'

Forth to the cavern mouth he stept;
His pistol's echo rang on high,
Zuleika started not, nor wept,

Despair benumb'd her breast and eye!-
'They hear me not, or if they ply
Their oars, 'tis but to see me die;

That sound hath drawn my foes more nigh Then forth my father's scimitar, Thou ne'er hast seen less equal war! Farewell, Zuleika !-Sweet! retire; Yet stay within-here linger safe, At thee his rage will only chafe. Stir not-lest even to thee perchance Some erring blade or ball should glance. Fear'st thou for him?-may I expire If in this strife I seek thy sire! No-though by him that poison pour'd, No-though again he call me coward! But tamely shall I meet their steel? No-as each crest save his may feel !'

XXIV.

One bound he made, and gain'd the sand.
Already at his feet hath sunk

The foremost of the prying band,

A gasping head, a quivering trunk:
Another falls-but round him close
A swarming circle of his foes;
From right to left his path he cleft,

And almost met the meeting wave:
His boat appears-not five oars' length-
His comrades strain with desperate strength-
Oh! are they yet in time to save?
His feet the foremost breakers lave;
His band are plunging in the bay,
Their sabres glitter through the spray;
Wet-wild-unwearied to the strand
They struggle-now they touch the land!

They come 'tis but to add to slaughterHis heart's best blood is on the water!

XXV.

Escaped from shot, unharm'd by steel,
Or scarcely grazed its force to feel,
Had Selim won, betray'd, beset,
To where the strand and billows met:
There as his last step left the land-
And the last death-blow dealt his hand-
Ah! wherefore did he turn to look

For her his eye but sought in vain?
That pause, that fatal gaze he took,

Hath doom'd his death, or fix'd his chain. Sad proof, in peril and in pain,

How late will Lover's hope remain !
His back was to the dashing spray;
Behind, but close, his comrades lay,
When at the instant hiss'd the ball-
'So may the foes of Giaffir fall!'
Whose voice is heard? whose carbine rang?
Whose bullet through the night-air sang,
Too nearly, deadly aim'd to err?
"Tis thine-Abdallah's Murderer !
The father slowly rued thy hate,
The son hath found a quicker fate:

Fast from his breast the blood is bubbling,
The whiteness of the sea-foam troubling-
If aught his lips essay'd to groan,
The rushing billows choked the tone!

XXVI.

Morn slowly rolls the clouds away:

Few trophies of the fight are there : The shouts that shook the midnight-bay Are silent; but some signs of fray

That strand of strife may bear. And fragments of each shiver'd brand; Steps stamp'd; and dash'd into the sand The print of many a struggling hand

May there be mark'd; nor far remote
A broken torch, an oarless boat;
And tangled on the weeds that heap
The beach where shelving to the deep
There lies a white capote !

Tis rent in twain-one dark-red stain
The wave yet ripples o'er in vain :
But where is he who wore?
Ye! who would o'er his relics weep,
Go, seek them where the surges sweep
Their burthen round Sigæum's steep,
And cast on Lemnos' shore:
The sea-birds shriek above the prey,
O'er which their hungry beaks delay,
As shaken on his restless pillow,

His head heaves with the heaving billow;
That hand, whose motion is not life,
Yet feebly seems to menace strife,
Flung by the tossing tide on high,
Then levell'd with the wave-

What recks it, though that corse shall lie
Within a living grave?
The bird that tears that prostrate form
Hath only robb'd the meaner worm;

By Helle's stream there is a voice of wail!
And woman's eye is wet-man's cheek is pale ·
Zuleika! last of Giaffir's race,

Thy destined lord is come too late :
He sees not-ne'er shall see thy face!
Can he not hear

The loud Wul-wulleh warn his distant ear? + Thy handmaids weeping at the gate,

The Koran-chanters of the hymn of fate, The silent slaves with folded arms that wait, Sighs in the hall, and shrieks upon the gale, Tell him thy tale!

Thou didst not view thy Selim fall!

That fearful moment when he left the cave Thy heart grew chill:

He was thy hope-thy joy-thy love-thine allAnd that last thought on him thou couldst not

save

Sufficed to kill;

Burst forth in one wild cry-and all was still.
Peace to thy broken heart, and virgin grave!
Ah, happy! but of life to lose the worst!
That grief-though deep-though fatal-was
thy first!

Thrice happy! ne'er to feel nor fear the force Of absence, shame, pride, hate, revenge, remorse!

[lies!

And, oh! that pang where more than madness The worm that will not sleep-and never dies; Thought of the gloomy day and ghastly night,. That dreads the darkness, and yet loathes the light, heart!

That winds around, and tears the quivering Ah, wherefore not consume it-and depart ! Woe to thee, rash and unrelenting chief!

Vainly thou heap'st the dust upon thy head, Vainly the sackcloth o'er thy limbs doth spread; By that same hand Abdallah-Selim-bled. Now let it tear thy beard in idle grief: Thy pride of heart, thy bride for Osman's bed, She, whom thy sultan had but seen to wed, Thy Daughter's dead!

Hope of thine age, thy twilight's lonely beam, The Star bath set that shone on Helle's stream. What quench'd its ray?-the blood that thou hast shed!

Hark! to the hurried question of Despair:
'Where is my child?'- - an Echo answers
'Where?' +

A turban is carved in stone above the graves of men only. The death-song of the Turkish women. The silent slaves are the men, whose notions of decorum forbid complaint in public.

'I came to the place of my birth, and cried, "The friends of my youth, where are they?" and an Echo answered, "Where are they?"-From an Arabic MS.

The above quotation (from which the idea in the text is

XXVIII.

They scarce can bear the morn to break That melancholy spell,

Within the place of thousand tombs
That shine beneath, while dark above
The sad but living cypress glooms

And withers not, though branch and leaf Are stamp'd with an eternal grief,

Like early unrequited Love,
One spot exists, which ever blooms,
Ev'n in that deadly grove-
A single rose is shedding there

Its lonely lustre, meek and pale:
It looks as planted by Despair-

So white-so faint-the slightest gale Might whirl the leaves on high;

And yet, though storms and blight assail, And hands more rude than wintry sky

May wring it from the stem-in vain-
To-morrow sees it bloom again :
The stalk some spirit gently rears,
And waters with celestial tears;

For well may maids of Helle deem
That this can be no earthly flower,
Which mocks the tempest's withering hour,
And buds unshelter'd by a bower;

Nor droops, though Spring refuse her shower,
Nor woos the summer beam :

To it the livelong night there sings
A bird unseen-but not remote :
Invisible his airy wings,

But soft as harp that Houri strings
His long entrancing note!

It were the Bulbul; but his throat,

Though mournful, pours not such a strain : For they who listen cannot leave

The spot, but linger there and grieve,
As if they loved in vain!

And yet so sweet the tears they shed,
'Tis sorrow so unmix'd with dread,

taken) must be already familiar to every reader-it is given in the first annotation, p. 67, of The Pleasures of Memory; a poem so well known as to render a reference almost superfluous, but to whose pages all will be delighted to recur.

And longer yet would weep and wake,
He sings so wild and well!

But when the day-blush bursts from high,
Expires that magic melody.

And some have been who could believe,
(So fondly youthful dreams deceive,
Yet harsh be they that blame,)
That note so piercing and profound
Will shape and syllable its sound
Into Zuleika's name.*

'Tis from her cypress' summit heard,
That melts in air the liquid word;
'Tis from her lowly virgin earth
That white rose takes its tender birth.
There late was laid a marble stone;
Eve saw it placed-the Morrow gone!
It was no mortal arm that bore
That deep-fix'd pillar to the shore;
For there, as Helle's legends tell,
Next morn 'twas found where Selim fell,
Lash'd by the tumbling tide, whose wave
Denied his bones a holier grave;
And there by night, reclined, 'tis said,
Is seen a ghastly turban'd head:
And hence extended by the billow,
'Tis named the 'Pirate-phantom's pillow!'
Where first it lay, that mourning flower
Hath flourish'd; flourisheth this hour,
Alone and dewy, coldly pure and pale;
As weeping Beauty's cheek at Sorrow's tale.

And airy tongues that syllable men's names.'-MIIT For a belief that the souls of the dead inhalat the for birds, we need not travel to the East. Lord Lyttelton story, the belief of the Duchess of Kendal that George L into her window in the shape of a raven (see Orford's & niscences), and many other instances, bring this superso nearer home. The most singular was the whim of a Worce lady, who, believing her daughter to exist in the shape singing bird, literally furnished her pew in the cathedre cages full of the kind; and as she was rich, and a besefer in beautifying the church, no objection was made to her less folly. For this anecdote, see Orford's Letters.