That beacon through the battle's stormy flood,

That rainbow of the field, whose showers were blood!

Twice hath the sun upon their conflict set,
And risen again, and found them grappling yet;
While streams of carnage in his noontide blaze,

Smoke up to Heav'n-hot as that crimson haze,
By which the prostrate Caravan is aw'd,*

In the red Desert, when the wind's abroad.

66

'On, Swords of God!" the panting CALIPH calls,

"Thrones for the living-Heav'n for him who falls!". "On, brave avengers, on," MOKANNA cries,

"And EBLIS blast the recreant slave that flies !"

Now comes the brunt, the crisis of the day—

They clash they strive the CALIPH'S troops give

way!

MOKANNA'S self plucks the black Banner down,
And now the Orient World's Imperial crown
Is just within his grasp—when, hark, that shout!
Some hand hath check'd the flying Moslem's rout;
And now they turn, they rally—at their head
A warrior, (like those angel youths who led,
In glorious panoply of Heav'n's own mail,

The Champions of the Faith through BEDER'S vale †,)

* Savary says of the south wind, which blows in Egypt from February to May, "Sometimes it appears only in the shape of an impetuous whirlwind, which passes rapidly, and is fatal to the tra, veller, surprised in the middle of the deserts. Torrents of burning sand roll before it, the firmament is enveloped in a thick veil, and the sun appears of the colour of blood. Sometimes whole caravans are buried in it."

In the great victory gained by Mahomed at Beder, he was

Bold as if gifted with ten thousand lives,

Turns on the fierce pursuers' blades, and drives

At once the multitudinous torrent back

While hope and courage kindle in his track ;
And, at each step, his bloody falchion makes.
Terrible vistas through which victory breaks!
In vain MOKANNA, midst the general flight,
Stands, like the red moon, on some stormy night,
Among the fugitive clouds that, hurrying by,
Leave only her unshaken in the sky

In vain he yells his desperate curses out,
Deals death promiscuously to all about,
To foes that charge and coward friends that fly,
And seems of all the Great Arch-enemy.
The panic spreads "A miracle!" throughout
The Moslem ranks, " a miracle!" they shout,
All gazing on that youth, whose coming seems
A light, a glory, such as breaks in dreams;
And every sword, true as o'er billows dim
The needle tracks the load-star, following him!

Right tow'rds MOKANNA now he cleaves his path,
Impatient cleaves, as though the bolt of wrath
He bears from Heav'n withheld its awful burst
From weaker heads, and souls but half-way curst,
To break o'er Him, the mightiest and the worst!
But vain his speed - though, in that hour of blood,
Had all God's seraphs round MoKANNA stood,

assisted, say the Mussulmans, by three thousand angels, led by Gabriel, mounted on his horse Hiazum. See The Koran and its Commentators.

With swords of fire, ready like fate to fall,
MOKANNA'S Soul would have defied them all,
Yet now, the rush of fugitives, too strong
For human force, hurries ev'n him along;
In vain he struggles 'mid the wedg'd array
Of flying thousands — he is borne away;
And the sole joy his baffled spirit knows,
In this forc'd flight, is murdering as he goes!
As a grim tiger, whom the torrent's might
Surprizes in some parch'd ravine at night,

Turns, ev❜n in drowning, on the wretched flocks,
Swept with him in that snow-flood from the rocks,
And, to the last, devouring on his way,

Bloodies the stream he hath not power to stay.

Hang out your gilded tapestry in the streets,
And light your shrines and chaunt your ziraleets.†
The Swords of God have triumph'd on his throne
Your Caliph sits, and the veil'd Chief hath flown.
Who does not envy that young warrior now,
To whom the Lord of Islam bends his brow,
In all the graceful gratitude of power,

For his throne's safety in that perilous hour?
Who doth not wonder, when, amidst the' acclaim
Of thousands, heralding to heaven his name

* The Tecbir, or cry of the Arabs. "Alla Acbar!" says Ockley, means, "God is most mighty."

† "The ziraleet is a kind of chorus, which the women of the East sing upon joyful occasions.”- RUSSEL.

'Mid all those holier harmonies of fame,

Which sound along the path of virtuous souls,

Like music round a planet as it rolls,

He turns away ·
coldly, as if some gloom
Hung o'er his heart no triumphs can illume;
Some sightless grief, upon whose blasted gaze
Though glory's light may play, in vain it plays.
Yes, wretched Azım! thine is such a grief,
Beyond all hope, all terror, all relief;

A dark, cold calm, which nothing now can break,
Or warm or brighten,--like that Syrian Lake,*
Upon whose surface morn and summer shed
Their smiles in vain, for all beneath is dead!

Hearts there have been, o'er which this weight of woe

Came by long use of suffering, tame and slow;

But thine, lost youth! was sudden

over thee It broke at once, when all seem'd ecstasy; When Hope look'd up, and saw the gloomy Past Melt into splendour, and Bliss dawn at last 'Twas then, ev'n then, o'er joys so freshly blown, This mortal blight of misery came down ;

Ev'n then, the full, warm gushings of thy heart

Were check'd like fount-drops, frozen as they start,
And there, like them, cold, sunless relics hang,
Each fix'd and chill'd into a lasting pang.

One sole desire, one passion now remains

To keep life's fever still within his veins,

life.

The Dead Sea, which contains neither animal nor vegetable

G

Vengeance!

dire vengeance on the wretch who cast

O'er him and all he lov'd that ruinous blast.

For this, when rumours reach'd him in his flight
Far, far away, after that fatal night, –

Rumours of armies, thronging to the' attack

Of the Veil'd Chief,- for this he wing'd him back,
Fleet as the vulture speeds to flags unfurl'd,
And, when all hope seem'd desp'rate, wildly hurl'd
Himself into the scale, and sav’d a world.

For this he still lives on, careless of all
The wreaths that Glory on his path lets fall;
For this alone exists-like lightning-fire,
To speed one bolt of vengeance, and expire!

But safe as yet that Spirit of Evil lives; With a small band of desperate fugitives, The last sole stubborn fragment, left unriven, Of the proud host that late stood fronting Heaven, He gain'd MEROU breath'd a short curse of blood

O'er his lost throne - then pass'd the JIHON'S flood,*
And gathering all, whose madness of belief

Still saw a Saviour in their down-fall'n Chief,
Rais'd the white banner within NEKSHEB's gates, †
And there, untam'd, the' approaching conqueror waits.

Of all his Haram, all that busy hive, With music and with sweets sparkling alive, He took but one, the partner of his flight, One

not for love- not for her beauty's light –

*The ancient Oxus..

+ A city of Transoxiana,