unlucky. It was while they rested during the heat of noon near a fountain, on which some hand had rudely traced those well-known words from the Garden of Sadi," Many, like me, have viewed this fountain, but they are gone, and their eyes are closed for ever!" that she took occasion, from the melancholy beauty of this passage, to dwell upon the charms of poetry in general. "It is true," she said, "few poets can imitate that sublime bird, which flies always in the air, and never touches the earth 3: it is only once in many ages a Genius appears, whose words, like those on the Written Mountain, last for ever:- but still there are some, as delightful perhaps, though not so wonderful, who, if not stars over our head, are at least flowers along our path, and whose sweetness of the moment we ought gratefully to inhale, without calling upon them for a brightness and a durability beyond their nature. In short," continued she, blushing, as if conscious of being caught in an oration," it is quite cruel that a poet cannot wander through his regions of enchantment, without having a critic for ever, like the old Man of the Sea, upon his back!"-FADLA

3 The Huma.

4 The Story of Sinbad.

DEEN, it was plain, took this last luckless allusion to himself, and would treasure it up in his mind as a whetstone for his next criticism. A sudden silence ensued; and the Princess, glancing a look at FERAmorz, saw plainly she must wait for a more courageous

moment.

But the glories of Nature and her wild, fragrant airs, playing freshly over the current of youthful spirits, will soon heal even deeper wounds than the dull Fadladeens of this world can inflict. In an evening or two after, they came to the small Valley of Gardens, which had been planted by order of the Emperor for his favourite sister Rochinara, during their progress to Cashmere, some years before; and never was there a more sparkling assemblage of sweets, since the Gulzar-e-Irem, or Rose-bower of Irem. Every precious flower was there to be found, that poetry, or love, or religion has ever consecrated; from the dark hyacinth, to which Hafez compares his mistress's hair, to the Cámalatá, by whose rosy blossoms the heaven of Indra is scented. As they sat in the cool fragrance of this delicious spot, and LALLA ROOKH remarked that she could fancy it the

abode of that Flower-loving Nymph whom they worship in the temples of Kathay, or of one of those Peris, those beautiful creatures of the air, who live upon perfumes, and to whom a place like this might make some amends for the Paradise they have lost, the young Poet, in whose eyes she appeared, while she spoke, to be one of the bright spiritual creatures she was describing, said hesitatingly that he remembered a Story of a Peri, which, if the Princess had no objection, he would venture to relate. "It is," said he, with an appealing look to FADLADEEN," in a lighter and humbler strain than the other;" then, striking a few careless but melancholy chords on his kitar, he thus began:

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PARADISE AND THE PERI.

ONE morn a Peri at the gate

Of Eden stood, disconsolate;
And as she listen'd to the Springs
Of Life within, like music flowing,
And caught the light upon her wings
Through the half-open portal glowing,

She wept to think her recreant race
Should e'er have lost that glorious place!

"How happy," exclaim'd this child of air, "Are the holy Spirits who wander there,

"Mid flowers that never shall fade or fall;

Though mine are the gardens of earth and sea, "And the stars themselves have flowers for me, "One blossom of Heaven out-blooms them all!

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Though sunny the Lake of cool Cashmere, "With its plane-tree Isle reflected clear,'

"And sweetly the founts of that Valley fall; "Though bright are the waters of SING-SU-HAY, "And the golden floods, that thitherward stray," "Yet-oh 'tis only the Blest can say

"How the waters of Heaven outshine them all!

"Go, wing thy flight from star to star, "From world to luminous world, as far

"As the universe spreads its flaming wall; "Take all the pleasures of all the spheres, "And multiply each through endless years, "One minute of Heaven is worth them all!"

The glorious Angel, who was keeping
The gates of Light, beheld her weeping;

5 "Numerous small islands emerge from the Lake of Cashmere. One is called Char Chenaur, from the plane trees upon it.”—Forster.

6 "The Altan Kol, or Golden River of Tibet, which runs into the Lakes of Sing-su-hay, has abundance of gold in its sands, which employs the inhabitants all the summer in gathering it."— Description of Tibet in Pinkerton.