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"One wandering star of virtue back "To its own native, heaven-ward track! "Let him but live, and both are Thine,

Together Thine-for, blest or crost, "Living or dead, his doom is mine,

"And if he perish, both are lost!”

THE

HE next evening LALLA ROOKH was entreated by her Ladies to continue the relation of her wonderful dream; but the fearful interest that hung round the fate of HINDA and her lover had completely removed every trace of it from her mind; - much to the disappointment of a fair seer or two in her train, who prided themselves on their skill in interpreting visions, and who had already remarked, as an unlucky omen, that the Princess, on the very morning after the dream, had worn a silk dyed with the blossoms of the sorrowful tree, Nilica.

FADLADEEN, whose wrath had more than once broken out during the recital of some parts of this most heterodox poem, seemed at length to have made up his mind to the infliction; and took his seat the evening with all the patience of a martyr, while the Poet continued his profane and seditious story thus:

To tearless eyes and hearts at ease
The leafy shores and sun-bright seas,
That lay beneath that mountain's height,
Had been a fair, enchanting sight.
'Twas one of those ambrosial eves
A day of storm so often leaves
At its calm setting-when the West
Opens her golden bowers of rest,
And a moist radiance from the skies
Shoots trembling down, as from the eyes
Of some meek penitent, whose last,
Bright hours atone for dark ones past,
And whose sweet tears, o'er wrong forgiven,
Shine, as they fall, with light from heaven!

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Had rush'd through KERMAN's almond groves,

And shaken from her bowers of date

That cooling feast the traveller loves,'

1 "In parts of Kerman, whatever dates are shaken from the trees by the wind they do not touch, but leave them for those who have not any, or for travellers."

- Ebn Haukel.

Now, lull'd to languor, scarcely curl

The Green Sea wave, whose waters gleam Limpid, as if her mines of pearl

Were melted all to form the stream.

And her fair islets, small and bright,

With their green shores reflected there,

Look like those Peri isles of light,

That hang by spell-work in the air.

But vainly did those glories burst
On HINDA's dazzled eyes, when first
The bandage from her brow was taken,
And pale and aw'd as those who waken

In their dark tombs when, scowling near,
The Searchers of the Grave appear, —

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She shuddering turn'd to read her fate
In the fierce eyes that flash'd around;

And saw those towers all desolate,

That o'er her head terrific frown'd,

As if defying ev'n the smile

Of that soft heaven to gild their pile.

2 The two terrible angels, Monkir and Nakir; who are called "the Searchers of the Grave" in the "Creed of the orthodox Mahometans" given by Ockley, vol. ii.

In vain, with mingled hope and fear,
She looks for him whose voice so dear
Had come, like music, to her ear

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Strange, mocking dream! again 'tis fled.
And oh! the shoots, the pangs of dread
That through her inmost bosom run,

When voices from without proclaim
"HAFED, the Chief" and, one by one,

The warriors shout that fearful name!

He comes

the rock resounds his tread

How shall she dare to lift her head,

Or meet those eyes, whose scorching glare
Not YEMEN's boldest sons can bear?
In whose red beam, the Moslem tells,
Such rank and deadly lustre dwells,
As in those hellish fires that light

The mandrake's charnel leaves at night! 3
How shall she bear that voice's tone,

At whose loud battle-cry alone

Whole squadrons oft in panic ran,

3

Scatter'd, like some vast caravan,

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"The Arabians call the mandrake the Devil's candle,' on account of its shining appearance in the night."— Richardson.

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