"One Moslem heart where, buried deep, "The sabre from its toil may sleep?

"No God of IRAN's burning skies! "Thou scorn'st th' inglorious sacrifice. "No-though of all earth's hope bereft, "Life, swords, and vengeance still are left. "We'll make yon valley's reeking caves

"Live in the awe-struck minds of men, " "Till tyrants shudder, when their slaves "Tell of the Ghebers' bloody glen.

"Follow, brave hearts! this pile remains

"Our refuge still from life and chains;

"But his the best, the holiest bed,

"Who sinks entomb'd in Moslem dead!”

Down the precipitous rocks they sprung,
While vigour, more than human, strung

Each arm and heart. Th' exulting foe

Still through the dark defiles below,

Track'd by his torches' lurid fire,

Wound slow, as through GOLCONDA's vale1

1 V. Hoole upon the Story of Sinbad.

The mighty serpent, in his ire,

Glides on with glittering, deadly trail.

No torch the Ghebers need

so well

They know each mystery of the dell,

So oft have, in their wanderings,

Cross'd the wild race that round them dwell,

The very tigers from their delves

Look out, and let them pass, as things

Untam'd and fearless like themselves!

There was a deep ravine, that lay
Yet darkling in the Moslem's way; —
Fit spot to make invaders rue

The many fall'n before the few.

The torrents from that morning's sky
Had fill'd the narrow chasm breast-high,

And, on each side, aloft and wild,

Huge cliffs and toppling crags were pil'd,
The guards, with which young Freedom lines

The pathways to her mountain shrines.

Here, at this pass, the scanty band

Of IRAN's last avengers stand

Here wait, in silence like the dead,
And listen for the Moslem's tread
So anxiously, the carrion-bird
Above them flaps his wing unheard!

They come

that plunge into the water

Gives signal for the work of slaughter.

Now, Ghebers, now if e'er your blades

Had point or prowess, prove them now

Woe to the file that foremost wades!

They come a falchion greets each brow, And, as they tumble, trunk on trunk, Beneath the gory waters sunk,

Still o'er their drowning bodies press
New victims quick and numberless;
Till scarce an arm in HAFED's band,
So fierce their toil, hath power to stir,
But listless from each crimson hand

The sword hangs, clogg'd with massacre. Never was horde of tyrants met

To patriot vengeance hath the sword

More terrible libations pour'd!

T

All up the dreary, long ravine,

By the red, murky glimmer seen

Of half-quench'd brands, that o'er the flood
Lie scatter'd round and burn in blood,
What ruin glares! what carnage swims!
Heads, blazing turbans, quivering limbs,
Lost swords that, dropp'd from many a hand,
In that thick pool of slaughter stand; -
Wretches who wading, half on fire

From the toss'd brands that round them fly, "Twixt flood and flame in shrieks expire;

And some who, grasp'd by those that die, Sink woundless with them, smother'd o'er In their dead brethren's gushing gore!

But vainly hundreds, thousands bleed,
Still hundreds, thousands more succeed; -
Countless as tow'rds some flame at night
The North's dark insects wing their flight,
And quench or perish in its light,
To this terrific spot they pour-
Till, bridg'd with Moslem bodies o'er,
It bears aloft their slippery tread,
And o'er the dying and the dead,

Tremendous causeway! on they pass.-
Then, hapless Ghebers, then, alas,

What hope was left for you? for you,
Whose yet warm pile of sacrifice

Is smoking in their vengeful eyes

-

Whose swords how keen, how fierce they knew,

And burn with shame to find how few.

Crush'd down by that vast multitude,

Some found their graves where first they stood;
While some with hardier struggle died,
And still fought on by HAFED's side,
Who, fronting to the foe, trod back
Tow'rds the high towers his gory track;
And, as a lion, swept away

By sudden swell of JORDAN's pride
From the wild covert where he lay, '

2

Long battles with th' o'erwhelming tide,

2 “In this thicket upon the banks of the Jordan several sorts of wild beasts are wont to harbour themselves, whose being washed out of the covert by the overflowings of the river gave occasion to that allusion of Jeremiah, he shall come up like a lion from the swelling of Jordan."- Maundrell's Aleppo.