1 This wonderful Throne was called The Star of the Genii. For a full description of it, see the Fragment, translated by Captain Franklin, from a Persian MS. entitled "The History of Jerusalem." Oriental Collections, vol. i. p. 235.- When Soliman travelled, the eastern writers say, "He had a carpet of green silk on which his throne was placed, being of a prodigious length and breadth, and sufficient for all his forces to stand upon, the men placing themselves on his right hand, and the spirits on his left; and that when all were in order, the wind, at his command, took up the carpet and transported it, with all that were upon it, wherever he pleased; the army of birds at the same time flying over their heads, and forming a kind of canopy to shade them from the sun."-Sale's Koran, vol. ii. p. 214, note.

2 The transmigration of souls was one of his doctrines.Vide D'Herbelot.

"Man, in the sunshine of the world's new spring, "Shall walk transparent, like some holy thing! "Then, too, your Prophet from his angel brow "Shall cast the Veil that hides its splendors now, "And gladden'd Earth shall, through her wide expanse,

"Bask in the glories of this countenance !

"For thee, young warrior, welcome!-thou hast yet

"Some tasks to learn, some frailties to forget, "Ere the white war-plume o'er thy brow can

wave;

"But, once my own, mine all till in the grave!"

The pomp is at an end-the crowds are goneEach ear and heart still haunted by the tone Of that deep voice, which thrill'd like ALLA's own!

This is according to D'Herbelot's account of the doctrines of Mokanna:-"Sa doctrine étoit, que Dieu avoit pris une forme et figure humaine, depuis qu'il eut commandé aux Anges d'adorer Adam, le premier des hommes. Qu'après la mort d'Adam, Dieu étoit apparu sous la figure de plusieurs Prophètes, et autres grands hommes qu'il avoit choisis, jusqu'à ce qu'il prit celle d'Abu Moslem, Prince de Khorassan, lequel professoit l'erreur de la Tenassukhiah ou Métempsychose; et qu'après la mort de ce Prince, la Divinité étoit passée, et descendue en sa personne."

6 Jesus.

The Young all dazzled by the plumes and lances, The glitt'ring throne, and Haram's half-caught glances;

The Old deep pond'ring on the promised reign
Of peace and truth: and all the female train
Ready to risk their eyes, could they but gaze
A moment on that brow's miraculous blaze!

But there was one, among the chosen maids, Who blush'd behind the gallery's silken shades, One, to whose soul the pageant of to-day

Has been like death:-you saw her pale dismay,
Ye wond'ring sisterhood, and heard the burst
Of exclamation from her lips, when first
She saw that youth, too well, too dearly known,
Silently kneeling at the Prophet's throne.

Ah ZELICA! there was a time, when bliss Shone o'er thy heart from ev'ry look of his; When but to see him, hear him, breathe the air In which he dwelt, was thy soul's fondest prayer; When round him hung such a perpetual spell, Whate'er he did, none ever did so well. Too happy days! when, if he touch'd a flow'r Or gem of thine, 'twas sacred from that hour; When thou didst study him till every tone And gesture and dear look became thy own,Thy voice like his, the changes of his face In thine reflected with still lovelier grace, Like echo, sending back sweet music, fraught With twice th' aërial sweetness it had brought! Yet now he comes,-brighter than even he E'er beam'd before,-but, ah! not bright for thee; No-dread, unlook'd for, like a visitant From th' other world, he comes as if to haunt Thy guilty soul with dreams of lost delight, Long lost to all but mem'ry's aching sight:Sad dreams! as when the Spirit of our Youth Returns in sleep, sparkling with all the truth And innocence once ours, and leads us back, In mournful mockery, o'er the shining track Of our young life, and points out every ray Of hope and peace we've lost upon the way!

:

Once happy pair!-In proud BOKHARA's groves, Who had not heard of their first youthful loves? Born by that ancient flood,' which from its spring In the dark Mountains swiftly wandering, Enrich'd by ev'ry pilgrim brook that shines With relics from BUCHARIA's ruby mines, And, lending to the CASPIAN half its strength, In the cold Lake of Eagles sinks at length ;

There, on the banks of that bright river born,
The flow'rs that hung above its wave at morn,
Bless'd not the waters, as they murmur'd by,
With holier scent and lustre, than the sigh
And virgin-glance of first affection cast
Upon their youth's smooth current, as it pass'd!
But war disturb'd this vision,-far away
From her fond eyes summon'd to join th' array
Of PERSIA'S warriors on the hills of THRACE,
The youth exchanged his sylvan dwelling-place
For the rude tent and war-field's dreadful clash;
His ZELICA's Sweet glances for the flash
Of Grecian wild-fire, and Love's gentle chains
For bleeding bondage on BYZANTIUM's plains.

Month after month, in widowhood of soul Drooping, the maiden saw two summers roll Their suns away-but, ah, how cold and dim Ev'n summer suns, when not beheld with him! From time to time ill-omen'd rumors came, Like spirit-tongues, mutt'ring the sick man's name, Just ere he dies:-at length those sounds of dread Fell with'ring on her soul," AZIM is dead!" Oh Grief, beyond all other griefs, when fate First leaves the young heart lone and desolate In the wide world, without that only tie For which it loved to live or fear'd to die ;Lorn as the hung-up lute, that ne'er hath spoken Since the sad day its master-chord was broken!

Fond maid, the sorrow of her soul was such,
Ev'n reason sunk,-blighted beneath its touch;
And though, ere long, her sanguine spirit rose
Above the first dead pressure of its woes,
Though health and bloom return'd, the delicate
chain

Of thought, once tangled, never clear'd again.
Warm, lively, soft as in youth's happiest day,
The mind was still all there, but turn'd astray;-
A wand'ring bark, upon whose pathway shone
All stars of heaven, except the guiding one!
Again she smiled, nay, much and brightly smiled,
But 'twas a lustre, strange, unreal, wild ;
And when she sung to her lute's touching strain,
"Twas like the notes, half ecstasy, half pain,
The bulbul utters, ere her soul depart,
When, vanquish'd by some minstrel's pow'rful art,
She dies upon the lute whose sweetness broke her
heart!

Such was the mood in which that mission found Young ZELICA, that mission, which around

1 The Amoo, which rises in the Belur Tag, or Dark Mountains, and running nearly from east to west, splits into

two branches; one of which falls into the Caspian sea, and the other into Aral Nahr, or the Lake of Eagles. 2 The nightingale.

The Eastern worid, in every region bless'd
With woman's smile, sought out its loveliest,
To grace that galaxy of lips and eyes
Which the Veil'd Prophet destined for the skies:-
And such quick welcome as a spark receives
Dropp'd on a bed of Autumn's wither'd leaves,
Did every tale of these enthusiasts find
In the wild maiden's sorrow-blighted mind.
All fire at once the madd'ning zeal she caught;-
Elect of Paradise! blest, rapturous thought!
Predestined bride, in heaven's eternal dome,

Of some brave youth-ha! durst they say "of

some ?"

No-of the one, one only object traced

In her heart's core too deep to be effaced;
The one whose mem'ry, fresh as life, is twined
With every broken link of her lost mind;

Together picturing to her mind and ear
The glories of that heav'n, her destined sphere,
Where all was pure, where every stain that lay
Upon the spirit's light should pass away,
And, realizing more than youthful love
E'er wish'd or dream'd, she should forever rove
Through fields of fragrance by her Azım's side,
His own bless'd, purified, eternal bride !—
"Twas from a scene, a witching trance like this,
He hurried her away, yet breathing bliss,

To the dim charnel-house ;-through all its

steams

Of damp and death, led only by those gleams
Which foul Corruption lights, as with design
To show the gay and proud she too can shine-
And, passing on through upright ranks of Dead,
Which to the maiden, doubly crazed by dread,

wreck'd,

Safe 'mid the ruins of her intellect!

Alas, poor ZELICA! it needed all

The fantasy, which held thy mind in thrall,
To see in that gay Haram's glowing maids
A shaded colony for Eden's shades;
Or dream that he,-of whose unholy flame
Thou wert too soon the victim,-shining came
From Paradise, to people its pure sphere

With souls like thine, which he hath ruin'd here!
No-had not reason's light totally set,
And left thee dark, thou hadst an amulet
In the loved image, graven on thy heart,
Which would have saved thee from the tempter's art,
And kept alive, in all its bloom of breath,
That purity, whose fading is love's death!—
But lost, infamed,-a restless zeal took place
Of the mild virgin's still and feminine grace;
First of the Prophet's favorites, proudly first

In zeal and charms, too well th' Impostor nursed

Her soul's delirium, in whose active flame,
Thus lighting up a young, luxuriant frame,
He saw more potent sorceries to bind
To his dark yoke the spirits of mankind,
More subtle chains than hell itself e'er twined.
No art was spared, no witch'ry ;-all the skill
His demons taught him was employ'd to fill
Her mind with gloom and ecstasy by turns-
That gloom, through which Phrensy but fiercer
burns;

That ecstasy, which from the depth of sadness Glares like the maniac's moon, whose light is madness!

cast,

To move their lips in mutt'rings as she pass'd-
There, in that awful place, when each had quaff'd
And pledged in silence such a fearful draught,
Such-oh! the look and taste of that red bowl
Will haunt her till she dies-he bound her soul
By a dark oath, in hell's own language framed,
Never, while earth his mystic presence claim'd,
While the blue arch of day hung o'er them both,
Never, by that all-imprecating oath,

In joy or sorrow from his side to sever.—
She swore, and the wide charnel echoed, "Never,
never!"

From that dread hour, entirely, wildly giv'n
To him and she believed, lost maid!-to heav'n;
Her brain, her heart, her passions all inflamed,
How proud she stood, when in full Haram named
The Priestess of the Faith!-how flash'd her
eyes

With light, alas, that was not of the skies,
When round, in trances, only less than hers,
She saw the Haram kneel, her prostrate worship-

pers.

Well might MOKANNA think that form alone
Had spells enough to make the world his own:-
Light, lovely limbs, to which the spirit's play
Gave motion, airy as the dancing spray,
When from its stem the small bird wings away:
Lips in whose rosy labyrinth, when she smiled,
The soul was lost; and blushes, swift and wild
As are the momentary meteors sent

Across th' uncalm, but beauteous firmament.
And then her look-oh! where's the heart so
wise

Could unbewilder'd meet those matchless eyes?

Like those of angels, just before their fall;

That sat upon his victim's downcast brow,
Or mark how slow her step, how alter'd now
From the quick, ardent Priestess, whose light bound
Came like a spirit's o'er th' unechoing ground,—
From that wild ZELICA, whose every glance
Was thrilling fire, whose ev'ry thought a trance!

Upon his couch the Veil'd MOKANNA lay, While lamps around-not such as lend their ray, Glimm'ring and cold, to those who nightly pray In holy Kooм,' or MECCA's dim arcades,But brilliant, soft, such lights as lovely maids Look loveliest in, shed their luxurious glow Upon his mystic Veil's white glitt'ring flow. Beside him, 'stead of beads and books of pray'r, Which the world fondly thought he mused on there, Stood Vases, fill'd with KISHMEE's golden wine, And the red weepings of the SHIRAZ Vine; Of which his curtain'd lips full many a draught Took zealously, as if each drop they quaff'd, Like ZEMZEM's Spring of Holiness,' had pow'r To freshen the soul's virtues into flow'r! And still he drank and ponder'd-nor could see Th' approaching maid, so deep his revery;

At length, with fiendish laugh, like that which broke

From EBLIS at the Fall of Man, he spoke :

By nonsense heap'd on nonsense, to the skies; "Ye shall have miracles, ay, sound ones too, "Seen, heard, attested, ev'ry thing—but true. "Your preaching zealots, too inspired to seek "One grace of meaning for the things they speak; "Your martyrs, ready to shed out their blood, "For truths too heav'nly to be understood; "And your State Priests, 'sole venders of the lore, "That works salvation;-as, on Ava's shore, "Where none but priests are privileged to trade "In that best marble of which Gods are made;" They shall have mysteries-ay, precious stuff, "For knaves to thrive by-mysteries enough;

66

4 The god Hannaman.-" Apes are in many parts of India highly venerated, out of respect to the God Hannaman, a deity partaking of the form of that race."-Pennani's Hindoostan.

See a curious account, in Stephen's Persia, of a solemn embassy from some part of the Indies to Goa, when the Portuguese were there, offering vast treasures for the recovery of a monkey's tooth, which they held in great veneration, and which had been taken away upon the conquest of the kingdom of Jafanapatan.

This resolution of Eblis not to acknowledge the new

others say, as many years; the angels, in the mean time, often visiting it, and Eblis (then one of the angels nearest to God's presence, afterwards the devil) among the rest; but he, not content with looking at it, kicked it with his foot till it rung, and knowing God designed that creature to be his superior, took a secret resolution never to acknowledge him as such."-Sale on the Koran.

A kind of lantern formerly used by robbers, called the Head of Glory, the candle for which was made of the fat of a dead malefactor. This, however, was rather a westere than an eastern superstition.

7 The material of which images of Gaudma (the Birman