by Thomas Moore
From a foul spirit dimmed his eyes —
He would have markt her shuddering frame,
When from the field of blood he came,
The faltering speech — the look estranged —
Voice, step and life and beauty changed —
He would have markt all this, and known
Such change is wrought by Love alone!
Ah! not the Love that should have blest
So young, so innocent a breast;
Not the pure, open, prosperous Love,
That, pledged on earth and sealed above,
Grows in the world’s approving eyes,
In friendship’s smile and home’s caress,
Collecting all the heart’s sweet ties
Into one knot of happiness!
No, HINDA, no, — thy fatal flame
Is nurst in silence, sorrow, shame; —
A passion without hope or pleasure,
In thy soul’s darkness buried deep,
It lies like some ill-gotten treasure, —
Some idol without shrine or name,
O’er which its pale-eyed votaries keep
Unholy watch while others sleep.
Seven nights have darkened OMAN’S sea,
Since last beneath the moonlight ray
She saw his light oar rapidly
Hurry her Gheber’s bark away, —
And still she goes at midnight hour
To weep alone in that high bower
And watch and look along the deep
For him whose smiles first made her weep; —
But watching, weeping, all was vain,
She never saw his bark again.
The owlet’s solitary cry,
The night-hawk flitting darkly by,
And oft the hateful carrion bird,
Heavily flapping his clogged wing,
Which reeked with that day’s banqueting —
Was all she saw, was all she heard.
’Tis the eighth morn — AL HASSAN’S brow
Is brightened with unusual joy —
What mighty mischief glads him now,
Who never smiles but to destroy?
The sparkle upon HERKEND’S Sea,
When tost at midnight furiously,235
Tells not of wreck and ruin nigh,
More surely than that smiling eye!
“Up, daughter, up — the KERNA’S236 breath
“Has blown a blast would waken death,
“And yet thou sleepest — up, child, and see
“This blessed day for heaven and me,
“A day more rich in Pagan blood
“Than ever flasht o’er OMAN’S flood.
“Before another dawn shall shine,
“His head — heart — limbs — will all be mine;
“This very night his blood shall steep
“These hands all over ere I sleep!” —
“His blood!” she faintly screamed — her mind
Still singling one from all mankind —
“Yes — spite of his ravines and towers,
“HAFED, my child, this night is ours.
“Thanks to all-conquering treachery,
“Without whose aid the links accurst,
“That bind these impious slaves, would be
“Too strong for ALLA’S self to burst!
“That rebel fiend whose blade has spread
“My path with piles of Moslem dead,
“Whose baffling spells had almost driven
“Back from their course the Swords of Heaven,
“This night with all his band shall know
“How deep an Arab’s steel can go,
“When God and Vengeance speed the blow.
“And — Prophet! by that holy wreath
“Thou worest on OHOD’S field of death,237
“I swear, for every sob that parts
“In anguish from these heathen hearts,
“A gem from PERSIA’S plundered mines
“Shall glitter on thy shrine of Shrines.
“But, ha! — she sinks — that look so wild —
“Those livid lips — my child, my child,
“This life of blood befits not thee,
“And thou must back to ARABY.
“Ne’er had I riskt thy timid sex
“In scenes that man himself might dread,
“Had I not hoped our every tread
“Would be on prostrate Persian necks —
“Curst race, they offer swords instead!
“But cheer thee, maid, — the wind that now
“Is blowing o’er thy feverish brow
“To-day shall waft thee from the shore;
“And ere a drop of this night’s gore
“Have time to chill in yonder towers,
“Thou’lt see thy own sweet Arab bowers!”
His bloody boast was all too true;
There lurkt one wretch among the few
Whom HAFED’S eagle eye could count
Around him on that Fiery Mount, —
One miscreant who for gold betrayed
The pathway thro’ the valley’s shade
To those high towers where Freedom stood
In her last hold of flame and blood.
Left on the field last dreadful night,
When sallying from their sacred height
The Ghebers fought hope’s farewell fight,
He lay — but died not with the brave;
That sun which should have gilt his grave
Saw him a traitor and a slave; —
And while the few who thence returned
To their high rocky fortress mourned
For him among the matchless dead
They left behind on glory’s bed,
He lived, and in the face of morn
Laught them and Faith and
Heaven to scorn.
Oh for a tongue to curse the slave
Whose treason like a deadly blight
Comes o’er the councils of the brave
And blasts them in their hour of might!
May Life’s unblessed cup for him
Be drugged with treacheries to the brim. —
With hopes that but allure to fly,
With joys that vanish while he sips,
Like Dead-Sea fruits that tempt the eye,
But turn to ashes on the lips!238
His country’s curse, his children’s shame,
Outcast of virtue, peace and fame,
May he at last with lips of flame
On the parched desert thirsting die, —
While lakes that shone in mockery nigh,239
Are fading off, untouched, untasted,
Like the once glorious hopes he blasted!
And when from earth his spirit flies,
Just Prophet, let the damned-one dwell
Full in the sight of Paradise
Beholding heaven and feeling hell!
LALLA ROOKH had the night before been visited by a dream which in spite of the impending fate of poor HAFED made her heart more than usually cheerful during the morning and gave her cheeks all the freshened animation of a flower that the Bidmusk had just passed over.240 She fancied that she was sailing on that Eastern Ocean where the sea-gypsies who live for ever on the water241 enjoy a perpetual summer in wandering from isle to isle when she saw a small gilded bark approaching her. It was like one of those boats which the Maldivian islanders send adrift, at the mercy of winds and waves, loaded with perfumes, flowers, and odoriferous wood, as an offering to the Spirit whom they call King of the Sea. At first, this little bark appeared to be empty but on coming nearer —
She had proceeded thus far in relating the dream to her Ladies, when FERAMORZ appeared at the door of the pavilion. In his presence of course everything else was forgotten and the continuance of the story was instantly requested by all. Fresh wood of aloes was set to burn in the cassolets; — the violet sherbets242 were hastily handed round, and after a short prelude o
n his lute in the pathetic measure of Nava,243 which is always used to express the lamentations of absent lovers, the Poet thus continued: —
The day is lowering — stilly black
Sleeps the grim wave, while heaven’s rack,
Disperst and wild, ‘twixt earth and sky
Hangs like a shattered canopy.
There’s not a cloud in that blue plain
But tells of storm to come or past; —
Here flying loosely as the mane
Of a young war-horse in the blast; —
There rolled in masses dark and swelling,
As proud to be the thunder’s dwelling!
While some already burst and riven
Seen melting down the verge of heaven;
As tho’ the infant storm had rent
The mighty womb that gave him birth,
And having swept the firmament
Was now in fierce career for earth.
On earth ’twas yet all calm around,
A pulseless silence, dread, profound,
More awful than the tempest’s sound.
The diver steered for ORMUS’ bowers,
And moored his skiff till calmer hours;
The sea-birds with portentous screech
Flew fast to land; — upon the beach
The pilot oft had paused, with glance
Turned upward to that wild expanse; —
And all was boding, drear and dark
As her own soul when HINDA’S bark
Went slowly from the Persian shore. —
No music timed her parting oar,244
Nor friends upon the lessening strand
Lingering to wave the unseen hand
Or speak the farewell, heard no more; —
But lone, unheeded, from the bay
The vessel takes its mournful way,
Like some ill-destined bark that steers
In silence thro’ the Gate of Tears.245
And where was stern AL HASSAN then?
Could not that saintly scourge of men
From bloodshed and devotion spare
One minute for a farewell there?
No — close within in changeful fits
Of cursing and of prayer he sits
In savage loneliness to brood
Upon the coming night of blood, —
With that keen, second-scent of death,
By which the vulture snuffs his food
In the still warm and living breath!246
While o’er the wave his weeping daughter
Is wafted from these scenes of slaughter, —
As a young bird of BABYLON,247
Let loose to tell of victory won,
Flies home, with wing, ah! not unstained
By the red hands that held her chained.
And does the long-left home she seeks
Light up no gladness on her cheeks?
The flowers she nurst — the well-known groves,
Where oft in dreams her spirit roves —
Once more to see her dear gazelles
Come bounding with their silver bells;
Her birds’ new plumage to behold
And the gay, gleaming fishes count,
She left all filleted with gold
Shooting around their jasper fount;248
Her little garden mosque to see,
And once again, at evening hour,
To tell her ruby rosary
In her own sweet acacia bower. —
Can these delights that wait her now
Call up no sunshine on her brow?
No, — silent, from her train apart, —
As if even now she felt at heart
The chill of her approaching doom, —
She sits, all lovely in her gloom
As a pale Angel of the Grave;
And o’er the wide, tempestuous wave
Looks with a shudder to those towers
Where in a few short awful hours
Blood, blood, in streaming tides shall run,
Foul incense for to-morrow’s sun!
“Where art thou, glorious stranger! thou,
“So loved, so lost, where art thou now?
“Foe — Gheber — infidel — whate’er
“The unhallowed name thou’rt doomed to bear,
“Still glorious — still to this fond heart
“Dear as its blood, whate’er thou art!
“Yes — ALLA, dreadful ALLA! yes —
“If there be wrong, be crime in this,
“Let the black waves that round us roll,
“Whelm me this instant ere my soul
“Forgetting faith — home — father — all
“Before its earthly idol fall,
“Nor worship even Thyself above him —
“For, oh, so wildly do I love him,
“Thy Paradise itself were dim
“And joyless, if not shared with him!”
Her hands were claspt — her eyes upturned,
Dropping their tears like moonlight rain;
And, tho’ her lip, fond raver! burned
With words of passion, bold, profane.
Yet was there light around her brow,
A holiness in those dark eyes,
Which showed, — tho’ wandering earthward now, —
Her spirit’s home was in the skies.
Yes — for a spirit pure as hers
Is always pure, even while it errs;
As sunshine broken in the rill
Tho’ turned astray is sunshine still!
So wholly had her mind forgot
All thoughts but one she heeded not
The rising storm — the wave that cast
A moment’s midnight as it past —
Nor heard the frequent shout, the tread
Of gathering tumult o’er her head —
Clasht swords and tongues that seemed to vie
With the rude riot of the sky. —
But, hark! — that war-whoop on the deck —
That crash as if each engine there,
Mast, sails and all, were gone to wreck,
Mid yells and stampings of despair!
Merciful Heaven! what can it be?
’Tis not the storm, tho’ fearfully
The ship has shuddered as she rode
O’er mountain-waves— “Forgive me, God!
“Forgive me” — shrieked the maid and knelt,
Trembling all over — for she felt
As if her judgment hour was near;
While crouching round half dead with fear,
Her handmaids clung, nor breathed nor stirred —
When, hark! — a second crash — a third —
And now as if a bolt of thunder
Had riven the laboring planks asunder,
The deck falls in — what horrors then!
Blood, waves and tackle, swords and men
Come mixt together thro’ the chasm, —
Some wretches in their dying spasm
Still fighting on — and some that call
“For GOD and IRAN!” as they fall!
Whose was the hand that turned away
The perils of the infuriate fray,
And snatcht her breathless from beneath
This wilderment of wreck and death?
She knew not — for a faintness came
Chill o’er her and her sinking frame
Amid the ruins of that hour
Lay like a pale and scorched flower
Beneath the red volcano’s shower.
But, oh! the sights and sounds of dread
That shockt her ere her senses fled!
The yawning deck — the crowd that strove
Upon the tottering planks above —
The sail whose fragments, shivering o’er
The stragglers’ heads all dasht with gore
Fluttered like bloody flags — the clash
Of sabres and the lightning’s flash
Upon their blades, hig
h tost about
Like meteor brands249 — as if throughout
The elements one fury ran,
One general rage that left a doubt
Which was the fiercer, Heaven or Man!
Once too — but no — it could not be —
’Twas fancy all — yet once she thought,
While yet her fading eyes could see
High on the ruined deck she caught
A glimpse of that unearthly form,
That glory of her soul, — even then,
Amid the whirl of wreck and storm,
Shining above his fellow-men,
As on some black and troublous night
The Star of EGYPT,250 whose proud light
Never hath beamed on those who rest
In the White Islands of the West,
Burns thro’ the storm with looks of flame
That put Heaven’s cloudier eyes to shame.
But no— ’twas but the minute’s dream —
A fantasy — and ere the scream
Had half-way past her pallid lips,
A death-like swoon, a chill eclipse
Of soul and sense its darkness spread
Around her and she sunk as dead.
How calm, how beautiful comes on
The stilly hour when storms are gone,
When warring winds have died away,
And clouds beneath the glancing ray
Melt off and leave the land and sea
Sleeping in bright tranquillity, —
Fresh as if Day again were born,
Again upon the lap of Morn! —
When the light blossoms rudely torn
And scattered at the whirlwind’s will,
Hang floating in the pure air still,
Filling it all with precious balm,
In gratitude for this sweet calm; —
And every drop the thundershowers
Have left upon the grass and flowers
Sparkles, as ‘twere that lightning-gem251
Whose liquid flame is born of them!
When, ‘stead of one unchanging breeze,
There blow a thousand gentle airs
And each a different perfume bears, —
As if the loveliest plants and trees
Had vassal breezes of their own
To watch and wait on them alone,
And waft no other breath than theirs:
When the blue waters rise and fall,
In sleepy sunshine mantling all;
And even that swell the tempest leaves
Is like the full and silent heaves
Of lovers’ hearts when newly blest,
Too newly to be quite at rest.
Such was the golden hour that broke
Upon the world when HINDA woke
From her long trance and heard around
No motion but the water’s sound
Rippling against the vessel’s side,
As slow it mounted o’er the tide. —
But where is she? — her eyes are dark,
