A long death-groan comes with it—can this be She enters Holy ALLA, what a sight Was there before her! By the glimmering light With their swoll'n heads sunk blackening on their breasts, Or looking pale to heav'n with glassy glare, As if they sought but saw no mercy there; As if they felt, though poison rack'd them through, Of their false Chief, who on the battle-plain I Dreadful it was to see the ghastly stare, The stony look of horror and despair, Which some of these expiring victims cast Upon their souls' tormentor to the last; Upon that mocking Fiend, whose Veil, now rais'd, Not the long promis'd light, the brow, whose beaming On its own brood; -no Demon of the Waste, 2 With lineaments so foul, so fierce as those Th' Impostor now, in grinning mockery, shows"There, ye wise Saints, behold your Light, your Star,"Ye would be dupes and victims, and ye are. "Is it enough? or must I, while a thrill "Lives in your sapient bosoms, cheat you still? 2 "The Afghauns believe each of the numerous solitudes and deserts of their country, to be inhabited by a lonely demon, whom they call the Ghoolee Beeabau, or Spirit of the Waste. They often illustrate the wildness of any sequestered tribe, by saying, they are wild as the Demon of the Waste." - Elphinstone's Caubul. "Swear that the burning death ye feel within, "Ev'n monstrous man, is after God's own taste; "And that- but see!ere I have half-way said "My greetings through, th' uncourteous souls are fled. "Farewell, sweet spirits! not in vain ye die, "If EBLIS loves you half so well as I.— "Ha, my young bride!—'tis well-take thou thy seat; Nay come-no shuddering-did'st thou never meet "The Dead before?—they grac'd our wedding, sweet; "And these, my guests to-night, have brimm'd so true "Their parting cups, that thou shalt pledge one too. "But how is this?-all empty? all drunk up? - "Hot lips have been before thee in the cup, "Young bride, yet stay-one precious drop remains, Enough to warm a gentle Priestess' veins ; —— Here, drink and should thy lover's conquering arms "Speed hither, ere thy lip lose all its charms, "Give him but half this venom in thy kiss, "And I'll forgive my haughty rival's bliss! "For me I too must die but not like these "Vile, rankling things, to fester in the breeze; "To have this brow in ruffian triumph shown, "With all death's grimness added to its own, "And rot to dust beneath the taunting eyes "Of slaves, exclaiming There his Godship lies!' "No-cursed race - since first my soul drew breath, 66 They've been my dupes, and shall be, ev'n in death. "Thou see'st yon cistern in the shade 'tis fill'd "With burning drugs, for this last hour distill'd; — "There will I plunge me, in that liquid flame — "Fit bath to lave a dying Prophet's frame ! "There perish, all-ere pulse of thine shall fail — gave; "To come again, with bright, unshrouded smile! "So shall they build me altars in their zeal, "Where knaves shall minister, and fools shall kneel; "Where Faith may mutter o'er her mystic spell, "Written in blood-and Bigotry may swell "The sail he spreads for heav'n with blasts from hell! "So shall my banner, through long ages, be "The rallying sign of fraud and anarchy; — "Kings yet unborn shall rue MOKANNA's name, "And guilt, and blood, that were its bliss in life! "Now mark how readily a wretch like me, He sprung and sunk, as the last words were said Of those wide walls the only living thing; The only wretched one, still curs'd with breath, In all that frightful wilderness of death! More like some bloodless ghost, such as, they tell, 3 In the lone Cities of the Silent 3 dwell, 3 They have all a great reverence for burial-grounds, which they sometimes call by the poetical name of Cities of the Silent, and which they people with the ghosts of the departed, who sit each at the head of his own grave, invisible to mortal eyes.”— Elphinstone. |