Is one of many, brave as he,

Who loathe thy haughty race and thee;
Who, though they know the strife is vain,
Who, though they know the riven chain
Snaps but to enter in the heart

Of him who rends its links apart,

Yet dare the issue, blest to be

Ev'n for one bleeding moment free,

And die in pangs of liberty!

Thou know'st them well-'tis some moons since

Thy turban'd troops and blood-red flags, Thou satrap of a bigot Prince!

Have swarm'd among these Green Sea crags;

Yet here, ev'n here, a sacred band,

Ay, in the portal of that land

Thou, Arab, dar'st to call thy own,

Their spears across thy path have thrown;

Here ere the winds half wing'd thee o'er -
Rebellion brav'd thee from the shore.

Rebellion! foul, dishonouring word,

Whose wrongful blight so oft has stain'd The holiest cause that tongue or sword

Of mortal ever lost or gain'd.

How many a spirit, born to bless,

Hath sunk beneath that withering name,

Whom but a day's, an hour's success

Had wafted to eternal fame!

As exhalations, when they burst

From the warm earth, if chill'd at first,
If check'd in soaring from the plain,
Darken to fogs and sink again;
But, if they once triumphant spread
Their wings above the mountain-head,
Become enthron'd in upper air,

And turn to sun-bright glories there!

And who is he, that wields the might

Of Freedom on the Green Sea brink,
Before whose sabre's dazzling light

The eyes of YEMEN's warriors wink?
Who comes embower'd in the spears
Of KERMAN's hardy mountaineers ? —
Those mountaineers that truest, last,

Cling to their country's ancient rites,
As if that God, whose eyelids cast

Their closing gleam on IRAN's heights,

Among her snowy mountains threw
The last light of his worship too!

'Tis HAFED

name of fear, whose sound

Chills like the muttering of a charm; Shout but that awful name around,

And palsy shakes the manliest arm.
'Tis HAFED, most accurst and dire
(So rank'd by Moslem hate and ire)
Of all the rebel Sons of Fire!

Of whose malign, tremendous power
The Arabs, at their mid-watch hour,

Such tales of fearful wonder tell,

That each affrighted sentinel

Lest HAFED in the midst should rise!

A man, they say, of monstrous birth,
A mingled race of flame and earth,
Sprung from those old, enchanted kings,

Who in their fairy helms, of yore,

8

8 Tahmuras, and other ancient Kings of Persia ; whose adventures in Fairy-Land among the Peris and Dives may be found in Richardson's curious Dissertation. The griffin Simoorgh, they say, took some feathers from her breast for Tahmuras, with which he adorned his helmet, and transmitted them afterwards to his descendants.

A feather from the mystic wings

Of the Simoorgh resistless wore;
And gifted by the Fiends of Fire,
Who groan'd to see their shrines expire,
With charms that, all in vain withstood,
Would drown the Koran's light in blood!

Such were the tales, that won belief,
And such the colouring Fancy gave
To a young, warm and dauntless Chief,
One who, no more than mortal brave,
Fought for the land his soul ador'd,
For happy homes and altars free,

His only talisman, the sword,

His only spell-word, Liberty!

One of that ancient hero line,

Along whose glorious current shine

Names, that have sanctified their blood;

AS LEBANON's small mountain-flood

Is render'd holy by the ranks

Of sainted cedars on its banks !9 ́

9 This rivulet, says Dandini, is called the Holy River from the

66 cedar-saints" among which it rises.

'Twas not for him to crouch the knee Tamely to Moslem tyranny; —

'Twas not for him, whose soul was cast

In the bright mould of ages past,
Whose melancholy spirit, fed

With all the glories of the dead,

Though fram'd for IRAN's happiest years, Was born among her chains and tears! 'Twas not for him to swell the crowd

Of slavish heads, that shrinking bowed
Before the Moslem, as he pass'd,

Like shrubs beneath the poison-blast
No far he fled-indignant fled

The pageant of his country's shame; While every tear her children shed Fell on his soul, like drops of flame;

And, as a lover hails the dawn

Of a first smile, so welcom'd he

The sparkle of the first sword drawn
For vengeance and for liberty!

But vain was valour - vain the flower Of KERMAN, in that deathful hour, Against AL HASSAN's whelming power.