only by the dipping of the wings of birds in its marble basons filled with the pure water of those hills, was to LALLA ROOKH all that her heart could fancy of fragrance, coolness, and almost heavenly tranquillity. As the Prophet said of Damascus, "it was too delicious ;" — and here, in listening to the sweet voice of FERAMmorz, or reading in his eyes what yet he never dared to tell her, the most exquisite moments of her whole life were passed. One evening, when they had been talking of the Sultana Nourmahal, the Light of the Haram,' who had so often wandered among these flowers, and fed with her own hands, in those marble basons, the small shining fishes of which she was so fond, the youth, in order to delay the moment of separation, proposed to recite a short story, or rather rhapsody, of which this adored Sultana was the heroine. It related, he said, to the reconcilement of a sort of lovers' quarrel, which took place between her and the Emperor during a Feast of Roses at Cashmere ;

6

-

5 Nourmahal signifies Light of the Haram. She was afterwards called Nourjehan, or the Light of the World.

6 V. note, p. 227.

and would remind the Princess of that difference between Haroun-al-Raschid and his fair mistress Marida, which was so happily made up by the soft strains of the musician, Moussali. As the story was chiefly to be told in song, and FERAMORZ had unluckily forgotten his own lute in the valley, he borrowed the vina of LALLA ROOKH's little Persian slave, and thus began:

HO has not heard of the Vale of CASHMERE, With its roses the brightest that earth ever gave,1 Its temples, and grottos, and fountains as clear

As the love-lighted eyes that hang over their wave?

Oh! to see it at sunset, when warm o'er the Lake

Its splendour at parting a summer eve throws, Like a bride, full of blushes, when ling'ring to take

A last look of her mirror at night ere she goes! When the shrines through the foliage are gleaming half shown,

And each hallows the hour by some rites of its own.
Here the music of pray'r from a minaret swells,

Here the Magian his urn full of perfume is swinging,

"The rose of Kashmire for its brilliancy and delicacy of odour has long been proverbial in the East."- Forster.

And here, at the altar, a zone of sweet bells

Round the waist of some fair Indian dancer is ringing." Or to see it by moonlight, — when mellowly shines

The light o'er its palaces, gardens and shrines;
When the water-falls gleam like a quick fall of stars,
And the nightingale's hymn from the Isle of Chenars
Is broken by laughs and light echoes of feet
From the cool, shining walks where the young people

meet.

Or at morn, when the magic of daylight awakes
A new wonder each minute, as slowly it breaks,
Hills, cupolas, fountains, call'd forth every one
Out of darkness, as they were just born of the Sun.
When the Spirit of Fragrance is up with the day,
From his Haram of night-flowers stealing away;
And the wind, full of wantonness, woos like a lover
The young aspen-trees 3 till they tremble all over.
When the East is as warm as the light of first hopes,

And Day, with his banner of radiance unfurl'd,

2" Tied round her waist the zone of bells, that sounded with ravishing melody."- Song of Jayadeva

3 "The little isles in the Lake of Cachemire are set with arbours and large-leaved aspen-trees, slender and tall."— Bernier.

9

Shines in through the mountainous portal 4 that opes, Sublime, from that Valley of bliss to the world!

But never yet, by night or day,
In dew of spring or summer's ray,
Did the sweet Valley shine so gay
As now it shines—all love and light,
Visions by day and feasts by night!
A happier smile illumes each brow,

With quicker spread each heart uncloses,
And all is ecstasy, for now

The Valley holds its Feast of Roses. That joyous time, when pleasures pour Profusely round, and in their shower

Hearts open, like the Season's Rose,

The Flowret of a hundred leaves, Expanding while the dew-fall flows, And every leaf its balm receives!

6

4" The Tuckt Suliman, the name bestowed by the Mahometans on this hill, forms one side of a grand portal to the Lake.” — Forster. 5" The Feast of Roses continues the whole time of their remaining in bloom." -v. Pietro de la Valle.

6" Gul sad berk, the Rose of a hundred leaves. I believe a particular species."- Ouseley.