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LALLA ROOKH, as they moved on, more than once looked back, to observe how the young Hindoo's lamp proceeded; and, while she saw with pleasure that it was still unextinguished, she could not help fearing that all the hopes of this life were no better than that feeble light upon the river. The remainder of the journey was passed in silence. She now, for the first time, felt that shade of melancholy, which comes over the youthful maiden's heart, as sweet and transient as her own breath upon a mirror; nor was it till she heard the lute of FERAMORZ, touched lightly at the door of her pavilion, that she waked from the reverie in which she had been wandering. Instantly her eyes were lighted up with pleasure; and, after a few unheard remarks from FADLADEEN, upon the indecorum of a poet seating himself in presence of a Princess, everything was arranged as on the preceding evening, and all listened with eagerness, while the story was thus continued:

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WHOSE are the gilded tents that crowd the way,
Where all was waste and silent yesterday?-
This City of War which, in a few short hours,
Hath sprung up here, as if the magic powers
Of him who, in the twinkling of a star,
Built the high pillar'd halls of Chilminar, *
Had conjur'd up, far as the eye can see,

This world of tents and domes and sun-bright armoury
Princely pavilions, screen'd by many a fold

Of crimson cloth, and topp'd with balls of gold;

*The edifices of Chilminar and Balbec are supposed to have been built by the Genii, acting under the orders of Jan ben Jan, who governed the world long before the time of Adam.

Steeds, with their housings of rich silver spun,
Their chains and poitrels glittering in the sun;
And camels, tufted o'er with Yemen's shells,
Shaking in every breeze their light-ton'd bells!

But yester-eve, so motionless around,

So mute was this wide plain, that not a sound
But the far torrent, or the locust-bird *
Hunting among the thickets, could be heard ;-
Yet hark! what discords now, of every kind,
Shouts, laughs, and screams, are revelling in the wind!
The neigh of cavalry, the tinkling throngs
Of laden camels, and their drivers' songs;---
Ringing of arms, and flapping in the breeze
Of streamers from ten thousand canopies ;—
War-music, bursting out from time to time
With gong and tymbalon's tremendous chime ;-
Or, in the pause, when harsher sounds are mute,
The mellow breathings of some horn or flute,
That far off, broken by the eagle note

Of th' Abyssinian trumpet, † swell and float!

Who leads this mighty army?-ask ye "who?"
And mark ye not those banners of dark hue,
The Night and Shadow, ‡ over yonder tent?-
It is the Caliph's glorious armament.

* A native of Khorassan, and allured southward by means of the water of a fountain between Shiraz and Ispahan, called the Fountain of Birds, of which it is so fond, that it will follow wherever that water is carried.

"This trumpet is often called in Abyssinia, Nesser Cano, which signifies, the Note

of the Eagle."-Note of Bruce's Editor.

The two black standards borne before the Caliphs of the house of Abbas were called, allegorically, the Night and the Shadow.-Vide Gibbon.

Rous'd in his palace by the dread alarms
That hourly came, of the false Prophet's arms,
And of his host of infidels, who hurl'd
Defiance fierce at Islam* and the world;-
Though worn with Grecian warfare, and behind
The veils of his bright palace calm reclin'd,
Yet brook'd he not such blasphemy should stain,
Thus unreveng'd, the evening of his reign;
But, having sworn upon the Holy Grave †
To conquer or to perish, once more gave
His shadowy banners proudly to the breeze,
And, with an army nurs'd in victories,
Here stands to crush the rebels that o'errun
His blest and beauteous Province of the Sun.

Ne'er did the march of MAHADI display
Such pomp before-not ev'n when on his way
To Mecca's temple, when both land and sea
Were spoil'd to feed the pilgrim's luxury; +-
When round him, mid the burning sands, he saw
Fruits of the north in icy freshness thaw,
And cool'd his thirsty lip, beneath the glow
Of Mecca's sun, with urns of Persian snow: §
Nor e'er did armament more grand than that
Pour from the kingdoms of the Caliphat.

* The Mahometan religion.

+ "The Persians swear by the tomb of Shah Besade, who is buried at Casbin; and when one desires another to asseverate a matter, he will ask him if he dare swear by the Holy Grave."--Struy.

gold.

Mahadi, in a single pilgrimage to Mecca, expended six millions of dinars of

§ Nivem Meccam apportavit, rem ibi aut nunquam aut raro visam.-Abulfeda.

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First, in the van, the People of the Rock, *
On their light mountain steeds, of royal stock:†
Then, chieftains of Damascus, proud to see
The flashing of their swords' rich marquetry ; ‡-
Men, from the regions near the Volga's mouth,
Mix'd with the rude, black archers of the south;
And Indian lancers, in white-turban'd ranks,
From the far Sinde, or Attock's sacred banks,
With dusky legions from the Land of Myrrh,§
And many a mace-arm'd Moor and Mid-Sea islander.

Nor less in number, though more new and rude
In warfare's school, was the vast multitude
That, fir'd by zeal, or by oppression wrong'd,
Round the white standard of th' Impostor throng'd.
Beside his thousands of Believers-blind,

Burning, and headlong, as the Samiel wind,—
Many who felt, and more who fear'd to feel,
The bloody Islamite's converting steel,
Flock'd to his banner;-chiefs of th' Uzbek race,
Waving their heron crests with martial grace ; ||
Turkomans, countless as their flocks, led forth
From th' aromatic pastures of the North;

* The inhabitants of Hejaz, or Arabia Petræa, called by an Eastern writer, People of the Rock."-Ebn Haukal.

"the

+ "Those horses, called by the Arabians Kochlani, of whom a written genealogy has been kept for 2000 years. They are said to derive their origin from King Solomon's steeds."-Niebuhr.

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+ 'Many of the figures on the blades of their swords are wrought in gold or silver, or in marquetry with small gems."-Asiat. Misc., vol. i.

§ Azab, or Saba.

"The chiefs of the Uzbek Tartars wear a plume of white heron's feathers in their turbans."--Account of Independent Tartary.

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