But the cool Caliph, fearful of some wile - In this blank stillness, checks the troops awhile, Just then, a figure, with slow step, advanced Forth from the ruin'd walls, and, as there glanced A sunbeam over it, all eyes could see The well-known Silver Veil!""T is He, 't is He, Young Azim from his steed springs to the ground- "I meant not, Azim," soothingly she said, As on his trembling arm she lean'd her head, And, looking in his face, saw anguish there Beyond all wounds the quiv'ring flesh can bear "I meant not thou shouldst have the pain of this: Though death, with thee thus tasted, is a bliss Thou wouldst not rob me of, didst thou but know How oft I've pray'd to God I might die so! But the Fiend's venom was too scant and slow; -To linger on were madd'ning — and I thought If once that Veil - nay, look not on it caught The eyes of your fierce soldiery, I should be Struck by a thousand death-darts instantly. But this is sweeter-oh! believe me, yes I would not change this sad, but dear caress, This death within thy arms I would not give For the most smiling life the nappiest live! All, that stood dark and drear before the eye A light comes o'er me from those looks of love, Morning and night before that Deity, To whom pure lips and hearts without a stain, Go to those happy fields where first we twined every wind That meets thee there, fresh from the well-known flow'rs, Will bring the sweetness of those innocent hours Back to thy soul, and thou mayst feel again For thy poor Zelica as thou didst then. 'Time fleeted — years on years had pass'd away, And few of those who, on that mournful day, Had stood, with pity in their eyes, to see The maiden's death, and the youth's agony, Were living still — when, by a rustic grave, Beside the swift Amoo's transparent wave, An aged man, who had grown aged there By that lone grave, morning and night in prayer, For the last time knelt down and, though the shade Of death hung dark'ning over him, there play'd A gleam of rapture on his eye and cheek, That brighten'd even Death-like the last streak Of intense glory on th' horizon's brim, When night o'er all the rest hangs chill and dim. THE story of the Veiled Prophet of Khorassan berg ended, they were now doomed to hear Fadlader n's criticisin upon it. A series of disappointments and accidents had occurred to this learned Chamberlain during the journey. In the first place, those couriers stationed, as in the reign of Shah Jehan, between Delhi and the Western coast of India, to secure a constant supply of mangoes for the Royal Table, had, by some cruel irregularity, failed in their duty; and to eat any mangoes but those of Mazagong was, of course, impossible. In the next place, the elephant, laden with his fine antique porcelain, had, in an unusual fit of liveliness, shattered the whole set to pieces: :- · an irreparable loss, as many of the vessels were so exquisitely old, as to have been used under the Emperors Yan and Chun, who reigned many ages before the dynasty of Tang. His Koran, too, supposed to be the identical copy between the leaves of which Mahomet's favorite pigeon used to nestle, had been mislaid by his Koranbearer three whole days; not without much spiritual alarm to Fadladeen, who, though professing to hold with other loyal and orthodox Mussulmans, that salvation could only be found in the Koran, was strongly suspected of believing in his heart, that it could only be fe and in his own particular copy of it. When to all these grievances is added the obstinacy of the cooks, in putting the pepper of Canara into his dishes instead of the cinnamon of Serendib, we may easily suppose that he came to the task of criticism with, at least, a sufficient degree of irritability for the purpose In order," said he, importantly swinging about his chaplet of pearls, "to convey with clearness my opinion of the story this young man has related, it is necessary to take a review of all the stories that have ever -"My good Fadladeen!" exclaimed the Princess, interrupting him, "we really do not deserve that you should give yourself so much trouble. Your opinion of the poem we have just heard, will, I have no doubt, be abundantly edifying, without any further waste of your valuable erudition."—"If that be all," replied the critic,-evidently mortified at not being allowed to show how much he knew about every thing but the subject immediately before him-"if that be all that is required, the matter is easily dispatched." He then proceeded to analyze the poem, in that strain (so well known to the unfortunate bards of Delhi) whose censures were an infliction from which few recovered, and whose very praises were like the honey extracted from the bitter flowers of the aloe. The chief personages of the story were, if he rightly understood them, an ill-favored gentleman, with a veil over his face; — a young lady, whose reason went and came, according as it suited the poet's convenience to be sensible or otherwise ;and a youth in one of those hideous Bucharian bonnets, who took the aforesaid gentleman in a veil for a Divinity. "From such materials," said he, "what can be expected?—after rivalling each other in long speeches and absurdities, through some thousands of lines as indigestible as the filberts of Berdaa, our friend in the veil jumps into a tub of aquafortis; the young lady dies in a set speech, whose only recommendation is that it is her last; and the lover lives on to a good old age, for the laudible purpose of seeing her ghost, which ne at last happily accomplishes, and expires. This, |