Those waves are hush'd, those planets shine; By the white moonbeam's dazzling power;- Should be awake at this sweet hour. And see where, high above those rocks * Upon the turban of a king, Oh what a pure and sacred thing Of the gross world, illumining One only mansion with her light! Unseen by man's disturbing eye, The flower that blooms beneath the sea, "Their kings wear plumes of black heron's feathers upon the right side, as a badge of sovereignty.". -HANWAY. "The Fountain of Youth, by a Mahometan tradition, is situated in some dark region of the East."-RICHARDSON. Too deep for sunbeams, doth not lie To lift the veil that shades them o'er!- In the lone deep some fairy shore, Beautiful are the maids that glide, On summer-eves, through YEMEN's * dales, As the white jasmine flowers they wear, Who, lull'd in cool kiosk or bower,t *Arabia Felix. In the midst of the garden is the chiosk, that is, a large room, commonly beautified with a fine fountain in the midst of it. It is raised nine or ten steps, and inclosed with gilded lattices, round which vines, jessamines, and honeysuckles make a sort of green wall; large trees are planted round this place, which is the scene of their greatest pleasures."—LAPY M. W. MONTAGU. The women of the East are never without their looking-glasses. "In Barbary," says Shaw, "they are so fond of their looking-glasses, which they hang But never yet hath bride or maid Light as the angel shapes that bless With eyes so pure, that from their ray The fond, weak tenderness of this: upon their breasts, that they will not lay them aside, even when after the drudgery of the day they are obliged to go two or three miles with a pitcher or a goat's skin to fetch water."-Travels. In other parts of Asia they wear little looking-glasses on their thumbs. "Hence (and from the lotus being considered the emblem of beauty) is the meaning of the following mute intercourse of two lovers before their parents : "He with salute of deference due, A lotus to his forehead prest; She rais'd her mirror to his view, Then turn'd it inward to her breast.'" Asiatic Miscellany, vol. ii. *"They say that if a snake or serpent fix his eyes on the lustre of those stones, (emeralds) he immediately becomes blind."- AHMED BEN ABDALAziz, Treatise on Jewels. A soul, too, more than half divine, Where, through some shades of earthly feeling, Like light through summer foliage stealing, Such is the maid who, at this hour, Watching the still and shining deep. On the magnificent earth and skies, In her own land, in happier days. Too rough the rocks, too bold the steep, So deem'd at least her thoughtful sire, He built her bower of freshness there, "At Gombaroon and the Isle of Ormus it is sometimes so hot, that the people are obliged to lie all day in the water."- MARCO POLO. And had it deck'd with costliest skill, Nor wake to learn what Love can dare;· For pearls, but when the sea's at rest, Hath ever held that pearl the best Though high that tower, that rock-way rude, Of ARARAT'S tremendous peak,* And think its steeps, though dark and dread, * This mountain is generally supposed to be inaccessible. Struy says, "I can well assure the reader that their opinion is not true, who suppose this mount to be inaccessible." He adds, that "the lower part of the mountain is cloudy, misty, and dark, the middlemost part very cold, and like clouds of snow, but the upper regions perfectly calm." It was on this mountain that the Ark was supposed to have rested after the Deluge, and part of it, they say, exists there still, which Struy thus gravely accounts for:-"Whereas none can remember that the air on the top of the hill did ever change, or was subject either to wind or rain, which is presumed to be the reason that the Ark has endured so long without being rotten." See Carreri's Travels, where the Doctor laughs at this whole account of Mount Ararat. |