Wild warriors of the turquoise hills *, - and those
Who dwell beyond the everlasting snows
Of HINDOO KOSH†, in stormy freedom bred,
Their fort the rock, their camp the torrent's bed.
But none, of all who own'd the Chief's command,
Rush'd to that battle-field with bolder hand,
Or sterner hate than IRAN's outlaw'd men,
Her Worshippers of Fire‡-all panting then
For vengeance on the' accursed Saracen;
Vengeance at last for their dear country spurn'd,
Her throne usurp'd, and her bright shrines o'erturn'd.
From YEZD'S § eternal mansion of the Fire,
Where aged saints in dreams of Heav'n expire;
From BADKU, and those fountains of blue flame
That burn into the CASPIAN, fierce they came,
Careless for what or whom the blow was sped,
So vengeance triumph'd, and their tyrants bled!
Such was the wild and miscellaneous host,
That high in air their motley banners tost
Around the Prophet-Chief- all eyes still bent
Upon that glittering Veil, where'er it went,
That beacon through the battle's stormy flood,

That rainbow of the field, whose showers were blood!'

We shall be satisfied with the example of Mr. Moore's oriental research which is afforded by the whole of the foregoing selection, and shall again relieve our readers from the glare of pomp, or the violence of passion, by one of those beautiful common-places which abound in this volume.

<* In the mountains of Nishapour and Tous (in Khorassan) they find turquoises. - Ebn Haukal

For a description of these stupendous ranges of mountains, v. Elphinstone's Caubul

6

The Ghebers or Guebres, those original natives of Persia, who adhered to their ancient faith, the religion of Zoroaster, and who, after the conquest of their country by the Arabs, were either persecuted at home, or forced to become wanderers abroad.'

6

§ "Yezd, the chief residence of those ancient natives, who worship the Sun and the Fire, which latter they have carefully kept lighted, without being once extinguished for a moment, above 3000 years, on a mountain near Yezd, called Ater Quedah, signifying the House or Mansion of the Fire. He is reckoned very unfortunate who dies off that mountain." Stephen's Persia.

"When the weather is hazy, the springs of Naptha (on an island near Baku) boil up the higher, and the Naptha often takes fire on the surface of the earth, and runs in a flame into the sea to a distance almost incredible."- Hanway on the Everlasting Fire at Baku.

• Oh

Oh Reason! who shall say what spells renew,
When least we look for it, thy broken clew!
Through what small vistas o'er the darken'd brain
Thy intellectual day-beam bursts again;

And how, like forts, to which beleaguerers win
Unhop'd-for entrance through some friend within,
One clear idea, wakened in the breast
By memory's magic, lets in all the rest!
Would it were thus, unhappy girl, with thee!
But, though light came, it came but partially;
Enough to show the maze, in which thy sense
Wander'd about, but not to guide it thence;
Enough to glimmer o'er the yawning wave,
But not to point the harbour which might save.
Hours of delight and peace, long left behind,
With that dear form came rushing o'er her mind;
But oh! to think how deep her soul had gone
In shame and falsehood, since those moments shone;
And, then, her oath-there madness lay again,
And, shuddering, back she sunk into her chain.
Of mental darkness, as if blest to flee

From light, whose every glimpse was agony!
Yet, one relief this glance of former years

Brought, mingled with its pain,-tears, floods of tears,
Long frozen at her heart, but now like rills
Let loose in spring-time from the snowy hills,

And gushing warm, after a sleep of frost,

Through valleys where their flow had long been lost!' Surely these lines convey a touching description of the most unhappy of all human disorders; and of that very curious but appalling phænomenon at some stages of insanity, the sudden, transient, and imperfect recovery of reason.

We shall now deem it incumbent on us to quote some stanzas, in which one of the brilliant and peculiar traits of this author's genius, we mean the vividness and the distinctness of his imagination, exercised on a subject of light and playful elegance, —is happily brought forwards, and with unusually sustained splendour. Azim, in the midst of the luxuries of Mokanna's palace, is pensively musing on the virtues and the charms of his absent Zelica:

While thus he thinks, still nearer on the breeze
Come those delicious, dream-like harmonies,
Each note of which but adds new, downy links
To the soft chain in which his spirit sinks.
He turns him tow'rd the sound, and, far away
Through a long vista, sparkling with the play
Of countless lamps,-like the rich track which Day
Leaves on the waters, when he sinks from us;
So long the path, its light so tremulous;
He sees a groupe of female forms advance,
Some chain'd together in the mazy dance
REV. JUNE, 1817.
O

}

By

By fetters, forg'd in the green sunny bowers,
As they were captives to the King of Flowers;
And some disporting round, unlink'd and free,
Who seem'd to mock their sisters' slavery,
And round and round them still, in wheeling flight
Went, like gay moths about a lamp at night;
While others wak'd, as gracefully along
Their feet kept time, the very soul of song
From psaltery, pipe, and lutes of heavenly thrill,
Or their own youthful voices, heavenlier still!
And now they come, now pass before his eye,
Forms such as Nature moulds, when she would vie
With Fancy's pencil, and give birth to things
Lovely beyond its fairest picturings!
Awhile they dance before him, then divide,
Breaking, like rosy clouds at even-tide
Around the rich pavilion of the sun,
Till silently dispersing, one by one,

Through many a path that from the chamber leads
To gardens, terraces, and moonlight meads,
Their distant laughter comes upon the wind,
And but one trembling nymph remains behind.
Beck'ning them back in vain, for they are gone,
And she is left in all that light alone;
No veil to curtain o'er her beauteous brow,
In its young bashfulness more beauteous now;
But a light, golden chain-work round her hair,
Such as the maids of YEZD and SHIRAZ wear,
From which, on either side, gracefully hung
A golden amulet, in the Arab tongue,
Engraven o'er with some immortal line
From holy writ, or bard scarce less divine;
While her left hand, as shrinkingly she stood,

Held a small lute of gold and sandal-wood,

Which, once or twice, she touch'd with hurried strain,
Then took her trembling fingers off again.'

A painter, possessed of any clearness of conception, could certainly embody the whole of this scene from the description before him but great, indeed, must be the skill of that pencil, which could preserve all the soft aerial colouring, all the fairy-like delicacy, of the original.

Long as our extracts from this first poem (and there are three to follow!) already have been, one other passage has so much truth and nature and such an enchanting tenderness about it, that we cannot refrain from transcribing it. The catastrophe of the Veiled Prophet' we shall not communicate; since it is our wish not to lessen, any farther than our task of criticism absolutely requires, the curiosity and interest which the work must excite in its first perusal. Suffice it to say that Zelica is lying wounded in Azim's

arms, and even here we are aware of being compelled to say too much :

"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 happiest live!
All, that stood dark and drear before the eye
Of my stray'd soul, is passing swiftly by;
A light comes o'er me from those looks of love,
Like the first dawn of mercy from above;
And if thy lips but tell me I'm forgiven,
Angels will echo the blest words in heaven!
But live, my AZIM; oh! to call thee mine
Thus once again!-my AzIM-dream divine!
Live, if thou ever lov'dst me, if to meet
Thy ZELICA hereafter would be sweet,
Oh live to pray for her-to bend the knee
Morning and night before that Deity,
To whom pure lips and hearts without a stain,
As thine are, Azim, never breath'd in vain,
And pray that He may pardon her,—may take
Compassion on her soul for thy dear sake,
And, nought remembering but her love to thee,
Make her all thine, all His, eternally!

Go to those happy fields where first we twin'd

Our youthful hearts together-every wind

That meets thee there, fresh from the well-known flowers,

Will bring the sweetness of those innocent hours

Back to thy soul, and thou may'st feel again
For thy poor ZELICA as thou did'st then.
So shall thy orisons, like dew that flies
To heav'n upon the morning's sunshine, rise
With all love's earliest ardour to the skies!
And should they but alas! my senses fail-
Oh for one minute!-should thy prayers prevail.
If pardon'd souls may from that World of Bliss
Reveal their joy to those they love in this,-

I'll come to thee-in some sweet dream--and tell-
Oh Heaven-I die-dear love! farewell, farewell.” '

With the exception of a few detached beauties, and some examples of the faults which we have generally censured, we must here bid adieu to the Veiled Prophet.' We shall prefix a brief title to each extract of the nature just mentioned, and thus enable our readers to judge more clearly of the correctness of our opinions.

Grecian Liberty.

Oh! who could, ev'n in bondage, tread the plains
Of glorious GREECE, nor feel his spirit rise

Kindling within him? who, with heart and eyes,
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Could

Could walk where Liberty had been, nor see
The shining foot-prints of her Deity,

Nor feel those god-like breathings in the air,
Which mutely told her spirit had been there?'
Perfectibility of Human Nature.

'those dreams of good that, vainly grand,
Haunt the young heart;-proud views of human-kind,
Of men to Gods exalted and refin'd;-

False views, like that horizon's fair deceit,
Where earth and heav'n but seem, alas, to meet!

Revived Associations of Youth.

While the young Arab, haunted by the smell
Of her own mountain-flowers, as by a spell,-
The sweet Elcaya, and that courteous tree
Which bows to all who seek its canopy-
Sees, call'd up round her by these magic scents,
The well, the camels, and her father's tents;
Sighs for the home she left with little pain,
And wishes, ev'n its sorrows back again!'

The last couplet is very much in the manner of that inimitable painter of natural scenes and feelings, Goldsmith; & name which we would earnestly beg to add to the small list of those genuine sons of Simplicity, who have never degraded their parent below the rank of a classical Muse. The poet, also, to whom Lalla Rookh is dedicated, the poet of Memory, may certainly claim a place in that honoured number; and his practice justifies our opinions. The idea, conveyed in the close of the last extract, well-known and beautiful as it is, was never more sweetly expressed than in that often-quoted passage of the eleventh Satire of Juvenal,

"Suspirat longo non visam tempore matrem, Et casulam, et notos tristis desiderat hædos."

Innocence.

"thou hast breath'd such purity, thy lay
Returns so fondly to youth's virtuous day,
And leads thy soul-if e'er it wander'd thence
So gently back to its first innocence,

That I would sooner stop th' unchained dove,
When swift returning to its home of love,
And round its snowy wing new fetters twine,
Than turn from virtue one pure wish of thine!"

Desperate Courage.

In vain MOKANNA, midst the general flight,

Stands, like the red moon, on some stormy night,
Among the fugitive clouds that, hurrying by,
Leave only her unshaken in the sky!-

We