All infidels - all enemies!
What was the daring hope that then
Cross'd her like lightning, as again,
With boldness that despair had lent,

She darted through that armèd crowd. A look so searching, so intent,

That e'en the sternest warrior bow'd Abash'd, when he her glances caught, As if he guessed whose form they sought. she sees him not, 'tis gone :

But no,

The vision that before her shone

Through all the maze of blood and storm,

Is fled; 'twas but a phantom form,

Scattering its brilliant fragments round.

And now she sees --- with horror sees

Their course is toward that mountain hold, Those towers, that make her life-blood freeze, Where Mecca's godless enemies

Lie, like beleaguer'd scorpions, roll'd In their last deadly, venomous fold! Amid th' illumined land and flood Sunless that mighty mountain stood; Save where, above its awful head, There shone a flaming cloud, blood-red, As 'twere the flag of destiny

Hung out to mark where death would be!

Had her bewilder'd mind the power

Of thought in this terrific hour,

She well might marvel where or how

Man's foot could scale that mountain's brow;
Since ne'er had Arab heard or known
Of path but through the glen alone.
But every thought was lost in fear,
When, as their bounding bark drew near
The craggy base, she felt the waves

Hurry them towards those dismal caves
That from the deep in windings pass
Beneath that mount's volcanic mass;
And loud a voice on deck commands
To lower the mast and light the brands!
Instantly o'er the dashing tide
Within a cavern's mouth they glide,
Gloomy as that eternal porch

Through which departed spirits go;Not e'en the flare of brand and torch

Its flickering light could further throw
Than the thick flood that boil'd below.
Silent they floated; as if each

Sat breathless, and too awed for speech
In that dark chasm, where even sound
Seem'd dark, so sullenly around
The goblin echoes of the cave
Mutter'd it o'er the long black wave,
As 'twere some secret of the grave!
But soft they pause the current turns

Beneath them from its onward track.
Some mighty, unseen barrier spurns
The vexed tide, all foaming, back,
And scarce the oar's redoubled force
Can stem the eddy's whirling course;
When, hark!
Among the rocks,
The oars are up,

some desperate foot has sprung

the chain is flung, the grapple clings,

And the toss'd bark in moorings swings.
Just then a daybeam through the shade
Broke tremulous; but ere the maid
Can see from whence the brightness steals,
Upon her brow she shuddering feels
A viewless hand, that promptly ties
A bandage round her burning eyes;
While the rude litter where she lies,
Uplifted by the warrior throng,
O'er the steep rocks is borne along.

Blest power of sunshine! genial Day,
What balm, what life, is in thy ray!
To feel thee is such real bliss,
That had the world no joy but this,
To sit in sunshine calm and sweet,
It were a world too exquisite

For man to leave it for the gloom,
The deep, cold shadow of the tomb!
E'en Hinda, though she saw not where
Or whither wound the perilous road,
Yet knew by that awakening air

Which suddenly around her glow'd,
That they had risen from darkness then,
And breathed the sunny world again!
But soon this balmy freshness fled;
For now the steepy labyrinth led

Through damp and gloom, - 'mid crash of boughs
And fall of loosen'd crags that rouse

The leopard from his hungry sleep,

Who, starting, thinks each crag a prey,

And long is heard from steep to steep,

Chasing them down their thundering way!
The jackal's cry, -the distant moan
Of the hyena, fierce and lone;
And that eternal, saddening sound

Of torrents in the glen beneath,

As 'twere the ever-dark profound

That rolls beneath the Bridge of Death!

All, all is fearful, e'en to see,

To gaze on those terrific things

She now but blindly hears, would be