To-night-but who and what art thou

Of foreign garb and fearful brow?
And what are these to thine or thee,

That thou should'st either pause or flee?
He stood some dread was on his face-
Soon Hatred settled in its place-

It rose not with the reddening flush
Of transient Anger's darkening blush,
But pale as marble o'er the tomb,

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Whose ghastly whiteness aids its gloom.

His brow was bent-his eye was glazed

He raised his arm, and fiercely raised;

And sternly shook his hand on high,

As doubting to return or fly ;

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Impatient of his flight delayed

Here loud his raven charger neighed

245

Down glanced that hand, and grasped his

blade

That sound had burst his waking dream,

As Slumber starts at owlet's scream.

The spur
Away-away-for life he rides-

hath lanced his courser's sides

Swift as the hurled on high jerreed,

9

Springs to the touch his startled steed,
The rock is doubled-and the shore

250

Shakes with the clattering tramp no more

The crag is won-no more is seen

His Christian crest and haughty mien.

255

But in that instant, o'er his soul

Winters of Memory seemed to roll;

And gather in that drop of time

A life of pain, an age of crime.
O'er him who loves, or hates, or fears,
Such moment pours the grief of years—
What felt he then-at once opprest

By all that most distracts the breast?
That pause-which pondered o'er his fate,
Oh, who its dreary length shall date!

Though in Time's record nearly nought,

It was Eternity to Thought!

For infinite as boundless space

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The thought that Conscience must embrace,

Which in itself can comprehend

Woe without name-or hope-or end.—

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The hour is past, the Giaour is gone, And did he fly or fall alone?

Woe to that hour he came or went,

The curse for Hassan's sin was sent
To turn a palace to a tomb;

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He came, he went, like the Simoom,10

That harbinger of fate and gloom,

Beneath whose widely-wasting breath

The very cypress droops to death

285

Dark tree-still sad, when others' grief is fled,

The only constant mourner o'er the dead!

The steed is vanished from the stall,

No serf is seen in Hassan's hall;

The lonely Spider's thin grey pall

Waves slowly widening o'er the wall;

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The Bat builds in his Haram bower;

And in the fortress of his power

The Owl usurps the beacon-tower;

The wild-dog howls o'er the fountain's brim, With baffled thirst, and famine, grim,

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For the stream has shrunk from its marble bed,

Where the weeds and the desolate dust are

spread.

"Twas sweet of yore to see it play

And chase the sultriness of day—

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As springing high the silver dew

In whirls fantastically flew,

And flung luxurious coolness round

The air, and verdure o'er the ground.

"Twas sweet, when cloudless stars were bright, To view the wave of watery light,

And hear its melody by night.

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