THE GIAOUR,

A FRAGMENT OF A TURKISH TALE.

No breath of air now breaks the wave
That rolls below the Athenian's grave,

*

That tomb which, gleaming o'er the cliff,

First greets the homeward-veering skiff,

High o'er the land he saved in vain

When shall such hero live again?

Fair clime! where every season smiles
Benignant o'er those blessed isles,

Which seen from far Colonna's height,

Make glad the heart that hails the sight,

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And lend to loneliness delight.

* A tomb above the rocks on the promontory, by some supposed the sepulchre of Themistocles.

There mildly dimpling-Ocean's cheek
Reflects the tints of many a peak
Caught by the laughing tides that lave
These Edens of the eastern wave;
And if at times a transient breeze
Break the blue chrystal of the seas,
Or sweep one blossom from the trees,
How welcome is each gentle air,

That wakes and wafts the odours there!
For there-the Rose o'er crag or vale,
Sultana of the Nightingale*,

The maid for whom his melody

His thousand songs are heard on high,
Blooms blushing to her lover's tale;
His queen, the garden queen, his Rose,
Unbent by winds, unchill'd by snows,
Far from the winters of the west
By every breeze and season blest,
Returns the sweets by nature given

In softest incense back to heaven;

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20

25

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* The attachment of the nightingale to the rose is a well-known Persian fable-if I mistake not, the "Bulbul of a thousand tales" is one

of his appellations.

And

every charm and grace hath mixed

Within the paradise she fixed

There man, enamour'd of distress,

Should mar it into wilderness,

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*The guitar is the constant amusement of the Greek sailor by night, with a steady fair wind, and during a calm, it is accompanied always by the voice, and often by dancing.

B 2

And trample, brute-like, o'er each flower

That tasks not one laborious hour;

Nor claims the culture of his hand

To bloom along the fairy land,
But springs as to preclude his care,

And sweetly woos him-but to spare!
Strange that where all is peace beside

There passion riots in her pride,

And lust and rapine wildly reign
To darken o'er the fair domain.
It is as though the fiends prevail'd

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60

The first dark day of nothingness,

The last of danger and distress;

(Before Decay's effacing fingers

Have swept the lines where beauty lingers,)

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That fires not-wins not-weeps not-now

So fair-so calm-so softly seal'd

The first-last look-by death reveal❜ḍ+!

# Aye, but to die and go we know not where,
"To lie in cold obstruction."

Measure for Measure, Act III. 130. Sc. 2, ↑ I trust that few of my readers have ever had an opportunity of witnessing what is here attempted in description, but those who have will probably retain a painful remembrance of that singular beauty which pervades, with few exceptions, the features of the dead, a few hours, and but for a few hours after "the spirit is not there." It is to be re