We, in some unknown Power's employ, Can neither, when we will, enjoy; I in the world must live:-but thou, Wilt not, if thou canst see me now, For thou art gone away from earth, And with that small transfigured Band, Whom many a different way Conducted to their common land, Thou learn'st to think as they. Christian and pagan, king and slave, They do not ask, who pined unseen, Whose one bond is that all have been There without anger thou wilt see No more, so he but rest, like thee, Unsoiled:-and so, farewell! Farewell!-Whether thou now liest near The ripples of whose blue waves cheer And in that gracious region bland, Between the dusty vineyard walls The pensive stranger's face, And stoops to clear thy moss-grown date Where between granite terraces The blue Seine rolls her wave, The Capital of Pleasure sees Farewell! Under the sky we part, In this stern Alpine dell: TH Edwin Arnold. THE EGYPTIAN PRINCESS. Herodotus, Book II. ap. 132. HERE was fear and destion over swarthy Egypt's land, From the holy city of the sun to hot Syenè's sand; The sistrum and the cymbal slept, the merry dance no more Trampled the evening river-buds by Nile's embroidered shore, For the daughter of the king must die, the dark magicians said, Before the red sun sank to rest that day in ocean's bed. And all that day the temple-smoke loaded the heavy air, But they prayed to one who heedeth none, nor heareth earnest prayer. That day the gonfalons were down, the silver lamps untrimmed, Sad at their oars the rowers sat, silent the Nile-boat skimmed, And through the land there went a wail of bitterest agony, From the iron hills of Nubia to the islands of the sea. There, in the very hall where once her laugh had loudest been, Where but that morning she had worn the wreath of Beauty's Queen, She lay, a lost but lovely thing--the wreath was on her brow, Alas! the lotus might not match its chilly paleness now; her eye. Her coal-black hair was tangled, and the sigh of parting day Stirred tremblingly its silky folds as on her breast they lay; How heavily her rounded arm lay buried by her side! How droopingly her lashes seemed those star-bright eyes to hide! And once there played upon her lips a smile like summer air, As though Death came with gentle face, and she mocked her idle fear. Low o'er the dying maiden's form the king and father bows, Stern anguish holds the place of pride upon the monarch's brows: "My daughter, in the world thou leav'st so dark without thy smile, Hast thou one care a father's love-a king's word may beguile Hast thou one last light wish-'tis thine-by Isis' throne on high, If Egypt's blood can win it thee, or Egypt's treasure buy.” How anxiously he waits her words!-upon the painted wall In long gold lines the dying lights between the columns fall; It lends her sinking limbs a glow, her pallid cheek a blush, hear The words that will be iron chains to bind them to her prayer :— "Father, dear father, it is hard to die so very young, Summer was coming, and I thought to see the flowers sprung, Must it be always dark like this?—I cannot see thy faceI am dying—hold me, father, in thy kind and close em brace; Oh, let them sometimes bear me where the merry sunbeams lie: I know thou wilt-farewell, farewell!—'tis easier now to die!" Small need of bearded leeches there; not all Arabia's store Of precious balm could purchase her one ray of sunlight more; Was it strange that tears were glistening where tears should never be, When death had smitten down to dust the beautiful and free? Was it strange that warriors should raise a woman's earnest cry For help and hope to Heaven's throne, when such as she must die? And ever when the shining sun has brought the summer round, And the Nile rises fast and full along the thirsty ground, |