"Tis true, they are a lawless brood, And oft around the cavern-fire To snatch the Rayahs from their fate. But be the star that guides the wanderer, Thou my Zuleika, share and bless my bark; The Dove of peace and promise to mine ark! Or, since that hope denied in worlds of strife, Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life! The evening-beam that smiles the clouds Though fortune frown, or falser friends betray. How dear the dream in darkest hours of ill, Should all be changed, to find thee faithful still! Be but thy soul, like Selim's, firmly shown; To thee be Selim's tender as thine own; To soothe each sorrow,share in each delight, Blend every thought, do all—but disunite! Once free, 'tis mine our horde again to guide; Friends to each other, foes to aught beside: Yet there we follow but the bent assign'd By fatal nature to man's warring kind: Mark! where his carnage and his conquests cease! He makes a solitude, and calls it—peace! I like the rest must use my skill or strength, But ask no land beyond my sabre's length: Power sways but by division-her resource The blest alternative of fraud or force! Ours be the last; in time deceit may come When cities cage us in a social home: There even thy soul might err-how oft the heart Corruption shakes which peril could not part! And woman, more than man, when death or woe Or even Disgrace would lay her lover low, By Osman's power and Giaffir's stern decree. That dread shall vanish with the favouring gale, Which Love to-night hath promised to my sail : No danger daunts the pair his smile hath blest, Their steps still roving, but their hearts at rest. With thee all toils are sweet, each clime hath charms; Earth-sea alike—our world within our arms! Ay-let the loud winds whistle o'er the deck, So that those arms cling closer round my neck: The deepest murmur of this lip shall be But hence ye thoughts that rise in Horror's shape! This hour bestows, or ever bars escape. Few words remain of mine my tale to close; Of thine but one to waft us from our foes; Yea-foes-to me will Giaffir's hate decline? And is not Osman, who would part us, thine? "His head and faith from doubt and death | Farewell, Zuleika !-Sweet! retire: Yet stay within—here linger safe, Zuleika, mute and motionless, Far, wide, through every thicket spread, Dauntless he stood-" Tis come-soon One kiss, Zuleika- 'tis my last: One bound he made, and gain'd the sand : Another falls-but round him close Escaped from shot, unharm'd by steel, Morn slowly rolls the clouds away; Steps stamp'd; and dash'd into the sand 'Tis rent in twain-one dark-red stain The sea-birds shriek above the prey, What recks it, though that corse shall lie The bird that tears that prostrate form The only heart, the only eye Had bled or wept to see him die, Had seen those scatter'd limbs composed, And mourn'd above his turban-stone, Thought of the gloomy day and ghastly That winds around, and tears the quivering Ah! wherefore not consume it - and depart! By that same hand Abdallah -- Selim bled. She, whom thy sultan had but seen to Thy Daughter's dead! Within the place of thousand tombs That heart hath burst-that eye was closed-The sad but living cypress glooms By Helle's stream there is a voice of wail! The loud Wul-wulleh warn his distant ear? Thou didst not view thy Selim fall! He was thy hope- thy joy-thy love-thine And that last thought on him thou couldst Sufficed to kill; not save And withers not, though branch and leaf - A single rose is shedding there Burst forth in one wild cry—and all was still. was thy first! Thrice happy! ne'er to feel nor fear the force remorse! And, oh! that pang where more than Mad⚫ness lies! The worm that will not sleep - and never dies; It were the Bulbul; but his throat, They scarce can bear the morn to break And longer yet would weep and wake, But when the day-blush bursts from high And some have been who could believe Tis from her cypress' summit heard, There late was laid a marble stone; daughters, may there be found; and Collins, when he denominated his Oriental his Irish Eclogues, was not aware how true, at least, was a part of his parallel. Your imagination will create a warmer sun, and less cloudy sky; but wildness, tenderness, and originality are part of your national claim of oriental descent, to which you have already thus far proved your title more clearly than the most zealous of your country's antiquarians. I DEDICATE to you the last production with which I shall trespass on public patience, and your indulgence, for some years; and I own that I feel anxious to avail myself of this latest and only opportunity of adorning my pages with a name, consecrated by unshaken public principle, and the most undoubted and various talents. While May I add a few words on a subject on Ireland ranks you among the firmest of her which all men are supposed to be fluent, patriots; while you stand alone the first of and none agreeable?-Self. I have written her bards in her estimation, and Britain much, and published more than enough to repeats and ratifies the decree, permit one, demand a longer silence than I now mediwhose only regret, since our first acquaint- tate; but for some years to come it is my ance, has been the years he had lost before intention to tempt no further the award of it commenced, to add the humble but sin-|"Gods, men, nor columns." In the present cere suffrage of friendship, to the voice of composition I have attempted not the most more than one nation. It will at least prove | difficult, but, perhaps, the best adapted to you, that I have neither forgotten the measure to our language, the good old and gratification derived from your society, nor now neglected heroic couplet. The stanza abandoned the prospect of its renewal, of Spenser is perhaps too slow and digniwhenever your leisure or inclination allows | fied for narrative; though I confess, it is you to atone to your friends for too long the measure most after my own heart. Scott an absence. It is said among those friends, alone, of the present generation, has hitherto I trust truly, that you are engaged in the composition of a poem whose scene will be laid in the East; none can do those scenes so much justice. The wrongs of your own country, the magnificent and fiery spirit of her sons, the beauty and feeling of her completely triumphed over the fatal facility of the octo-syllabic verse; and this is not the least victory of his fertile and mighty genius: in blank verse, Milton, Thomson, and our dramatists, are the beacons that shine along the deep, but warn Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey. us from the rough and barren rock on which | These are our realms, no limits to their they are kindled. The heroic couplet is swaynot the most popular measure certainly; but as I did not deviate into the other from a wish to flatter what is called public opinion, I shall quit it without further apology, and take my chance once more with that versification, in which I have hitherto published nothing but compositions whose former circulation is part of my present and will be of my future regret. Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave; Not thou, vain lord of wantonness and ease! Whom slumber soothes not-pleasure cannot please Oh, who can tell, save he whose heart hath tried, And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide, That thrills the wanderer of that trackless With regard to my story, and stories in general, I should have been glad to have rendered my personages more perfect and amiable, if possible, inasmuch as I have been sometimes criticised, and considered no less responsible for their deeds and qualities than if all had been personal. Be it so if I have deviated into the gloomy vanity of "drawing from self," the pictures are probably like, since they are unfavourable; and if not, those who know me are undeceived, and those who do not, I have little interest in undeceiving. I have no particular desire that any but my acquaint- | And where the feebler faint—can only feel— ance should think the author better than Feel-to the rising bosom's inmost core, the beings of his imagining; but I cannot Its hope awaken and its spirit soar? help a little surprise, and perhaps amuse- No dread of death-if with us die our foesment, at some odd critical exceptions in Save that it seems even duller than repose: the present instance, when I see several Come when it will-we snatch the life of bards (far more deserving, I allow), in lifevery reputable plight, and quite exempted from all participation in the faults of those heroes, who, nevertheless, might be found with little more morality than "The Giaour," and perhaps but no-I must admit Childe Harold to be a very repulsive personage; and as to his identity, those who like it must give him whatever "alias" they please. If, however, it were worth while to remove the impression, it might be of some service to me, that the man who is alike the delight of his readers and his friends, the poet of all circles, and the idol of his own, permits me here and elsewhere to subscribe myself, most truly and affectionately, January 2, 1814. CANTO I -nessun maggior dolore, "O'ER the glad waters of the dark blue sea, Survey our empire and behold our home! When lost-what recks it by disease or Let him who crawls enamour'd of decay, Ours-the fresh turf, and not the feverish While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul, control. His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave, And they who loathed his life may gild his grave: Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed, When Ocean shrouds and sepulchres our For us even banquets fond regret supply And cry, Remembrance saddening o'er each Such were the notes that from the Pirate's isle, Around the kindling watch-fire rang the while; Such were the sounds that thrill'd the rocks along, |