For Ali had a sword, much like himself,
A crooked blade, guilty of human gore-
The trophies it had lopped from many an elf
Were stuck at his head-quarters by the score-
Nor yet in peace he laid it on the shelf,
But jested with it, and his wit cut sore;
So that (as they of Public Houses speak)
He often did his dozen butts a week.
Therefore his slaves, with most obedient fears,
Came with the sack the lady to enclose;
In vain from her stag-eyes "the big round tears.
Coursed one another down her innocent nose;"
In vain her tongue wept sorrow in their ears;
Though there were some felt willing to oppose,
Yet when their heads came in their heads, that minute.
Though 'twas a piteous case, they put her in it.
And when the sack was tied, some two or three
Of these black undertakers slowly brought her
To a kind of Moorish Serpentine; for she
Was doomed to have a winding sheet of water.
Then farewell, earth-farewell to the green tree-
Farewell, the sun—the moon-each little daughter!
She's shot from off the shoulders of a black,
Like a bag of Wall's End from a coalman's back.
The waters oped, and the wide sack full-filled
All that the waters oped, as down it fell;
Then closed the wave, and then the surface rilled
A ring above her, like a water-knell;
A moment more, and all its face was stilled,
And not a guilty heave was left to tell
That underneath its calm and blue transparence
A dame lay drowned in her sack, like Clarence.
But Heaven beheld, and awful witness bore,
The moon in black eclipse deceased that night,
Like Desdemona smothered by the Moor;
The lady's natal star with pale affright
Fainted and fell—and what were stars before
Turned comets as the tale was brought to light;
And all looked downward on the fatal wave,
And made their own reflections on her grave.
Next night, a head—a little lady head,
Pushed through the waters a most glassy face,
With weedy tresses, thrown apart and spread,
Combed by 'live ivory, to show the space
Of a pale forehead, and two eyes that shed
A soft blue mist, breathing a bloomy grace
Over their sleepy lids-and so she raised
Her aqualine nose above the stream, and gazed.
She oped her lips-lips of a gentle blush,
So pale it seemed near drowned to a whiteShe oped her lips, and forth there sprang a gush Of music bubbling through the surface light; The leaves are motionless, the breezes hush
To listen to the air-and through the night There came these words of a most plaintive ditty, Sobbing as they would break all hearts with pity:
Farewell, farewell, to my mother's own daughter,
The child that she wet-nursed is lapped in the wave
The Mussulman coming to fish in this water,
Adds a tear to the flood that weeps over her grave.
This sack is her coffin, this water's her bier,
This grayish bath cloak is her funeral pall,
And, stranger, O stranger! this song that you hear
Is her epitaph, elegy, dirges, and all !
Farewell, farewell, to the child of Al Hassan,
My mother's own daughter-the last of her race— She's a corpse, the poor body! and lies in this basin, And sleeps in the water that washes her face.
'TWAS in the reign of Lewis, called the Great,
As one may read on his triumphal arches,
The thing befell I'm going to relate,
In course of one of those "
pomposo" marches
He loved to make, like any gorgeous Persian,
Partly for war, and partly for diversion.
Some wag had put it in the royal brain
To drop a visit at an old chateau,
Quite unexpected, with his courtly train;
The monarch liked it—but it happened so,
That Death had got before them by a post,
And they were "reckoning without their host."
Who died exactly as a child should die,
Without one groan or a convulsive breath,
Closing without one pang his quiet eye,
Sliding composedly from sleep-to death;
A corpse so placid ne'er adorned a bed,
He seemed not quite-but only rather dead.
All night the widowed Baroness contrived
To shed a widow's tears; but on the morrow
Some news of such unusual sort arrived,
There came strange alteration in her sorrow; From mouth to mouth it passed, one common humming Throughout the house-the King! the King is coming!
The Baroness, with all her soul and heart,
A loyal woman (now called ultra royal),
Soon thrust all funeral concerns apart,
And only thought about a banquet loyal;
In short, by aid of earnest preparation,
The visit quite dismissed the visitation.
And, spite of all her grief for the ex-mate,
There was a secret hope she could not smother,
That some one, early, might replace "the late"-
It was too soon to think about another;
Yet let her minutes of despair be reckoned
Against her hope, which was but for a second.
She almost thought that being thus bereft
Just then, was one of time's propitious touches;
A thread in such a nick so nicked, it left
Free opportunity to be a duchess;
Thus all her care was only to look pleasant,
But as for tears-she dropped them--for the present.
Her household, as good servants ought to try,
Looked like their lady-any thing but sad,
And giggled even that they might not cry,
To damp fine company; in truth they had
No time to mourn, through choking turkeys' throttles,
Scouring old laces, and reviewing bottles.
Oh what a hubbub for the house of wo!
All, resolute to one irresolution,
Kept tearing, swearing, plunging to and fro,
Just like another French mob-revolution.
There lay the corpse that could not stir a muscle,
But all the rest seemed Chaos in
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