XXXIV.

Aye as I went, that maiden who had reared The torch of Truth afar, of whose high deeds

The Hermit in his pilgrimage had heard,
Haunted my thoughts.

sickness feeds

Ah, Hope its

With whatsoe'er it finds, or flowers or weeds!

Could she be Cythna? Was that corpse

a shade

Such as self-torturing thought from madness breeds?

Why was this hope not torture? Yet it

made

A light around my steps which would not ever fade.

Over the Asian mountains, and, outspread

The plain, the City, and the Camp, below,

Skirted the midnight ocean's glimmering

flow;

The City's moonlit spires and myriad lamps Like stars in a sublunar sky did glow, And fires blazed far amid the scattered

camps,

Like springs of flame which burst where'er swift Earthquake stamps.

II.

All slept but those in watchful arms who stood,

And those who sate tending the beacon's light,

And the few sounds from that vast multi

tude

Made silence more profound. - Oh, what a might

Of human thought was cradled in that night!

How many hearts impenetrably veiled

Beat underneath its shade, what secret fight Evil and good, in woven passions mailed, Waged through that silent throng, a war that never failed!

III.

And now the Power of Good held victory,
So, through the labyrinth of many a tent,
Among the silent millions who did lie
In innocent sleep, exultingly I went;

His downward face." A friend!" I cried

aloud,

And quickly common hopes made freemen

I

understood.

IV.

sate beside him while the morning beam

Crept slowly over Heaven, and talked with him

Of those immortal hopes, a glorious theme! Which led us forth, until the stars grew

dim:

And all the while methought his voice did swim

As if it drownèd in remembrance were

Of thoughts which make the moist eyes overbrim :

At last, when daylight 'gan to fill the air, He looked on me, and cried in wonder,

"Thou art here!"

V.

Then, suddenly, I knew it was the youth
In whom its earliest hopes my spirit

found;

But envious tongues had stained his spotless truth,

And thoughtless pride his love in silence bound,

And shame and sorrow mine in toils had

wound,

Whilst he was innocent, and I deluded;

The truth now came upon me, on the ground

Tears of repenting joy, which fast intruded, Fell fast, and o'er its peace our mingling spirits brooded.

VI.

Thus while with rapid lips and earnest eyes We talked, a sound of sweeping conflict,

spread