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(From Thalaba the Destroyer, Book IV)
STILL o’er the wilderness | |
| Settled the moveless mist. | |
| The timid antelope, that heard their steps, | |
| Stood doubtful where to turn in that dim light. | |
| The ostrich, blindly hastening, met them full. | 5 |
| At night, again in hope, | |
| Young Thalaba lay down: | |
| The morning came, and not one guiding ray | |
| Through the thick mist was visible, | |
| The same deep moveless mist that mantled all. | 10 |
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| O for the vulture’s scream, | |
| Who haunts for prey the abode of humankind! | |
| O for the plover’s pleasant cry | |
| To tell of water near! | |
| O for the camel-driver’s song! | 15 |
| For now the water-skin grows light, | |
| Though of the draught, more eagerly desired, | |
| Imperious prudence took with sparing thirst. | |
| Oft from the third night’s broken sleep, | |
| As in his dreams he heard | 20 |
| The sound of rushing winds, | |
| Started the anxious youth, and looked abroad, | |
| In vain! for still the deadly calm endured. | |
| Another day passed on; | |
| The water-skin was drained; | 25 |
| But then one hope arrived, | |
| For there was motion in the air! | |
| The sound of the wind arose anon, | |
| That scattered the thick mist, | |
| And lo! at length the lovely face of Heaven! | 30 |
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| Alas!—a wretched scene | |
| Was opened on their view. | |
| They looked around, no wells were near, | |
| No tent, no human aid! | |
| Flat on the camel lay the water-skin, | 35 |
| And their dumb servant difficultly now, | |
| Over hot sands and under the hot sun, | |
| Dragged on with patient pain. | |
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| But O the joy! the blessed sight! | |
| When in that burning waste the travellers | 40 |
| Saw a green meadow, fair with flowers besprent, | |
| Azure and yellow, like the beautiful fields | |
| Of England, when amid the growing grass | |
| The bluebell bends, the golden king-cup shines, | |
| And the sweet cowslip scents the genial air, | 45 |
| In the merry month of May; | |
| O joy! the travellers | |
| Gaze on each other with hope-brightened eyes, | |
| For sure through that green meadow flows | |
| The living stream! And lo! their famished beast | 50 |
| Sees the restoring sight! | |
| Hope gives his feeble limbs a sudden strength, | |
| He hurries on!— | |
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| The herbs so fair to eye | |
| Were senna, and the gentian’s blossom blue, | 55 |
| And kindred plants, that with unwatered root | |
| Fed in the burning sand, whose bitter leaves | |
| Even frantic Famine loathed. | |
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