Like ships that have gone down at sea,
When heaven was all tranquillity!
A something, light as air-a look,

A word unkind or wrongly taken-
Oh! love, that tempests never shook,

A breath, a touch like this hath shaken. And ruder words will soon rush in To spread the breach that words begin; And eyes forget the gentle ray They wore in courtship's smiling day; And voices lose the tone that shed A tenderness round all they said; Till fast declining, one by one, The sweetnesses of love are gone, And hearts, so lately mingled, seem Like broken clouds, or like the stream, That smiling left the mountain's brow

As though its waters ne'er could sever, Yet, ere it reach the plain below,

Breaks into floods, that part for ever.

Oh, you, that have the charge of Love,
Keep him in rosy bondage bound,
As in the Fields of Bliss above

He sits, with flow'rets fetter'd round ;-
Loose not a tie that round him clings,
Nor ever let him use his wings;
For ev'n an hour, a minute's flight
Will rob the plumes of half their light.
Like that celestial bird,-whose nest

Is found beneath far Eastern skies,-Whose wings, though radiant when at rest, Lose all their glory when he flies!

HAT evening, (trusting that his soul

Might be from haunting love released

By mirth, by music, and the bowl,)
The' Imperial SELIM held a feast

In his magnificent Shalimar :-
In whose Saloons, when the first star
Of evening o'er the waters trembled,
The Valley's loveliest all assembled ;
All the bright creatures that, like dreams,
Glide through its foliage, and drink beams
Of beauty from its founts and streams;
And all those wand'ring minstrel-maids,
Who leave-how can they leave?—the shades
Of that dear Valley, and are found
Singing in gardens of the South

Those songs, that ne'er so sweetly sound
As from a young Cashmerian's mouth.

There, too, the Haram's inmates smile;Maids from the West, with sun-bright hair, And from the Garden of the NILE,

Delicate as the roses there ;

Daughters of Love from CYPRUS' rocks,
With Paphian diamonds in their locks ;-
Light PERI forms, such as they are
On the gold meads of CANDAHAR ;
And they, before whose sleepy eyes,

In their own bright Kathaian bow'rs,
Sparkle such rainbow butterflies,

That they might fancy the rich flow'rs, That round them in the sun lay sighing, Had been by magic all set flying.

Every thing young, every thing fair
From East and West is blushing there,
Except-except-oh, NOURMAHAL !
Thou loveliest, dearest of them all,
The one whose smile shone out alone,

Amidst a world the only one;
Whose light, among so many lights,
Was like that star on starry nights
The seaman singles from the sky,
To steer his bark for ever by!

Thou wert not there-so SELIM thought,

And everything seem'd drear without thee;
But, ah! thou wert, thou wert,-and brought
Thy charm of song all fresh about thee.
Mingling unnoticed with a band
Of lutanists from many a land,
And veil'd by such a mask as shades
The features of young Arab maids,-
A mask that leaves but one eye free,
To do its best in witchery,-
She roved, with beating heart, around,

And waited, trembling, for the minute,
When she might try if still the sound
Of her loved lute had magic in it.

The board was spread with fruits and wine; With grapes of gold, like those that shine On CASBIN'S hills;-pomegranates full

Of melting sweetness, and the pears And sunniest apples that CAUBUL

In all its thousand gardens bears ;— Plantains, the golden and the green, MALAYA'S nectar'd mangusteen ; Prunes of BOKHARA, and sweet nuts

From the far groves of SAMARCAND, And BASRA dates, and apricots,

Seed of the Sun, from IRAN's land ;With rich conserve of Visna cherries, Of orange flowers, and of those berries

That, wild and fresh, the young gazelles
Feed on in ERAC's rocky dells.
All these in richest vases smile,

In baskets of pure santal-wood,
And urns of porcelain from that isle
Sunk underneath the Indian flood,
Whence oft the lucky diver brings
Vases to grace the halls of kings.
Wines, too, of every clime and hue,

Around their liquid lustre threw :
Amber Rosolli,-the bright dew

From vineyards of the Green-Sea gushing;
And SHIRAZ wine, that richly ran

As if that jewel, large and rare, The ruby for which KUBLAI-KHAN Offer'd a city's wealth, was blushing,

Melted within the goblets there!

And amply SELIM quaffs of each,
And seems resolved the flood shall reach
His inward heart,-shedding around
A genial deluge, as they run,
That soon shall leave no spot undrown'd,
For Love to rest his wings upon.
He little knew how well the boy

Can float upon a goblet's streams,
Lighting them with his smile of joy ;—

As bards have seen him in their dreams, Down the blue GANGES laughing glide Upon a rosy lotus wreath,

Catching new lustre from the tide

That with his image shone beneath.