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• from every beauteous race beneath the sun,' that he may give them a holy education, and make of them a young nursery for heaven. In this galaxy of lips and eyes,' is a beautiful young maniac, who had entered the Haram in the rapturous belief, that she should be trained up there, to be the bride in paradise of a lover, whom she supposed to be dead. Her burning spirit is here wrought upon to her ruin, so that she even glories in being the honoured victim of Mokanna, fondly dreaming that in yielding to him, she gave herself to heaven. The real horrour of this is somewhat relieved by their private wedding in the charnel-house, where she binds herself to the prophet forever, over a bowl of red charnel wine. It is further relieved by some unusual phenomena in Zelica's madness, for not only does her reason come and go at Mr. Moore's pleasure, but even while utterly deranged, she is at times a perfectly unconscious sinner, at others, the slave of zeal and ambition, aware of Mokanna's treachery and her own guilt, but afraid to amend her ways, because of her oath, and even hoping that her patient continuance in evil doing, will most effectually purify her spirit. This may be honest delirium, but we should not be surprised, if it were utter nonsense.

With her delirious raptures are mingled the fire and glare of something unholy. The picture of her dishonoured beauty is mournful enough; but Mr. Moore hangs over it with too much complacency.

'Light, lovely limbs, to which the spirit's play
Gave motion, airy as the dancing spray,

When from its stem the small bird wings away!
Lips, in whose rosy labyrinth, when she smil'd,
The soul was lost; and blushes, swift and wild
As are the momentary meteors sent

Across th' uncalm but beauteous firmament.
And then her look!-oh! where's the heart so wise,
(ould unbewilder'd meet those matchless eyes?
Quick, restless, strange, but exquisite withal,
Like those of angels, just before their fall;

Now shadow'd with the shames of earth, now crost
By glimpses of the heaven her heart had lost;

In every glance there broke, without contrpul,
The flashes of a bright but troubled soul,
Where sensibility still wildly play'd,

Like lightning, round the ruins it had made.' p. 27.

Zelica and the rest of the sainted colony' were hidden spectators of Azim's publick reception, and she recognizes in the proselyte her long-lost lover, of whose heart, we may remember, she hoped to be more worthy in heaven, by the purifying influences of transgression upon earth,

as perfumes rise,

Through flame and smoke, most welcome to the skies.' p. 30. The sight of Azim restores her reason sufficiently to apprize her of her condition in the Haram, but not to confirm in her the purpose of virtue. Her oath in the charnel-house rushes over her, and buries her in darkness again. At this moment, she is summoned to attend Mokanna in his place of prayer, and as she was now, for the first time, slow in obeying the call, he has leisure to rail awhile at mankind for standing in awe of such a wretch as himself. There he lay, upon his couch in the cool garden oratory,' with soft lights around him, such as lovely maids look loveliest in,' covered with his silver veil, drinking largely of white wine and red, pondering in deep reverie, and then bursting out in the merriest and most vulgar abuse of human nature.

He has none of Timon's sad, vehement misanthropy, nor of Richard's malicious scorn and fine sarcasm,nor of Satan's proud vindictiveness and unguarded sorrow. He is,as we hinted before, a sour Jacobin, some low, clamorous ruffian, suddenly grown up to be a gentleman. His character exhibits, for a time, with considerable clearness and consistency, a combination of vile and prosperous insolence with lust and malignity-no very tempting compound, we admit, either in life or poetry, though it might require some skill, to form and preserve it. But Mr. Moore was too delicate an artist to rest satisfied with the close truth of a low, vicious character. Because the prophet was vigorous, cunning and fearless, he must needs be invested with grandeur, and become a finished gallant, a subtle poisoner of innocence and a sublime warriour. To render him still more poetical, Mr. Moore has made a desperate effort to give him the ferocious levity and deadly irony, which sometimes throw a gleam of frightful mirth over a dark and severe character, deepening its malignity and horrour, like the grim smile, that glares amidst the scowls and shadow, the solitude and midnight of the countenance. Mokanna, however, remains inflexibly vulgar, in spite of all that

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Mr. Moore can do to heighten or rather mar his character. We may observe here, that he rarely looks upon a character as an individual, or a consistent whole. He appears to have certain prominent abstract qualities, virtues or vices, in store, which he has determined to attach to the first poetical personage, that comes in his way. He only wants an opportunity to bring them forward-it is of no concern to him whether the character hangs well together, is governed by any single principle, in a word, whether it has individuality or not. This may account for the singular incongruity of some of his characters and the ostentatious insignificance of others.-But to return.

Poor Zelica, who has heard a good deal of the soliloquy, startles him at length by a piteous exclamation; but our prophet, recovering himself, turns to her with the wiliest gallantry of a modern rake, and begs her, for the sake of her soul and eyes, to take some inspiring juice, which Genii had brought him from the upper sphere,-for, that night, he must rely upon the power of her perfect beauty, to vanquish the virtue, as the world called it, of young Azim, and soften his heart for the reception of religious impressions. Her answer is a little too declamatory, but with an expression at times, of horrour, tenderness and despair.

Great God! to whom

I once knelt innocent, is this my doom ?

Are all my dreams, my hopes of heavenly bliss,
My purity, my pride, then come to this,-
To live, the wanton of a fiend! to be

The pander of his guilt.'

p. 38.

And sunk, myself, as low as hell can steep
In its hot flood, drag others down as deep!
Others?-ha! yes-that youth who came to-day-
Not him I lov'd-not him'-
p. 39.

Must he too, glorious as he is, be driven

A renegade like me from love and heaven?

Like me? weak wretch, I wrong him-not like me ;
No-he's all truth, and strength and purity!
Fill up your madd'ning hell-cup to the brim,
Its witchery, fiend, will have no charm for him.
Let loose your glowing wantons from their bowers,
He loves, he loves, and can defy their powers!
Wretch as I am, in his heart still I reign
Pure as when first we met.'

'Far off to some benighted land I'll fly,

Where sunbeam ne'er shall enter till I die;

Where none will ask the lost one whence she came,
But I may fade and fall without a name !

And thou-curst man or fiend, whate'er thou art,
Who found'st this burning plague-spot in my heart,
And spread'st it,-Oh, so quick!-thro' soul and frame
With more than demon's art, till I became

A loathsome thing, all pestilence, all flame !—

If, when I'm gone

p. 40.

The prophet breaks in, and repays her at first with the coarsest taunts, and then with harsh violence, like one who loves to crush the weak, and deride the sorrows of the proud as well as humble. And when he finds this unavailing, he subdues her by recalling her oath and the private wedding, assures her that he is a knave, favours her with a sight of his face, and all this to prevail upon her to seduce her own lover. Surely our prophet wants even the poor virtue of jealousy, as well as a moderate share of sagacity.

Mr. Moore is of course quite at home in the Haram, where we are detained some time, by Eastern luxuries of all sorts, from the arts of elegance to those of seduction.

The younger part of the sisterhood are out in the moonlight, gathering fresh chaplets for their heads, and there is something cool and innocent in their remembrance of home.

'Gay creatures! sweet, though mournful 'tis to see
How each prefers a garland from that tree,
Which brings to mind her childhood's innocent day,
And the dear fields and friendships far away.
The maid of India, blest again to hold
In her full lap the Champac's leaves of gold,
Thinks of the time, when, by the Ganges' flood,
Her little playmates scatter'd many a bud
Upon her long black hair, with glossy gleam
Just dripping from the consecrated stream.
While the young Arab, haunted by the smell
Of her own mountain flowers, as by a spell,
Sees, call'd up round her by these magic scents,
The well, the camels, and her father's tents;
Sighs for the home she left with little pain,
And wishes e'en its sorrows back again.' p. 47.

Mr. Moore should have dreaded the interview between Azim and Zelica. Nothing in the story offers more for poetry, but it called for real passion-it required a poet, who could understand the heart when it was in earnest, and lend it simple utterance. It was a time to throw aside all mockery, all consciousness of art, all the vanity of this world, and suffer passion to have entire sway, whether it poured in grief, or imploring remorse or perfect love.-Zelica swoons as she approachesAzim, and he, after slowly recognizing her, breathes in this strain, his sweetest consolation and sympathy.

• Come, look upon thy Azim-one dear glance,
Like those of old, were heaven! whatever chance
Hath brought thee here, Oh! 'twas a blessed one!
There-my sweet lids-they move that kiss hath run
Like the first shoot of life through every vein,

And now I clasp her, mine, all mine again!' p. 65.

To avert his desperate anguish, when he learns her fallen condition, she enters at once into an explanation of her conduct, but in a strain that partakes more of narrative tranquillity than of strong passion or subdued grief. She closes with as much resignation as we expected.

Thou weep'st for me-do, weep-Oh! that I durst
Kiss off that tear! but, no-these lips are curst,
They must not touch thee;-one divine caress,
One blessed moment of forgetfulness

I've had within those arms, and that shall lie,
Shrin❜d in my soul's deep memory till I die!
That last of joy's last relics here below,
The one sweet drop in all this waste of wo,
My heart has treasur'd from affection's spring,
To sooth and cool its deadly withering!" p. 68.

Azim is nearly frantick, when she assures him that guilt has separated her from him forever-but he seems to have caught a little of her composed manner of speaking. We suspect they are both merely manufacturing verses, and thinking chiefly of some beautiful images which they are anxious to bring in.

Zelica, Zelica !the youth exclaim'd,

In all the tortures of a mind inflam'd

Almost to madness by that sacred heaven,

Where yet, if pray'rs can move, thou❜lt be forgiv'n,