Then shall our monarch hunt; they, famine-clung,
Shall sweep the barren hills with lolling tongue,
Where no prey is, led thither on pretence
That there 'twas seen: it since has wander'd thence.
Then Chud, instructed, shall his sovereign lure
To nearer hills, as if it there were sure;
And in the noon shall he his beagles lead
To where the wild king loiters with his steed.
Behold them started! Rush the kindled pack—
Not even unfeign'd restraint could keep them back;
So fiercely hunger pricks their headlong way,
Against their instinct, on the unwonted prey.
Onward they drive: At once, perhaps 'tis well-
The ox-king falls before their crowding yell;
Nor bone, nor scalp, the bloody grass alone
Next moment tells our fears with him are gone.
If Chud from royal game can them restrain,
At least on Zublon shall they go amain;
Or falls the horse, or flees but soon to fall.
The mad king sees his son-has seen it all.
That son away pursues the storm of chase,
And ne'er again dares see his father's face.
What must he do? The rest has been explain'd:
His sire must die: Our place is thus maintain'd."-
"This more: Our king, when prince, with bold desire Loved Cyra, heedless of his angry sire.
When Heaven's decree against the latter sped,
The stag-eyed damsel from the palace fled.
But I have learn'd her haunt; far in the wild
She dwells, a Jewish hind's adopted child,
Th' embruted monarch near; for her's the praise
To love, to tend him through his humbled days.
So let this maid be carried from her place,
Say on the night of our appointed chase ;
Then, for I know our monarch loves her still,
Shall she become the creature of his will.
Then in his hours of hope unfilial
And mingled fear, shall we declare her thrall-
Thus from the service of his father gained
By force, and in his palace thus detained.
So shall he feel again that father wronged;
And dare be bold, to have his life prolonged."-
"Our scheme is doubly one, how wisely blent!
It but remains to push it to th' event.
This be in haste; for Persia's menaced war
Against us hangs upon the east afar.
The issue? Good our plan in any case.
But now our king has leisure for the chase."-
"Behold the first faint shoots of morning light
Breathe upward through the shadowy cone of night,
Sickening the eastern stars: 'Tis now the time,
Old Chardes waits us on his watch sublime;
From him the signs celestial shall we know,
Shape farther plans, and onward safely go."
BEFORE her cavern stands at eventide
Cyra, her harp clear glittering by her side.
Now for the king she looks far east away,
And now she turns unto the setting day;
She vails her dazzled face, her garments shine
With molten gold, like angel robes divine,
Touched by the sun, as large he stoops to rest
Beyond th' Assyrian kingdoms in the west.
Eastward again she looked; she cleared her eye—
Ha! yes, she sees come o'er yon mountain high
A courser white; swift dogs are on his rear;
Upcoming hunters on the hill appear.
Can that be Zublon? From the mountain fails
The chase now swallowed by the nearer vales,
Perplexed and wide; again it comes in sight,
And lo! 'tis Zublon sure that leads the flight.
He takes the river, stems it with disdain,
Paws the near shore, forth springs, comes on amain.
The yielding dogs float down athwart the flood,
Swarm on the bank, renew their yells for blood,
Regain their track; inextricable, dense,
With crowding heads they wedge their way intense.
In fear majestic on the charger drew;
White clouds of smoke his seething nostrils blew;
Now streamed his tail on high, now swept the plain;
Abroad were driven the terrors of his mane.
He toiled, he strained, he neared the well-known maid,
Beheld his rock, and turning proudly neighed,
Went reeking past, and rushed into his cave;
And Cyra ran the gallant horse to save.
Quick dipped in oil, and lit, in either hand
Of gummy pine she bore a waving brand,
Forth held them, hasted to the entrance back,
There met the brindled leaders of the pack,
Scorched their dry tongues, and blinded them with fire,
Still kept them back, still forced them to retire.
One minute more! impell'd by crowding power
And hungry rage, the damsel they'll devour.
Great God of love! that moment to the den
With axes came a company of men,
Who on the mountains fell the stately trees:
Homeward returning, on the evening breeze
They heard the tumult, ran, and joy'd to bring
Swift aid to her, the handmaid of their king.
Close banded now within the entrance, they,
With brands and axes kept the hounds at bay,
Smote down the foremost, that with tusky ire,
High fretted necks and boiling eyes of fire,
Came leaping headlong in their lust of food,
And parched desire to dip their mouths in blood;
Till Chud the hunter came with smarting thong,
And down the mountain lashed the yelling throng.
THE lovely moon came up the east, and shone
Sweetly above the hills of Babylon;
And forth young Cyra wandered by her light,
And wet her sandals in the dews of night;
Oft pausing she to strike her harp's clear string,
Through the still vales to lure the homeward king.
Long hours she roamed, but ne'er her wild lord came;
The keener heavens breathed chilly through her frame;
Then back she slowly went, and to divide
The lonely hours, her scented fire supplied.
Nor yet, her hope though fainting, did she leave
Undone the filial duty of each eve;
But mixed his bowls of milk and tempered wine,
With drops infused, the pith of flowers divine,
In gentle wisdom that their healing dew
In nightly sleep his spirit might renew.
A foot, a shadow came, uprose the maid,
'Tis he!-she forward springs-is she afraid ?-
Awed she draws back, she stands in mute surprise,
To see that solemn light within his eyes-
The strict concentred check-the lucid reins
Of reason, ruler o'er ecstatic pains.
With silent love on Cyra long he gazed,
Till came some quick sense of his life abased;
Gleamed his proud tears; into his cave's recess
He strode away in his sublime distress,
As in pale Hades midst dim-visioned things
Stalk the proud shadows of forgotten kings.
Her lamp the maid replenished with the oils
Of fragrant trees, to work her lovely toils.
Too newly, deeply glad for this, she stood
Entranced, till startled by a groan subdued.
Noiseless her footsteps as the falling snows,
With shaded lamp unto the king she goes;
Lets fall the shifting light by mild degrees,
Till now the features of her lord she sees.
He sleeps, yet brokenly; those sultry gleams
Betray a spirit toiling in his dreams.
Forth Cyra hastes, but soon she reappears
With mingled balms; with these, and with her tears
That dropped the while, she washed those dews away
From off his forehead, till refreshed he lay;
Then kissed his cheek, and with a daughter's care
Arranged the wild heaps of his raven hair;
And strewed the opiate herbs around his head,
Their healing virtue on his soul to shed;
And oft withdrew, yet oft came back again,
Till clear he lay from every print of pain.
Then sate the maid, unrolling, white as milk,
Down from her knee a web of Persian silk,
Flower'd by her needle, as her shaping mind
Thereon the King's young conquests had design'd,—
From Nile victorious to the glimmering North,
Whose pictured form with keys of ice came forth;
O'er Tyre triumphant, o'er Damascus, o'er
Great kingdoms eastward to the Indian shore:
All here portrayed in glory and in gloom,
Rich as the work of an enchanted loom.
Her heart a silent covenant had made,
The finish'd gift before him should be laid
That solemn day, when he should leave that den,
Raised up by God again to govern men;
That to his heart, his humbled sense, his awe
Of Him who ruled him with a wondrous law-
His fear from this-his joy, redeem'd—his thought
Of her who loved him, and that picture wrought,
A lasting great memorial it might be,
That he for all should Zion's captives free.
His reason comes; her half-wrought cloth demands
The sleepless haste of her unwearied hands.
Forth came the King; his worn and awful face,
On Cyra bent, began to melt apace
To gleams-how tender! farther still subdued
To mingled tears of more than gratitude.
Stung by some fierce remembrance, fiercely changed,
With sudden strides throughout the cave he ranged;
Like toil-caught lion of his prey bereaved,
The mighty buckles of his bosom heaved;
Wild flew his locks; and darkness o'er his face
Settled, like night upon the desert place.
But trembling came: he knelt with humbled brow,
Solemn as when the ancient forests bow,
Smote by the cardinal winds:-"I know thee well,"
Uprising, said he, " God of Israel!
The bright stars are the dust beneath thy feet!
Vast ages dim not thine essential seat!
Under thy dread permission, in thy sight
I rise a king; but I shall reign aright.
Though greatly wronged, to-day though galled my pride, Yet to my heart shall vengeance be denied.
Yea, by their insults of this day extreme,
My foes have chased my madness like a dream.
Their's no excuse; yet, by thy grace upraised,
To me thy mercy, shall by mine be praised:
For I am humbled; ne'er shall be forgot
Thy power, that curbed me down to such a lot.
O! hear me now for her, this precious child,
More than my daughter on the mountains wild!
For me her dear eyes faint: Great God of Heaven,
Be health, be gladness to young Cyra given!
Let her but live, that I to her may prove
At least a father for her boundless love!"
He ceased: young reverence her eyes abased;
With trembling joy a cup to him she raised.
He took the cup, with murmured love he blessed
The virgin, drank, retired, and lay at rest;
For she had spiced it with the sovereign flowers
Of sleep, to soothe him through the midnight hours.
There sits young Cyra: as her work is sped
Waves the redundant glory of her head,
Her dark and heavy locks. O! more than wife!
O! bold and lavish of thy generous life
For him, thy lord! What though by cares subdued,
Pale is thy cheek, O! virgin greatly good,
All fair art thou as the accomplished eve,
Whose finished glories not a wish can leave;
Yea, more than eve consummate, as her skies
Where lurk the cognate morrow's glorious dyes:
So wears thy youth still promise, still when won
The perfect grace of every duty done!
Yea, who can see thee in this holy hour,
Nor deem thee guarded by supernal power?
Nor deem he sees of watchers here divine,
Incessant gleams around this cavern shine?
Light speed thy task, young Cyra, happy be,
Here angel wings are visitant for thee!
But hush! but hark! ha! see-a stealthy shape!
A second, third!-O! how may she escape ?
She starts-is seized-she struggles-shrieks
In vain; the king in charmed sleep is laid.
Masked forms around her throng, with many a foot
Th' emblazoned web of beauty they pollute.
Even Zublon's help she craves in her dismay;
But yielding, fainting, quick is borne away.
Ta' immortal sun from ocean bounds away,
And from his forehead gives the flaming day.
Long eastward looks from off his terrace high,
The King Chaldean with an anxious eye,
Troubled his brow, for lo! afar descried
Comes on the Persian war sun-glorified.
His shortened gaze in nearer view commands
Th' embattled might of Babylonian lands,
In gorgeous ferment. From the city pour
Fresh hosts continuous through th' impatient hour:
There jostling chariots leap; the tide runs high
With all the pomp of flowing chivalry,
Arabian camels, and Nisæan steeds
Bearing a province of auxiliar Medes.
Onward they scour; for westward o'er the plain
The flower of Persian kingdoms draws its train,-
From where its world of waters Indus brings
To Ocean, upwards by his hoary springs,
To where the Tartar's winking hordes look forth
Over the snowy bastions of the North,-
An army great and terrible: Earth seems
To be on fire beneath their brazen gleams.
Near waxed the fronting lines; intensely keen
They paused, and sternest silence was between.
Loud blew the Persian trumpets; wide the heaven
By one great shout from all their hosts was riven.
Chaldea answered on the west. At once
Th' Immortal Band of Persia's youth advance,
Flanked by a cloudy stir on either side,
Of swarming horse and archers opening wide.
Came o'er each army, darkening like a shroud,
The crossing texture of the arrowy cloud.
Beneath, the vans were locked together grim,
Were interfused the battle's ridges dim,
There opening, closing here, till form gave way,
Forgot th' imposing beauty of array.
How gazed the king, intensely forward bow'd,
As thick and thicker grew the battle-cloud,
Still darker waxed, now broke in lightened seams,
Again devoured the momentary gleams!
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