Classic Poem

FADLADEEN, at the conclusion of this light rhapsody, took occasion to sum
up his opinion of the young Cashmerian's poetry,--of which, he trusted,
they had that evening heard the last. Having recapitulated the epithets,
"frivolous"--"inharmonious"--"nonsensical," he proceeded to say that,
viewed in the most favorable light it resembled one of those Maldivian
boats, to which the Princess had alluded in the relation of her dream,--
a slight, gilded thing, sent adrift without rudder or ballast, and with
nothing but vapid sweets and faded flowers on board. The profusion,
indeed, of flowers and birds, which this poet had ready on all occasions,
--not to mention dews, gems, etc.--was a most oppressive kind of opulence
to his hearers; and had the unlucky effect of giving to his style all the
glitter of the flower garden without its method, and all the flutter of
the aviary without its song. In addition to this, he chose his subjects
badly, and was always most inspired by the worst parts of them. The
charms of paganism, the merits of rebellion,--these were the themes
honored with his particular enthusiasm; and, in the poem just recited, one
of his most palatable passages was in praise of that beverage of the
Unfaithful, wine;--"being, perhaps," said he, relaxing into a smile, as
conscious of his own character in the Haram on this point, "one of those
bards, whose fancy owes all its illumination to the grape, like that
painted porcelain, so curious and so rare, whose images are only
visible when liquor is poured into it." Upon the whole, it was his
opinion, from the specimens which they had heard, and which, he begged to
say, were the most tiresome part of the journey, that--whatever other
merits this well-dressed young gentleman might possess--poetry was by no
means his proper avocation; "and indeed," concluded the critic, "from his
fondness for flowers and for birds, I would venture to suggest that a
florist or a bird-catcher is a much more suitable calling for him than a
poet."

They had now begun to ascend those barren mountains, which separate
Cashmere from the rest of India; and, as the heats were intolerable, and
the time of their encampments limited to the few hours necessary for
refreshment and repose, there was an end to all their delightful evenings,
and LALLA ROOKH saw no more of FERAMORZ. She now felt that her short dream
of happiness was over, and that she had nothing but the recollection of
its few blissful hours, like the one draught of sweet water that serves
the camel across the wilderness, to be her heart's refreshment during the
dreary waste of life that was before her. The blight that had fallen upon
her spirits soon found its way to her cheek, and her ladies saw with
regret--though not without some suspicion of the cause--that the beauty of
their mistress, of which they were almost as proud as of their own, was
fast vanishing away at the very moment of all when she had most need of
it. What must the King of Bucharia feel, when, instead of the lively and
beautiful LALLA ROOKH, whom the poets of Delhi had described as more
perfect than the divinest images in the house of AZOR, he should
receive a pale and inanimate victim, upon whose cheek neither health nor
pleasure bloomed, and from whose eyes Love had fled,--to hide himself in
her heart?

If any thing could have charmed away the melancholy of her spirits, it
would have been the fresh airs and enchanting scenery of that Valley,
which the Persians so justly called the Unequalled. But neither the
coolness of its atmosphere, so luxurious after toiling up those bare and
burning mountains,--neither the splendor of the minarets and pagodas, that
shone put from the depth of its woods, nor the grottoes, hermitages, and
miraculous fountains, which make every spot of that region holy
ground,--neither the countless waterfalls, that rush into the Valley from
all those high and romantic mountains that encircle it, nor the fair city
on the Lake, whose houses, roofed with flowers, appeared at a
distance like one vast and variegated parterre;--not all these wonders and
glories of the most lovely country under the sun could steal her heart for
a minute from those sad thoughts which but darkened and grew bitterer
every step she advanced.

The gay pomps and processions that met her upon her entrance into the
Valley, and the magnificence with which the roads all along were
decorated, did honor to the taste and gallantry of the young King. It was
night when they approached the city, and, for the last two miles, they had
passed under arches, thrown from hedge to hedge, festooned with only those
rarest roses from which the Attar Gul, more precious than gold, is
distilled, and illuminated in rich and fanciful forms with lanterns of the
triple-colored tortoise-shell of Pegu. Sometimes, from a dark wood
by the side of the road, a display of fireworks would break out, so sudden
and so brilliant, that a Brahmin might fancy he beheld that grove, in
whose purple shade the God of Battles was born, bursting into a flame at
the moment of his birth;--while, at other times, a quick and playful
irradiation continued to brighten all the fields and gardens by which they
passed, forming a line of dancing lights along the horizon; like the
meteors of the north as they are seen by those hunters who pursue the
white and blue foxes on the confines of the Icy Sea.

These arches and fireworks delighted the Ladies of the Princess
exceedingly; and, with their usual good logic, they deduced from his taste
for illuminations, that the King of Bucharia would make the most exemplary
husband imaginable. Nor, indeed, could LALLA ROOKH herself help feeling
the kindness and splendor with which the young bridegroom welcomed
her;--but she also felt how painful is the gratitude which kindness from
those we cannot love excites; and that their best blandishments come over
the heart with all that chilling and deadly sweetness which we can fancy
in the cold, odoriferous wind that is to blow over this earth in the
last days.

The marriage was fixed for the morning after her arrival, when she was,
for the first time, to be presented to the monarch in that Imperial Palace
beyond the lake, called the Shalimar. Though never before had a night of
more wakeful and anxious thought been passed in the Happy Valley, yet,
when she rose in the morning, and her Ladies came around her, to assist in
the adjustment of the bridal ornaments, they thought they had never seen
her look half so beautiful. What she had lost of the bloom and radiancy
of her charms was more than made up by that intellectual expression, that
soul beaming forth from the eyes, which is worth all the rest of
loveliness. When they had tinged her fingers with the Henna leaf, and
placed upon her brow a small coronet of jewels, of the shape worn by the
ancient Queens of Bucharia, they flung over her head the rose-colored
bridal veil, and she proceeded to the barge that was to convey her across
the lake;--first kissing, with a mournful look, the little amulet of
cornelian, which her father at parting had hung about her neck.

The morning was as fresh and fair as the maid on whose nuptials it rose,
and the shining lake, all covered with boats, the minstrels playing upon
the shores of the islands, and the crowded summer-houses on the green
hills around, with shawls and banners waving from their roofs, presented
such a picture of animated rejoicing, as only she, who was the object of
it all, did not feel with transport. To LALLA ROOKH alone it was a
melancholy pageant; nor could she have even borne to look upon the scene,
were it not for a hope that among the crowds around, she might once more
perhaps catch a glimpse of FERAMORZ. So much was her imagination haunted
by this thought that there was scarcely an islet or boat she passed on the
way at which her heart did not flutter with the momentary fancy that he
was there. Happy, in her eyes, the humblest slave upon whom the light of
his dear looks fell!--In the barge immediately after the Princess sat
FADLADEEN, with his silken curtains thrown widely apart, that all might
have the benefit of his august presence, and with his head full of the
speech he was to deliver to the King, "concerning FERAMORZ and literature
and the Chabuk as connected therewith."

They now had entered the canal which leads from the Lake to the splendid
domes and saloons of the Shalimar and went gliding on through the gardens
that ascended from each bank, full of flowering shrubs that made the air
all perfume; while from the middle of the canal rose jets of water, smooth
and unbroken, to such a dazzling height that they stood like tall pillars
of diamond in the sunshine. After sailing under the arches of various
saloons they at length arrived at the last and most magnificent, where the
monarch awaited the coming of his bride; and such was the agitation of her
heart and frame that it was with difficulty she could walk up the marble
steps which were covered with cloth of gold for her ascent from the barge.
At the end of the hall stood two thrones, as precious as the Cerulean
Throne of Koolburga, on one of which sat ALIRIS, the youthful King
of Bucharia, and on the other was in a few minutes to be placed the most
beautiful Princess in the world. Immediately upon the entrance of LALLA
ROOKH into the saloon the monarch descended from his throne to meet her;
but scarcely had he time to take her hand in his when she screamed with
surprise and fainted at his feet. It was FERAMORZ, himself, who stood
before her! FERAMORZ, was, himself, the Sovereign of Bucharia, who in this
disguise had accompanied his young bride from Delhi, and having won her
love as an humble minstrel now amply deserved to enjoy it as a King.

The consternation of FADLADEEN at this discovery was, for the moment,
almost pitiable. But change of opinion is a resource too convenient in
courts for this experienced courtier not to have learned to avail himself
of it. His criticisms were all, of course, recanted instantly: he was
seized with an admiration of the King's verses, as unbounded as, he begged
him to believe, it was disinterested; and the following week saw him in
possession of an additional place, swearing by all the Saints of Islam
that never had there existed so great a poet as the Monarch ALIRIS, and
moreover ready to prescribe his favorite regimen of the Chabuk for every
man, woman and child that dared to think otherwise.

Of the happiness of the King and Queen of Bucharia, after such a
beginning, there can be but little doubt; and among the lesser symptoms it
is recorded of LALLA ROOKH that to the day of her death in memory of their
delightful journey she never called the King by any other name than
FERAMORZ.