The fifth, who, by a Christian mother nourished,
Had been neglected, ill-used, and what not,
Because deformed, yet died all game and bottom,716
To save a Sire who blushed that he begot him.
CXI
The eldest was a true and tameless Tartar,
As great a scorner of the Nazarene
As ever Muhammad picked out for a martyr,
Who only saw the black-eyed girls in green,
Who make the beds of those who won’t take quarter
On earth, in Paradise; and when once seen,
Those houris, like all other pretty creatures,
Do just whate’er they please, by dint of features.
CXII
And what they pleased to do with the young Khan
In Heaven I know not, nor pretend to guess;
But doubtless they prefer a fine young man
To tough old heroes, and can do no less;717
And that’s the cause no doubt why, if we scan
A field of battle’s ghastly wilderness,
For one rough, weather-beaten, veteran body,
You’ll find ten thousand handsome coxcombs bloody.
CXIII
Your houris also have a natural pleasure
In lopping off your lately married men,
Before the bridal hours have danced their measure
And the sad, second moon grows dim again,
Or dull Repentance hath had dreary leisure
To wish him back a bachelor now and then:
And thus your Houri (it may be) disputes
Of these brief blossoms the immediate fruits.
CXIV
Thus the young Khan, with Houris in his sight,
Thought not upon the charms of four young brides,
But bravely rushed on his first heavenly night.
In short, howe’er our better faith derides,
These black-eyed virgins make the Muslims fight,
As though there were one Heaven and none besides—
Whereas, if all be true we hear of Heaven
And Hell, there must at least be six or seven.
CXV
So fully flashed the phantom on his eyes,
That when the very lance was in his heart,
He shouted “Allah!” and saw Paradise
With all its veil of mystery drawn apart,
And bright Eternity without disguise
On his soul, like a ceaseless sunrise, dart:—
With Prophets—Houris—Angels—Saints, descried
In one voluptuous blaze—and then he died—718
CXVI
But with a heavenly rapture on his face.
The good old Khan, who long had ceased to see
Houris, or aught except his florid race,
Who grew like cedars round him gloriously—
When he beheld his latest hero grace
The earth, which he became like a felled tree,
Paused for a moment from the fight, and cast
A glance on that slain son, his first and last.
CXVII
The soldiers, who beheld him drop his point,
Stopped as if once more willing to concede
Quarter, in case he bade them not “aroynt!”
As he before had done. He did not heed
Their pause nor signs: his heart was out of joint,
And shook (till now unshaken) like a reed,
As he looked down upon his children gone,
And felt—though done with life—he was alone.719
CXVIII
But ’twas a transient tremor:—with a spring
Upon the Russian steel his breast he flung,
As carelessly as hurls the moth her wing
Against the light wherein she dies: he clung
Closer, that all the deadlier they might wring,
Unto the bayonets which had pierced his young;
And throwing back a dim look on his sons,
In one wide wound poured forth his soul at once.
CXIX
’Tis strange enough—the rough, tough soldiers, who
Spared neither sex nor age in their career
Of carnage, when this old man was pierced through,
And lay before them with his children near,
Touched by the heroism of him they slew,
Were melted for a moment; though no tear
Flowed from their bloodshot eyes, all red with strife,
They honoured such determined scorn of Life.
CXX
But the stone bastion still kept up its fire,
Where the chief Pacha calmly held his post:
Some twenty times he made the Russ retire,
And baffled the assaults of all their host;
At length he condescended to inquire
If yet the city’s rest were won or lost;
And being told the latter, sent a Bey
To answer Ribas’ summons to give way.720
CXXI
In the mean time, cross-legged, with great sang-froid,
Among the scorching ruins he sat smoking
Tobacco on a little carpet;—Troy
Saw nothing like the scene around;—yet looking
With martial Stoicism, nought seemed to annoy
His stern philosophy; but gently stroking
His beard, he puffed his pipe’s ambrosial gales,
As if he had three lives, as well as tails.721
CXXII
The town was taken—whether he might yield
Himself or bastion, little mattered now:
His stubborn valour was no future shield.
Ismail’s no more! The Crescent’s silver bow
Sunk, and the crimson Cross glared o’er the field,
But red with no redeeming gore: the glow
Of burning streets, like moonlight on the water,
Was imaged back in blood, the sea of slaughter.722
CXXIII
All that the mind would shrink from of excesses—
All that the body perpetrates of bad;
All that we read—hear—dream, of man’s distresses—
All that the Devil would do if run stark mad;
All that defies the worst which pen expresses—
All by which Hell is peopled, or as sad
As Hell—mere mortals who their power abuse—
Was here (as heretofore and since) let loose.
CXXIV
If here and there some transient trait of pity
Was shown, and some more noble heart broke through
Its bloody bond, and saved, perhaps, some pretty
Child, or an agèd, helpless man or two—
What’s this in one annihilated city,
Where thousand loves, and ties, and duties grew?
Cockneys of London! Muscadins of Paris!
Just ponder what a pious pastime War is.723
CXXV
Think how the joys of reading a Gazette
Are purchased by all agonies and crimes:
Or if these do not move you, don’t forget
Such doom may be your own in after-times.
Meantime the Taxes, Castlereagh, and Debt,
Are hints as good as sermons, or as rhymes.
Read your own hearts and Ireland’s present story,
Then feed her famine fat with Wellesley’s glory.
CXXVI
But still there is unto a patriot nation,
Which loves so well its country and its King,
A subject of sublimest
