Ours the tiger of the brake,

All that plague the sons of men. Ours the tempest's midnight wrack, Pestilence that wastes by day

Dread the race of Zaharak!

Fear the spell of Dahomay!'

XXII

Uncouth and strange the accents shrill
Rung those vaulted roofs among,
Long it was ere faint and still

Died the far-resounding song.

While yet the distant echoes roll,

The warrior communed with his soul.

'When first I took this venturous quest,

I swore upon the rood

Neither to stop nor turn nor rest,

For evil or for good.

My forward path too well I ween
Lies yonder fearful ranks between;
For man unarmed 't is bootless hope
With tigers and with fiends to cope -
Yet, if I turn, what waits me there
Save famine dire and fell despair? —
Other conclusion let me try,

Since, choose howe'er I list, I die.

Forward lies faith and knightly fame;
Behind are perjury and shame.

In life or death I hold my word!'
With that he drew his trusty sword,
Caught down a banner from the wall,
And entered thus the fearful hall.

XXIII

On high each wayward maiden threw
Her swarthy arm with wild halloo!
On either side a tiger sprung —

Against the leftward foe he flung
The ready banner to engage
With tangling folds the brutal rage;
The right-hand monster in mid air
He struck so fiercely and so fair
Through gullet and through spinal bone
The trenchant blade hath sheerly gone.
His grisly brethren ramped and yelled,
But the slight leash their rage withheld,
Whilst 'twixt their ranks the dangerous road
Firmly though swift the champion strode.

Safe to the gallery's bound he drew,

Safe passed an open portal through;

And when against pursuit he flung
The gate, judge if the echoes rung!

Onward his daring course he bore,
While, mixed with dying growl and roar,
Wild jubilee and loud hurra

Pursued him on his venturous way.

XXIV

'Hurra, hurra! Our watch is done!
We hail once more the tropic sun.
Pallid beams of northern day,
Farewell, farewell! Hurra, hurra!

'Five hundred years o'er this cold glen
Hath the pale sun come round agen;
Foot of man till now hath ne'er
Dared to cross the Hall of Fear.

'Warrior! thou whose dauntless heart
Gives us from our ward to part,
Be as strong in future trial
Where resistance is denial.

'Now for Afric's glowing sky,

Zwenga wide and Atlas high,

Zaharak and Dahomay! —

--

Mount the winds! Hurra, Hurra!'

XXV

The wizard song at distance died,

As if in ether borne astray,

While through waste halls and chambers wide The knight pursued his steady way

Till to a lofty dome he came

That flashed with such a brilliant flame

As if the wealth of all the world

Were there in rich confusion hurled.
For here the gold in sandy heaps
With duller earth incorporate sleeps;
Was there in ingots piled, and there
Coined badge of empery it bare;
Yonder, huge bars of silver lay,
Dimmed by the diamond's neighbouring ray,
Like the pale moon in morning day;
And in the midst four maidens stand,
The daughters of some distant land.
Their hue was of the dark-red dye
That fringes oft a thunder sky;
Their hands palmetto baskets bare,
And cotton fillets bound their hair;
Slim was their form, their mien was shy,
To earth they bent the humbled eye,
Folded their arms, and suppliant kneeled,
And thus their proffered gifts revealed.

XXVI

CHORUS

'See the treasures Merlin piled,

Portion meet for Arthur's child.

Bathe in Wealth's unbounded stream,

Wealth that Avarice ne'er could dream!'

FIRST MAIDEN

'See these clots of virgin gold!
Severed from the sparry mould,
Nature's mystic alchemy

In the mine thus bade them lie;
And their orient smile can win
Kings to stoop and saints to sin.'

SECOND MAIDEN

'See these pearls that long have slept; These were tears by Naiads wept

For the loss of Marinel.

Tritons in the silver shell

Treasured them till hard and white

As the teeth of Amphitrite.'

THIRD MAIDEN

'Does a livelier hue delight?

Here are rubies blazing bright,