Felt his throat swell with grief.
“Where wilt thou go my Child?” he cried,
“Wilt thou not wait a sign
“To point thy destined way?”
“God will conduct me!” said the noble youth,
He said and from the Tent
In the depth of the darkness departed.
They heard his parting steps,
The quiver rattling as he past away.
THALABA THE DESTROYER. BOOK IV.
Whose is yon dawning form,
That in the darkness meets
The delegated youth?
Dim as the shadow of a fire at noon,
Or pale reflection on the evening brook
Of Glow-worm on the bank
Kindled to guide her winged paramour.
A moment, and the brightening image shaped
His Mother’s form and features. “Go,” she cried,
“To Babylon, and from the Angels learn
“What talisman thy task requires.”
The Spirit hung towards him when she ceased,
As tho’ with actual lips she would have given
A mother’s kiss... his arms outstretched,
His body bending on,
His lips unclosed and trembling into speech
He prest to meet the blessing,... but the wind
Played on his cheek: he looked, and he beheld
The darkness close. “Again! again!” he cried,
“Let me again behold thee!” from the darkness
His Mother’s voice went forth;
“Thou shall behold me in the hour of death.”
Day dawns, the twilight gleam dilates,
The Sun comes forth and like a God
Rides thro’ rejoicing heaven.
Old Moath and his daughter from their tent
Beheld the adventurous youth,
Dark moving o’er the sands,
A lessening image, trembling thro’ their tears.
Visions of high emprize
Beguiled his lonely road;
And if sometimes to Moath’s tent
The involuntary mind recurred,
Fancy, impatient of all painful thoughts
Pictured the bliss should welcome his return.
In dreams like these he went,
And still of every dream
Oneiza formed a part,
And Hope and Memory made a mingled joy.
In the eve he arrived at a Well,
The Acacia bent over its side,
Under whose long light-hanging boughs
He chose his night’s abode.
There, due ablutions made and prayers performed,
The youth his mantle spread,
And silently produced
His solitary meal.
The silence and the solitude recalled
Dear recollections, and with folded arms,
Thinking of other days, he sate, till thought
Had left him, and the Acacia’s moving shade
Upon the sunny sand
Had caught his idle eye,
And his awakened ear
Heard the grey Lizard’s chirp,
The only sound of life.
As thus in vacant quietness he sate,
A Traveller on a Camel reached the Well,
And courteous greeting gave.
The mutual salutation past,
He by the cistern too his garment spread,
And friendly converse cheered the social meal.
The Stranger was an antient man,
Yet one whose green old age
Bore the fair characters of temperate youth.
So much of manhood’s strength his limbs retained,
It seemed he needed not the staff he bore.
His beard was long, and grey, and crisp;
Lively his eyes and quick,
And reaching over them
The large broad eye-brow curled....
His speech was copious, and his winning words
Enriched with knowledge, that the attentive youth
Sate listening with a thirsty joy.
So in the course of talk
The adventurer youth enquired
Whither his course was bent;
The Old Man answered, “to Bagdad I go.”
At that so welcome sound a flash of joy
Kindled the eye of Thalaba;
“And I too,” he replied,
“Am journeying thitherward,
“Let me become companion of thy way!”
Courteous the Old Man smiled,
And willing in assent....
OLD MAN.
Son, thou art young for travel.
THALABA.
Until now
I never past the desert boundary.
OLD MAN.
It is a noble city that we seek.
Thou wilt behold magnificent palaces,
And lofty obelisks, and high-domed Mosques,
And rich Bazars, whither from all the world
Industrious merchants meet, and market there
The World’s collected wealth.
THALABA.
Stands not Bagdad
Near to the site of ancient Babylon
And Nimrod’s impious temple?
OLD MAN.
From the walls
’Tis but a long day’s distance.
THALABA.
And the ruins?
OLD MAN.
A mighty mass remains; enough to tell us
How great our fathers were, how little we.
Men are not what they were; their crimes and follies
Have dwarfed them down from the old hero race
To such poor things as we!
THALABA.
At Babylon
I have heard the Angels expiate their guilt,
Haruth and Maruth.
OLD MAN.
’Tis a history
Handed from ages down; the nurses make it
A tale to please their children,
And as their garrulous ignorance relates
We learn it and believe... but all things feel
The power of Time and Change! thistles and grass
Usurp the desolate palace, and the weeds
Of Falshood root in the aged pile of Truth.
How have you heard the tale?
THALABA.
Thus... on a time
The Angels at the wickedness of man
Expressed indignant wonder: that in vain
Tokens and signs were given, and Prophets sent,...
Strange obstinacy this! a stubborness
Of sin, they said, that should for ever bar
The gates of mercy on them. Allah heard
Their unforgiving pride, and bade that two
Of these untempted Spirits should descend,
Judges on earth. Haruth and Maruth went,
The chosen Sentencers; they fairly heard
The appeals of men to their tribunal brought,
And rightfully decided. At the length
A Woman came before them... beautiful
Zohara was, as yonder Evening star,
In the mild lustre of whose lovely light
Even now her beauty shines. They gazed on her
With fleshly eyes, they tempted her to sin.
The wily woman listened, and required
A previous price, the knowledge of the name
Of God. She learnt the wonder-working name
And gave it utterance, and its virtue bore her
Up to the glorious Presence, and she told
Before the aweful Judgement-Seat, her tale.
OLD MAN.
I know the rest, the accused Spirits were called:
Unable of defence, and penitent,
They owned their crime and heard the doom deserved.
Then they besought the Lord that not for ever
His wrath might be upon them; and implored
That penal ages might at
length restore them
Clean from offence, since then by Babylon
In the cavern of their punishment they dwell,
Runs the conclusion so?
THALABA.
So I am taught.
OLD MAN.
The common tale! and likely thou hast heard
How that the bold and bad, with impious rites
Intrude upon their penitence, and force,
Albeit from loathing and reluctant lips,
The sorcery-secret?
THALABA.
Is it not the truth?
OLD MAN.
Son, thou hast seen the Traveller in the sands
Move in the dizzy light of the hot noon,
Huge as the giant race of elder times,
And his Camel, than the monstrous Elephant,
Seem of a vaster bulk.
THALABA.
A frequent sight.
OLD MAN.
And hast thou never in the twilight, fancied
Familiar object into some strange shape
And form uncouth?
THALABA.
Aye! many a time.
OLD MAN.
Even so
Things viewed at distance thro’ the mist of fear,
In their distortion terrify and shock
The abused sight.
THALABA.
But of these Angels fate
Thus in the uncreated Book is written.
OLD MAN.
Wisely from legendary fables, Heaven
Inculcates wisdom.
THALABA.
How then is the truth?
Is not the dungeon of their punishment
By ruined Babylon?
OLD MAN.
By Babylon
Haruth and Maruth may be found.
THALABA.
And there
Magician learn their impious sorcery?
OLD MAN.
Son what thou sayest is true, and it is false.
But night approaches fast; I have travelled far
And my old lids are heavy... on our way
We shall have hours for converse, let us now
Turn to our due repose. Son, peace be with thee!
So in his loosened cloak
The Old Man wrapt himself
And laid his limbs at length:
And Thalaba in silence laid him down.
Awhile he lay and watched the lovely Moon,
O’er whose broad orb the boughs
A mazy fretting framed,
Or with a pale transparent green
Lighting the restless leaves,
The thin Acacia leaves that played above.
The murmuring wind, the moving leaves
Lulled him to sleep with mingled lullabies.
Not so the dark Magician by his side,
Lobaba, who from the Domdaniel caves
Had sought the dreaded youth.
Silent he lay, and simulating sleep,
Till by the long and regular breath he knew
The youth beside him slept.
Carefully then he rose,
And bending over him, surveyed him near
And secretly he cursed
The dead Abdaldar’s ring,
Armed by whose amulet
He slept from danger safe.
Wrapped in his mantle Thalaba reposed,
His loose right arm pillowing his head.
The Moon was on the Ring,
Whose crystal gem returned
A quiet, moveless light.
Vainly the Wizard vile put forth his hand
And strove to reach the gem,
Charms strong as hell could make them, made it safe.
He called his servant fiends,
He bade the Genii rob the sleeping youth.
By the virtue of the Ring,
By Mohammed’s holier power,
By the holiest name of God,
Had Thalaba disarmed the evil race.
Baffled and weary, and convinced at length,
Anger, and fear, and rancour gnawing him,
The accursed Sorcerer ceased his vain attempts.
Content perforce to wait
Temptations likelier aid.
Restless he lay, and brooding many a wile,
And tortured with impatient hope,
And envying with the bitterness of hate
The innocent youth, who slept so sweetly by.
The ray of morning on his eye lids fell,
And Thalaba awoke
And folded his mantle around him,
And girded his loins for the day;
Then the due rites of holiness observed.
His comrade too arose,
And with the outward forms
Of righteousness and prayer insulted God.
They filled their water skin, they gave
The Camel his full draught.
Then on their road while yet the morn was young
And the air was fresh with dew,
Forward the travellers went,
With various talk beguiling the long way.
But soon the youth, whose busy mind
Dwelt on Lobaba’s wonder-stirring words,
Renewed the unfinished converse of the night.
THALABA.
Thou saidest that it is true, and yet is false,
That men accurst, attain at Babylon
Forbidden knowledge from the Angel pair....
How mean you?
LOBABA.
All things have a double power,
Alike for good and evil, the same fire
That on the comfortable hearth at eve
Warmed the good man, flames o’er the house at night
Should we for this forego
The needful element?
Because the scorching summer Sun
Darts fever, wouldst thou quench the orb of day?
Or deemest thou that Heaven in anger formed
Iron to till the field, because when man
Had tipt his arrows for the chase, he rushed
A murderer to the war?
THALABA.
What follows hence?
LOBABA.
That nothing in itself is good or evil,
But only in its use. Think you the man
Praiseworthy who by painful study learns
The knowledge of all simples, and their power
Healing or harmful?
THALABA.
All men hold in honour
The skilful Leech. From land to land he goes
Safe in his privilege; the sword of war
Spares him, Kings welcome him with costly gifts,
And he who late had from the couch of pain
Lifted a languid look to him for aid,
Views him with brightened eyes, and blesses him
In his first thankful prayer.
LOBABA.
Yet some there are
Who to the purposes of wickedness,
Apply this knowledge, and from herbs distil
Poison to mix it in the trusted draught.
THALABA.
Allah shall cast them in the fire
Whose fuel is the cursed! there shall they
Endure the ever-burning agony
Consuming still in flames, and still renewed.
LOBABA.
But is their knowledge therefore in itself
Unlawful?
THALABA.
That were foolishness to think.
LOBABA.
O what a glorious animal were Man,
Knew he but his own powers! and knowing gave them
Room for their growth and spread! the Horse obeys
His guiding will, the patient Camel bears him
Over these wastes of sand, the Pigeon wafts
His bidding thro’ the sky: and with these triumphs
He rests contented! with these ministers,
When he might awe the Elements, and make
Myriads of Spirits
serve him!
THALABA.
But as how!
By a league with Hell, a covenant that binds
The soul to utter death!
LOBABA.
Was Solomon
Accurst of God? yet to his talismans
Obedient, o’er his throne the birds of Heaven
Their waving wings his sun-shield, fanned around him
The motionless air of noon: from place to place,
As his will reined the viewless Element
He rode the Wind: the Genii reared his temple,
And ceaselessly in fear while his dead eye
O’erlooked them, day and night pursued their toil,
So dreadful was his power.
THALABA.
But ’twas from Heaven
His wisdom came; God’s special gift... the guerdon
Of early virtue.
LOBABA.
Learn thou, O young man!
God hath appointed Wisdom the reward
Of study! ’tis a spring of living waters,
Whose inexhaustible bounties all might drink
But few dig deep enough. Son! thou art silent,...
Perhaps I say too much,... perhaps offend thee.
THALABA.
Nay, I am young, and willingly as becomes me,
Hear the wise words of age.
LOBABA.
Is it a crime
To mount the horse, because forsooth thy feet
Can serve thee for the journey? is it sin
Because the Hern soars upward in the sky
Above the arrow’s flight, to train the Falcon
Whose beak shall pierce him there? the powers which All
Granted to man, were granted for his use;
All knowledge that befits not human weakness
Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southey Page 101