by René Basset
Such ill requital from the King,
He called his page and bade him straight
A limner deft before him bring.
For he would have him paint at large,
In color, many a new device
And write his sufferings on his shield.
No single blazon would suffice.
And first a green field parched and seared;
A coal, in myriad blazes burned,
And like his ardent hopes of yore,
At length to dust and ashes turned.
And then a miser, rich in gold,
Who locks away some jewel bright,
For fear the thief a gem may steal,
Which yet can yield him no delight.
A fair Adonis done to death
Beneath the wild boar's cruel tusk.
A wintry dawn on pallid skies,
A summer's day that turns to dusk.
A lovely garden green and fair
Ravaged and slashed by strokes of steel;
Or wasted in its trim parterres
And trampled by the common heel.
So spake the brave heart-broken Moor;
Until his tears and struggling sighs
Turned to fierce rage; the painting then
He waited for with eager eyes.
He asks that one would fetch a steed,
Of his good mare no more he recks,
For womankind have done him wrong,
And she is woman in her sex.
The plumes of yellow, blue, and white
From off his bonnet brim he tears,
He will no longer carry them;
They are the colors Zaida wears.
He recks no more of woman's love,
His city now he bids farewell,
And swears he will no more return
Nor in Granada seek to dwell.
WOMAN'S FICKLENESS
A stout and valorous gentleman,
Granada knew his worth,
And rich with many a spoil of love,
Went Abenamar forth.
Upon his bonnet, richly dyed,
He bore a lettered scroll,
It ran, "'Tis only love that makes
The solace of my soul."
His bonnet and his brow were hid
Beneath a hood of green,
And plumes of violet and white
Above his head were seen.
And 'twixt the tassel and the crown
An emerald circlet shone.
The legend of the jewel said,
"Thou art my hope alone."
He rode upon a dappled steed
With housings richly dight,
And at his left side clanking hung
A scimitar of might.
And his right arm was sleeved in cloth
Of tawny lion's hue,
And at his lance-head, lifted high,
A Turkish pennon flew.
And when he reached Daraja's camp
He saw Daraja stand
Beside his own perfidious love,
And clasp her by the hand.
He made to her the wonted sign,
Then lingered for a while,
For jealous anguish filled his heart
To see her tender smile.
He spurred his courser to the blood;
One clattering bound he took,
The Moorish maiden turned to him.
Ah, love was in her look!
Ah, well he saw his hopeless fate,
And in his jealous mood
The heart that nothing feared in fight
Was whelmed in sorrow's flood.
"O false and faithless one," he said,
"What is it that I view?
Thus the foreboding of my soul
I see at last come true;
Shame that a janizary vile,
Of Christian creed and race,
A butt of bright Alhambra's feasts,
Has taken now my place.
Where is the love thou didst avow,
The pledge, the kiss, the tear,
And all the tender promises
Thou whisperedst in my ear?
Thou, frailer than the withered reed,
More changeful than the wind,
More thankless than the hardest heart
In all of womankind;
I marvel not at what I see,
Nor yet for vengeance call;
For thou art woman to the core,
And in that name is all."
The gallant Moor his courser checked,
His cheek with anger burned,
Men saw, that all his gallant mien
To gloom and rage was turned.
KING JUAN
"Abenamar, Abenamar," said the monarch to the knight,
"A Moor art thou of the Moors, I trow, and the ladies' fond delight,
And on the day when first you lay upon your mother's breast,
On land and sea was a prodigy, to the Christians brought unrest;
The sea was still as a ruined mill and the winds were hushed to rest.
And the broad, broad moon sank down at noon, red in the stormy west.
If thus thou wert born thou well mayst scorn to ope those lips of thine,
That out should fly a treacherous lie, to meet a word of mine."
"I have not lied," the Moor replied, and he bowed his haughty head
Before the King whose wrath might fling his life among the dead.
"I would not deign with falsehood's stain my lineage to betray;
Tho' for the truth my life, in sooth, should be the price I pay.
I am son and squire of a Moorish sire, who with the Christians strove,
And the captive dame of Christian name was his fair wedded love;
And I a child from that mother mild, who taught me at her knee
Was ever told to be true and bold with a tongue that was frank and free,
That the liar's art and the caitiff heart would lead to the house of doom;
And still I must hear my mother dear, for she speaks to me from the tomb.
Then give me my task, O King, and ask what question thou mayst choose;
I will give to you the word that is true, for why should I refuse?"
"I give you grace for your open face, and the courteous words you use.
What castles are those on the hill where grows the palm-tree and the; pine?
They are so high that they touch the sky, and with gold their pinnacles shine."
"In the sunset's fire there glisten, sire, Alhambra's tinted tiles;
And somewhat lower Alijire's tower upon the vega smiles,
And many a band of subtile hand has wrought its pillared aisles.
The Moor whose thought and genius wrought those works for many moons
Received each day a princely pay--five hundred gold doubloons--
Each day he left his labor deft, his guerdon was denied;
Nor less he lost than his labor cost when he his hand applied.
And yonder I see the Generalifé with its orchard green and wide;
There are growing there the apple and pear that are Granada's pride.
There shadows fall from the soaring wall of high Bermeja's tower;
It has flourished long as a castle strong, the seat of the Soldan's power."
The King had bent and his ear had lent to the words the warrior spoke,
And at last he said, as he raised his head before the crowd of folk:
"I would take thee now with a faithful vow, Granada for my bride,
King Juan's Queen would hold, I ween, a throne and crown of pride;
That very hour I would give thee dower that well would suit thy will;
Cordova's town should be thine own, and the mosque of proud Seville.
Nay, ask not, King, for I wear the ring of a faithful wife and true;
Some graceful maid or a widow arrayed in her weeds is the wife for you,
And close I cling to the Moorish King who holds me
to his breast,
For well I ween it can be seen that of all he loves me best."
ABENAMAR'S JEALOUSY
Alhambra's bell had not yet pealed
Its morning note o'er tower and field;
Barmeja's bastions glittered bright,
O'ersilvered with the morning light;
When rising from a pallet blest
With no refreshing dews of rest,
For slumber had relinquished there
His place to solitary care,
Brave Abenamar pondered deep
How lovers must surrender sleep.
And when he saw the morning rise,
While sleep still sealed Daraja's eyes,
Amid his tears, to soothe his pain,
He sang this melancholy strain:
"The morn is up,
The heavens alight,
My jealous soul
Still owns the sway of night.
Thro' all the night I wept forlorn,
Awaiting anxiously the morn;
And tho' no sunlight strikes on me,
My bosom burns with jealousy.
The twinkling starlets disappear;
Their radiance made my sorrow clear;
The sun has vanished from my sight,
Turned into water is his light;
What boots it that the glorious sun
From India his course has run,
To bring to Spain the gleam of day,
If from my sight he hides away?
The morn is up,
The heavens are bright,
My jealous soul
Still owns the sway of night."
ADELIFA'S JEALOUSY
Fair Adelifa sees in wrath, kindled by jealous flames,
Her Abenamar gazed upon by the kind Moorish dames.
And if they chance to speak to him, or take him by the hand,
She swoons to see her own beloved with other ladies stand.
When with companions of his own, the bravest of his race,
He meets the bull within the ring, and braves him to his face,
Or if he mount his horse of war, and sallying from his tent
Engages with his comrades in tilt or tournament,
She sits apart from all the rest, and when he wins the prize
She smiles in answer to his smile and devours him with her eyes.
And in the joyous festival and in Alhambra's halls,
She follows as he treads the dance at merry Moorish balls.
And when the tide of battle is rising o'er the land,
And he leaves his home, obedient to his honored King's command,
With tears and lamentation she sees the warrior go
With arms heroic to subdue the proud presumptuous foe.
Though 'tis to save his country's towers he mounts his fiery steed
She has no cheerful word for him, no blessing and godspeed;
And were there some light pretext to keep him at her side,
In chains of love she'd bind him there, whate'er the land betide.
Or, if 'twere fair that dames should dare the terrors of the fight,
She'd mount her jennet in his train and follow with delight.
For soon as o'er the mountain ridge his bright plume disappears,
She feels that in her heart the jealous smart that fills her eyes with tears.
Yet when he stands beside her and smiles beneath her gaze,
Her cheek is pale with passion pure, though few the words she says.
Her thoughts are ever with him, and they fly the mountain o'er
When in the shaggy forest he hunts the bristly boar.
In vain she seeks the festal scene 'mid dance and merry song,
Her heart for Abenamar has left that giddy throng.
For jealous passion after all is no ignoble fire,
It is the child of glowing love, the shadow of desire.
Ah! he who loves with ardent breast and constant spirit must
Feel in his inmost bosom lodged the arrows of distrust.
And as the faithful lover by his loved one's empty seat
Knows that the wind of love may change e'er once again they meet,
So to this sad foreboding do fancied griefs appear
As he who has most cause to love has too most cause for fear.
And once, when placid evening was mellowing into night,
The lovely Adelifa sat with her darling knight;
And then the pent-up feeling from out her spirit's deeps
Rose with a storm of heavy sighs and trembled on her lips:
"My valiant knight, who art, indeed, the whole wide world to me,
Clear mirror of victorious arms and rose of chivalry,
Thou terror of thy valorous foe, to whom all champions yield,
The rampart and the castle of fair Granada's field,
In thee the armies of the land their bright example see,
And all their hopes of victory are founded upon thee;
And I, poor loving woman, have hope in thee no less,
For thou to me art life itself, a life of happiness.
Yet, in this anxious trembling heart strange pangs of fear arise,
Ah, wonder not if oft you see from out these faithful eyes
The tears in torrents o'er my cheek, e'en in thy presence flow.
Half prompted by my love for thee and half by fears of woe,
These eyes are like alembics, and when with tears they fill
It is the flame of passion that does that dew distil.
And what the source from which they flow, but the sorrow and the care
That gather in my heart like mist, and forever linger there.
And when the flame is fiercest and love is at its height,
The waters rise to these fond eyes, and rob me of my sight,
For love is but a lasting pain and ever goes with grief,
And only at the spring of tears the heart can drink relief.
Thus fire and love and fear combined bring to my heart distress,
With jealous rage and dark distrust alarm and fitfulness.
These rage within my bosom; they torment me till I'd weep.
By day and night without delight a lonely watch I keep.
By Allah, I beseech thee, if thou art true to me,
That when the Moorish ladies turn round and gaze on thee,
Thou wilt not glance again at them nor meet their smiling eye,
Or else, my Abenamar, I shall lay me down and die.
For thou art gallant, fair, and good; oh, soothe my heart's alarms,
And be as tender in thy love as thou art brave in arms.
And as they yield to thee the prize for valor in the field
Oh, show that thou wilt pity to thy loving lady yield."
Then Abenamar, with a smile, a kiss of passion gave.
"If it be needful," he replied, "to give the pledge you crave
To tell thee, Adelifa, that thou art my soul's delight
And lay my inmost bosom bare before thy anxious sight,
The bosom on whose mirror shines thy face in lines of light,
Here let me ope the secret cell that thou thyself may see,
The altar and the blazing lamp that always burn for thee.
And if perchance thou art not thus released from torturing care,
Oh, see the faith, the blameless love that wait upon thee there.
And if thou dost imagine I am a perjured knight,
I pray that Allah on my head may call down bane and blight,
And when into the battle with the Christian I go
I pray that I may perish by the lances of the foe;
And when I don my armor for the toils of the campaign,
That I may never wear the palm of victory again,
But as a captive, on a shore far from Granada, pine,
While the freedom that I long to have may never more be mine.
Yes, may my foes torment me in that sad hour of need;
My very friends, for their own ends, prove worthless as a reed.
My kin deny, my fortune fly, and, on my dying day,
My very hopes of Paradise in darkness pass away.
Or if I live in freedom to see my love once more,
May I meet the fate which most I hate, and at my palace door
Find that some caitiff lover has won thee for his own,
And turn to die, of mad despair, distracted and alone.
Wherefore, my life, my darling wife, let all thy pain be cured;
Thy trust in my fidelity be from this hour assured.
No more those pearly tears of thine fall useless in the dust
No more the jealous fear distract thy bosom with mistrust.
Believe me by the oath I swear my heart I here resign,
And all I have of love and care are, Adelifa, thine.
Believe that Abenamar would his own life betray
If he had courage thus to throw life's choicest gem away."
Then Adelifa smiled on him and at the words he said,
Upon his heaving bosom her blushing cheek she laid.
And from that hour each jealous thought far from her mind she thrust
And confidence returned again in place of dark distrust.
FUNERAL OF ABENAMAR
The Moors of haughty Gelves have changed their gay attire.
The caftan and the braided cloak, the brooch of twisted wire,
The gaudy robes, the mantles of texture rich and rare,
The fluttering veils and tunic bright the Moors no longer wear.
And wearied is their valorous strength, their sinewy arms hang down;
No longer in their lady's sight they struggle for the crown.
Whether their loves are absent or glowing in their eyes,
They think no more of jealous feud nor smile nor favor prize;
For love himself seems dead to-day amid that gallant train
And the dirge beside the bier is heard and each one joins the strain,
And silently they stand in line arrayed in mourning black
For the dismal pall of Portugal is hung on every back.
And their faces turned toward the bier where Abenamar lies,
The men his kinsmen silent stand, amid the ladies' cries
And thousand thousands ask and look upon the Moorish knight,
By his coat of steel they weeping kneel, then turn them from the sight.
And some proclaim his deeds of fame, his spirit high and brave,
And the courage of adventure that had brought him to the grave.