from Canto VIII

111

The eldest was a true and tameless Tartar,
    As great a scorner of the Nazarene
As ever Mahomet 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.

112

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;
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.

113

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.

114

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 Moslems 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.

115

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:

116

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.

117

The soldiers, who beheld him drop his point,
     Stopped as if once more willing to concede
Quarter, in case he bade them not “aroint!”
     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.

118

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.

119

‘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 blood-shot eyes, all red with strife,
They honoured such determined scorn of life.

120

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 enquire
     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.