Beneath him guides the Khan to war,--

Such thoughts his mind has banished far.

Has treason scaled the harem's wall,

Whose height might treason's self appal,

And slavery's daughter fled his power,

To yield her to the daring Giaour?

No! pining in his harem sadly,

No wife of his would act so madly;

To wish or think they scarcely dare;

By wretches, cold and heartless, guarded,

Hope from each breast so long discarded;

Treason could never enter there.

Their beauties unto none revealed,

They bloom within the harem's towers,

As in a hot-house bloom the flowers

Which erst perfumed Arabia's field.

To them the days in sameness dreary,

And months and years pass slow away,

In solitude, of life grown weary,

Well pleased they see their charms decay.

Each day, alas! the past resembling,

Time loiters through their halls and bowers;

In idleness, and fear, and trembling,

The captives pass their joyless hours.

The youngest seek, indeed, reprieve

Their hearts in striving to deceive

Into oblivion of distress,

By vain amusements, gorgeous dress,

Or by the noise of living streams,

In soft translucency meand'ring,

To lose their thoughts in fancy's dreams,

Through shady groves together wand'ring.

But the vile eunuch too is there,