But, Selim, thou must answer why1 410 But be it, since thou say'st 'tis well; Yet what thou mean'st by 'arms' and 'friends,' Beyond my weaker sense extends. I meant that Giaffir should have heard The very vow I plighted thee; What other hath Zuleika seen What other can she seek to see What change is wrought to make me shun The truth-my pride, and thine till now? No! happier made by that decree, Deep were my anguish, thus compelled". i. But-Selim why my heart's reply Is more than I can guess or tell, 420 430 But since thou say'st'tis so—'tis well.-[MS.] [The fourth line erased.] ii. He blest me more in leaving thee. Much should I suffer thus compelled.—[MS.] I. This wherefore should I not reveal? And such it feels while lurking here; Nor leave me thus to thoughts of fear. I tremble now to meet his eye— Say, Selim, canst thou tell me why?” XIV. "Zuleika-to thy tower's retreat And now with him I fain must prate There's fearful news from Danube's banks, i. This vow I should no more conceal And wherefore should I not reveal!—[MS.] ii. My breast is consciousness of sin But when and where and what the crime 440 450 "Tchocadar '—one of the attendants who precedes a man of authority. [See D'Ohsson's Tableau Générale, etc., 1787, ii. 159, and Plates 87, 88. The Turks seem to have used the Persian word chawki-dār, an officer of the guard-house, a policeman (whence our slang word "chokey"), for a "valet de pied," or, in the case of the Sultan, for an apparitor. The French spelling points to D'Ohsson as Byron's authority.] For which the Giaour may give him thanks! Our Sultan hath a shorter way Such costly triumph to repay. But, mark me, when the twilight drum 460 Hath warned the troops to food and sleep, Unto thy cell with Selim come; Then softly from the Haram creep Where we may wander by the deep: Which some have felt, and more may feel. "Fear thee, my Selim! ne'er till now "Delay not thou; i. Be silent thou.--[MS.] 470 480 VOL. III. N CANTO THE SECOND.i I. THE winds are high on Helle's wave, And shrieking sea-birds warned him home; With signs and sounds, forbade to go, May nerve young hearts to prove as true. i. Nov. 9th 1813.-[MS.] 490 500 1. [Vide Ovid, Heroides, Ep. xix.; and the De Herone atque Leandro of Musæus.] II. The winds are high and Helle's tide The tombs, sole relics of his reign, III. Oh! yet-for there my steps have been; To trace again those fields of yore, Believing every hillock green Contains no fabled hero's ashes, And that around the undoubted scene 510 Thine own "broad Hellespont "1 still dashes, Be long my lot! and cold were he Who there could gaze denying thee! 520 1. The wrangling about this epithet, "the broad Hellespont" or the "boundless Hellespont," whether it means one or the other, or what it means at all, has been beyond all possibility of detail. I have even heard it disputed on the spot ; and not foreseeing a speedy conclusion to the controversy, amused myself with swimming across it in the mean time; and probably may again, before the point is settled. Indeed, the question as to the truth of " the tale of Troy divine" still continues, much of it resting upon the talismanic word "repos : " probably Homer had the same notion of distance that a coquette has of time; and when he talks of boundless, means half a mile; as the latter, by a like figure, when she says eternal attachment, simply specifies three weeks. [For a defence of the Homeric àrelpwv, and for a résumé of the wrangling" of the topographers, Jean Baptiste Le Chevalier (1752-1836) and Jacob Bryant (1715-1804), etc., see Travels in Albania, 1858, ii. 179–185.] |