VI.
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air, as the first that fell of womankind,When on that dread yet lovely serpent smiling,Whose Image then was stamped upon her mind-- 160But once beguiled--and ever more beguiling;Dazzling, as that, oh! too transcendent visionTo Sorrow's phantom-peopled slumber given,When heart meets heart again in dreams Elysian,And paints the lost on Earth revived in Heaven;Soft, as the memory of buried love;Pure, as the prayer which Childhood wafts above;Was she--the daughter of that rude old Chief,Who met the maid with tears--but not of grief. Who hath not proved how feebly words essay[132] 170To fix one spark of Beauty's heavenly ray?Who doth not feel, until his failing sight[fl]Faints into dimness with its own delight,His changing cheek, his sinking heart confessThe might--the majesty of Loveliness?Such was Zuleika--such around her shoneThe nameless charms unmarked by her alone--The light of Love, the purity of Grace,[fm]The mind, the Music[133] breathing from her face,The heart whose softness harmonized the whole, 180And oh! that eye was in itself a Soul! Her graceful arms in meekness bendingAcross her gently-budding breast;At one kind word those arms extendingTo clasp the neck of him who blestHis child caressing and carest,Zuleika came--and Giaffir feltHis purpose half within him melt:Not that against her fancied wealHis heart though stern could ever feel; 190Affection chained her to that heart;Ambition tore the links apart.
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