The fate of Phrosine, the fairest of this sacrifice, is the subject of many a Romaic and Arnaout ditty. The story in the text is one told of a young Venetian many years ago, and now nearly forgotten. I heard it by accident recited by one of the coffee-house story-tellers who abound in the Levant, and sing or recite their narratives. The additions and interpolations by the translator will be easily distinguished from the rest by the want of Eastern imagery; and I regret that my memory has retained so few fragments of the original.

For the contents of some of the notes I am indebted partly to D'Herbelot, and partly to that most eastern, and, as Mr. Weber justly entitles it, "sublime tale," the "Caliph Vathek." I do not know from what source the author of that singular volume may have drawn his materials; some of his incidents are to be found in the "Bibliothèque Orientale;" but for correctness of costume, beauty of description, and power of imagination, it far surpasses all European imitations; and bears such marks of originality, that those who have visited the East will find some difficulty in believing it to be more than a translation. As an Eastern tale, even Rasselas must bow before it; his "Happy Valley" will not bear a comparison with the "Hall of Eblis."

THE

SIEGE OF CORINTH.

TO JOHN CAM HOBHOUSE, ESQ.

THIS POEM IS INSCRIBED

BY HIS FRIEND.

*

ADVERTISEMENT.

The grand army of the Turks (in 1715), under the Prime Vizier, to open to themselves a way into the heart of the Morea, and to form the siege of Napoli di Romania, the most considerable place in all that country, thought it best, in the first place, to attack Corinth, upon which they made several storms. The garrison being weakened, and the governor seeing it was impossible to hold out against so mighty a force, thought it fit to beat a parley: but while they were treating about the articles, one of the magazines in the Turkish camp, wherein they had six hundred barrels of powder, blew up by accident, whereby six or seven hundred men were killed: which so enraged the infidels, that they would not grant any capitulation, but stormed the place with so much fury, that they took it, and put most of the garrison, with Signor Minotti, the governor, to the sword. The rest, with Antonio Bembo, proveditor extraordinary, were made prisoners of war."History of the Turks, vol. iii. p. 151.

* Napoli di Romania is not now the most considerable place in the Morea, but Tripolitza, where the Pacha resides, and maintains his government. Napoli is near Argos. I visited all three in 1810-11; and in the course of journeying through the country, from my first arrival in 1809, 1 crossed the Isthmus eight times, in my way from Attica to the Morea, over the mountains, or in the other direction, when passing from the Gulf of Athens to that of Lepanto. Both the routes are picturesque and beautiful, though very different: that by sea has more sameness, but the voyage, being always within sight of land, and often very near it, presents many attractive views of the islands Salamis, Egina, Poro, etc. and the coast of the continent.

MANY a vanish'd year and age,

And tempest's breath, and battle's rage,
Have swept o'er Corinth; yet she stands,
A fortress form'd to Freedom's hands.

The whirlwind's wrath, the earthquake's shock,
Have left untouch'd her hoary rock,

The keystone of a land which still,
Though fall'n, looks proudly on that hill,
The land-mark to the double tide

That purpling rolls on either side,
As if their waters chafed to meet,
Yet
pause
and crouch beneath her feet.
But could the blood before her shed
Since first Timoleon's brother bled,'
Or baffled Persia's despot fled,

Arise from out the earth which drank
The stream of slaughter as it sank,
That sanguine ocean would o'erflow
Her isthmus idly spread below:
Or could the bones of all the slain,
Who perish'd there, be piled again,

That rival pyramid would rise

More mountain-like through those clear skies,

And downward to the Isthmian plain
From shore to shore of either main,
The tent is pitch'd, the crescent shines
Along the Moslem's leaguering lines;
And the dusk Spahi's bands advance
Beneath each bearded Pacha's glance ;
And far and wide as eye can reach,
The turban'd cohorts throng the beach;
And there the Arab's camel kneels,
And there his steed the Tartar wheels
The Turcoman hath left his herd,3
The sabre round his loins to gird;
And there the volleying thunders pour,
Till waves grow smoother to the roar.
The trench is dug, the cannon's breath
Wings the far-hissing globe of death;
Fast whirl the fragments from the wall,
Which crumbles with the ponderous ball;
And from that wall the foe replies,
O'er dusty plain and smoky skies,
With fires that answer fast and well

+

The summons of the Infidel.

JII.

But near, and nearest to the wall
Of those who wish and work its fall,
With deeper skill in war's black art
Than Othman's sons, and high of heart
As
any chief that ever stood

Triumphant in the fields of blood;
From post to post, and deed to deed,
Fast spurring on his reeking steed,
Where sallying ranks the trench assail,
And make the foremost Moslem quail;
Or where the battery, guarded well,
Remains as yet impregnable,
Alighting cheerly to inspire

The soldier slackening in his fire:
The first and freshest of the host

Which Stamboul's sultan there can boast,

To guide the follower o'er the field,
To point the tube, the lance to wield,
Or whirl around the bickering blade,—
Was Alp, the Adrian renegade!

IV.

From Venice-once a race of worth
His gentle sires he drew his birth;