The Arctic Queen | Page 3

name with ours through all the earth,?Fearless of harm from one who only craves?The crown of Genius for his soul-lit brow.?Almost I rowed my shallop to his feet;?Almost I offered to convey him hither,?Yet feared so much, O, Queen, thy just displeasure,?That I forbore.
"Long time he, gazing, stood;?And when he turned, 'twas with so deep a sigh?The sound awakened in me strange regret,?Endless reproach, and grief before unknown.?Art angry with thy maiden, peerless Queen?"
Over the lustrous forehead of OENE?A shadow came, and deepened in her eyes.
"I might have slain thee both, if thou hadst ventured;?For it is part of our ancestral law,?The most immutable, to guard ourselves,?With our severest powers, from envious Man.?Yet, as thou sayest, he might have fed our hearts?With sweet immortal food--aye, given us souls,?If such things be,--worth half my priceless realms.?No more--no more! KOLONA! take thy place!"
As a soft flower shrinks from the coming night,?Amid protecting leaves, KOLONA shrank,?Amid her tresses, from her sovereign's eyes,?So gloomy yet so kind; and mutely stood?Amid the bright and coyly wondering train.
A band of sprites, armed with sharp, silver spears,?With pearl-encrusted garb and gleaming sandals,?Dwelling low down the land, even amid men,?The Queen's advance guard, giving due alarm?Of all attacks, taking short flights by night,?And reconnoitering the southern world,--?Had sent a group to counsel with their Queen.?These, now, had much to say of an adventure?Which took them almost to the Tropic Zone:--?How they had blighted fruit; and mildews cast?Over the fields; and blasted flowering trees;?Nipping the hopes of gaudy butterflies,?Doting on honeyed flowers to fill their mouths;?Chilling the saucy birds within their nests;?Ruining the rainbow hues of many a garden;?Pricking the insect world with their fine spears,?And disappointing mortals of their wish.
Their somewhat boastful discourse these had ceased,?When came in hosts a crowd around the Pole,?Parting on each side to make way for one,?A stranger, craving audience of their Queen.?What saw those weird and piercing eyes, full turned?To meet the coming throng?--a singular sight,?Which filled them with bright anger and surprise!?Up from the sea, along a silvery path,?A mortal came; her girlish feet the first?That ever pressed the veritable Pole;?And not more strange to her was this wild queen,?And all the fairness of these maids of honor,?Than was her sunny beauty unto them.?The fluttering brightness of her golden hair,?The lustrous darkness of her eyes, the warmth?Of tropic tints upon her brow and cheek,?The dimpled fullness of her form, appeared?In vivid contrast with their fairer charms.?She held an offering of gorgeous flowers--?Those most renowned for fragrance--in her hands,?Which, as she reached the platform, she held forth?With a most winning, most beseeching air.?Amazed at such presumption, on the maid,?Queen OENE's brow darkened in sudden wrath.
"Warriors! do ye permit this sight!" she cried.
The lightest breath of that majestic voice?Had ever been with prompt obedience met;?But now, though hoarse and deep as surging sea,?No spear was lowered and no arrow bent.?The Pole-Queen raised aloft her pale right arm;--?She stamped her haughty feet upon the pave,--?And all the Powers of the vast Frigid Zone?Were in commotion terrible:--the earth?Shook till the people reeled, and reeling, fell;?The circle of white gems about the throne?Threw off strange darts of light which smote like steel: Swift whirling round with inconceivable speed?A host of Northern Lights sprang into air,?And, battling round their Queen, confused and wild,?Blent with each other in the fierce affray.?The frightened stars paled in the distant sky;?And spectres rushed on shadowy steeds of grey?Down the flushed firmament; and shining spears,?Held by invisible hands, whirled high o'erhead.?Pale mortals in the far off Torrid Zone?Saw wonders in the Northern air with fear;?And when an inward trembling shook the Pole?Central through all the earth, in distant lands?The mountains belched forth fire on fated cities.
Behind the throne suddenly arose a shower,?As 'twere of phosphorescent flakes of snow,?Straight upward like a fountain, and then fell?In glowing sparks wide over all the land.?The surging sea dashed its bewildered waves?Against the foreheads of gigantic bergs,?Walking, like drunken men, the noisy deep.?Anon the POLE was calm. Uninjured stood?The mortal maid before the great OENE;?While near, a thousand prostrate subjects lay?Slain by an angry sovereign disobeyed.
"Queen of this strange and spectral land, wilt thou?Not show thy favor to a lonesome child?Come wandering all this way, impelled by love??Not hate, ambition, curiosity,?Have led me to thy fair and fearful presence.?I have no power, am but a weak young girl;?And chance, alone, has thus revealed to me?The mystic glory of this unknown world,?With thy bright self and this enchanted isle,--?This pearl upon the bosom of the deep?So palely, purely fair--undreamed of beauty!?Love is the sole excuse which I can urge?For my intrusion"--here the stranger blushed,?Drooping in silence her embarrassed head.
"Speak on!" imperially the Pole-Queen said,?Charmed in her own despite, by that sweet face;?While LIR-LIR to KOLONA leaned and smiled,?Commending, in a whisper, what she saw:?And a soft flutter