Page:Arabian poetry for English readers.djvu/96

Rh 26. Then I rose with her; and as we walked she drew over our footsteps the train of her pictured robe.

27. Soon as we had passed the habitations of her tribe, and come to the bosom of a vale, surrounded with hillocks of spiry sand,

28. I gently drew her towards me by her curled locks, and she softly inclined to my embrace;—her waist was gracefully slender, but sweetly swelled the part encircled with ornaments of gold.

29. Delicate was her shape; fair her skin; and her body well proportioned: her bosom was as smooth as a mirror,

30. Or, like the pure egg of an ostrich, of a yellowish tint blended with white, and nourished by a stream of wholesome water not yet disturbed.

31. She turned aside, and displayed her soft cheek: she gave a timid glance with languishing eyes, like those of a roe in the groves of Wegera looking tenderly at her young.

32. Her neck was like that of a milk-white hind, but, when she raised it, exceeded not the justest symmetry; nor was the neck of my beloved so unadorned.

33. Her long coal-black hair decorated her back, thick and diffused, like bunches of dates clustering on the palm-tree.

34. Her locks were elegantly turned above her head; and the riband which bound them was lost in her tresses, part braided, part dishevelled.