Page:Specimens of German Romance (Volume 2).djvu/66

 he poured forth again all the purple blood which he had drawn from the princess, and then gave up his spirit in a wretched manner, amidst the most violent convulsions. All the flowers that stood around dipped their vestments in this ichor, and stained them, in perpetual remembrance of the murdered princess, with so bright a purple, that no painter on earth can imitate it. You know, Pepusch, that the most beautiful pinks and hyacinths grow in that cypress-grove where the Leech-Prince kissed to death the fair Gamaheh.

"The genius, Thetel, now thought of departing, as he had much to do at Samarcand before night, and cast a farewell look at the princess, when he seemed as if fixed by magic to the spot, and gazed on the fair one with deep emotion. Suddenly a thought struck him. Instead of going on farther, he took the princess in his arms, and rose with her high into the air; at which time two philosophers, one of whom it should be said was myself,—were observing the course of the stars from the gallery of a lofty tower. They perceived high above them