Yet well thou'lt know the hand that wrote this letter for thine eye,
For conscience will remind thee of thy fickle treachery.
Dissemble as thou wilt, and play with woman's skill thy part,
Thou knowest there is but one who bears for thee a broken heart."
Thus read the valiant castellan of Baza's castle tower,
Then sealed the scrip and sent it to the Moorish maiden's bower.
ZAIDA OF TOLEDO
Upon a gilded balcony, which decked a mansion high,
A place where ladies kept their watch on every passer-by,
While Tagus with a murmur mild his gentle waters drew
To touch the mighty buttress with waves so bright and blue,
Stands Zaida, radiant in her charms, the flower of Moorish maids,
And with her arching hand of snow her anxious eyes she shades,
Searching the long and dusty road that to Ocana leads,
For the flash of knightly armor and the tramp of hurrying steeds.
The glow of amorous hope has lit her cheek with rosy red,
Yet wrinkles of too anxious love her beauteous brow o'er-spread;
For she looks to see if up the road there rides a warrior tall--
The haughty Bencerraje, whom she loves the best of all.
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