For, as we thought, three frigates from Algiers
Bore down from Naxos to our aid, but soon 500
The abhorred cross glimmered behind, before,
Among, around us; and that fatal sign
Dried with its beams the strength in Moslem hearts,
As the sun drinks the dew.—­What more?  We fled!—­
Our noonday path over the sanguine foam 505
Was beaconed,—­and the glare struck the sun pale,—­
By our consuming transports:  the fierce light
Made all the shadows of our sails blood-red,
And every countenance blank.  Some ships lay feeding
The ravening fire, even to the water’s level; 510
Some were blown up; some, settling heavily,
Sunk; and the shrieks of our companions died
Upon the wind, that bore us fast and far,
Even after they were dead.  Nine thousand perished! 
We met the vultures legioned in the air 515
Stemming the torrent of the tainted wind;
They, screaming from their cloudy mountain-peaks,
Stooped through the sulphurous battle-smoke and perched
Each on the weltering carcase that we loved,
Like its ill angel or its damned soul, 520
Riding upon the bosom of the sea. 
We saw the dog-fish hastening to their feast. 
Joy waked the voiceless people of the sea,
And ravening Famine left his ocean cave
To dwell with War, with us, and with Despair. 525
We met night three hours to the west of Patmos,
And with night, tempest—­

NOTES:  503 in edition 1822; of editions 1839. 527 And edition 1822; As editions 1839.

MAHMUD: 
Cease!

[ENTER A MESSENGER.]

MESSENGER: 
Your Sublime Highness,
That Christian hound, the Muscovite Ambassador,
Has left the city.—­If the rebel fleet
Had anchored in the port, had victory 530
Crowned the Greek legions in the Hippodrome,
Panic were tamer.—­Obedience and Mutiny,
Like giants in contention planet-struck,
Stand gazing on each other.—­There is peace
In Stamboul.—­

MAHMUD: 
Is the grave not calmer still? 535
Its ruins shall be mine.

HASSAN: 
Fear not the Russian: 
The tiger leagues not with the stag at bay
Against the hunter.—­Cunning, base, and cruel,
He crouches, watching till the spoil be won,
And must be paid for his reserve in blood. 540
After the war is fought, yield the sleek Russian
That which thou canst not keep, his deserved portion
Of blood, which shall not flow through streets and fields,
Rivers and seas, like that which we may win,
But stagnate in the veins of Christian slaves! 545

[ENTER SECOND MESSENGER.]