JAUNTS IN THE JUNGLE. 13 



ing fiends, howl and shriek in dismal chorus, falling 

 on the ear with an ominous sound, woeful, unearthly, 

 and desolate, as of yore they struck upon the senses 

 of the lonely dwellers on Mount Ararat, seeming to 

 moan over the destruction of a world ! 



At last comes night cloudless, brilliant, and fairy- 

 like in its moonlit existence. 



The white mists rising in the valleys below, give 

 to the hill-tops that stretch above them the appear- 

 ance of a cluster of islands in a silvery sea. Myriads 

 of fire-flies glitter on every tree of the mountain, and 

 never did a glimpse of Paradise beam on the opium- 

 wrought visions of a fanatic in all the beau-ideal of 

 its blest tranquillity more serenely glorious than the 

 scene before me ! 



At length a shriek from some dyspeptic baboon in 

 a nightmare recalls a sense of my position, and the 

 late hour of night ; and the last cheroot, 



Like a saint of old, condemn'd and sold, 

 To death through suffering driven ; 



having 



Pass'd with a smile, from its funeral pile, 

 To become a bright cloud in Heav'n, 



I retrace my steps to my mountain-home, and am 

 soon wrapt in a sleep as breathless as the air around 

 me, and dreamless as the sleep of death ! 



