On sloping mounds, or in the vale beneath, Are domes where whilom kings did make repair; But now the wild flowers round them only breathe: Yet ruined splendour still is lingering there. And yonder towers the prince's palace fair: There thou, too, Vathek! England's wealthiest son, Once formed thy Paradise, as not aware When wanton Wealth her mightiest deeds hath done, Meek Peace voluptuous lures was ever wont to shun. XXIII. Here didst thou dwell, here schemes of pleasure plan. Beneath yon mountain's ever beauteous brow; But now, as if a thing unblest by man, Thy fairy dwelling is as lone as thou! Here giant weeds a passage scarce allow To halls deserted, portals gaping wide; Fresh lessons to the thinking bosom, how Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied; Swept into wrecks anon by Time's ungentle tide. XXIV. Behold the hall where chiefs were late convened! Oh! dome displeasing unto British eye! With diadem hight foolscap, lo! a fiend, A little fiend that scoffs incessantly, There sits in parchment robe arrayed, and by His side is hung a seal and sable scroll, Where blazoned glare names known to chivalry, And sundry signatures adorn the roll, Whereat the urchin points, and laughs with all his soul. XXV. Convention is the dwarfish demon styled That foiled the knights in Marialva's dome: Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled, And turned a nation's shallow joy to gloom. Here Folly dashed to earth the victor's plume, And Policy regained what Arms had lost: For chiefs like ours in vain may laurels bloom! Woe to the conquering, not the conquered host, Since baffled Triumph droops on Lusitania's coast. XXVI. And ever since that martial synod met, Britannia sickens, Cintra, at thy name; And folks in office at the mention fret, And fain would blush, if blush they could, for shame. How will posterity the deed proclaim! Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer, To view these champions cheated of their fame, By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here, Where Scorn her finger points through many a coming year? XXVII. So deemed the Childe, as o'er the mountains he Did take his way in solitary guise: Sweet was the scene, yet soon he thought to flee, More restless than the swallow in the skies: Though here awhile he learned to moralise, For Meditation fixed at times on him, And conscious Reason whispered to despise His early youth misspent in maddest whim; But as he gazed on Truth, his aching eyes grew dim. XXVIII.