Then strove their stag-eyed mother to calm down This his paternal rage, and thus addrest-- “O! Most Serene! why dost thou stamp and frown, And box the compass of the royal chest? Ah! thou wilt mar that portly trunk, I own I love to gaze on!--Pr’ythee, thou hadst best Pocket thy fists. Nay, love, if you so thin Your beard, you’ll want a wig upon your chin!” But not her words, nor e’en her tears, could slack The quicklime of his rage, that hotter grew: He called his slaves to bring an ample sack Wherein a woman might be _poked_--a few Dark grimly men felt pity and look’d black At this sad order; but their slaveships knew When any dared demur, his sword so bending Cut off the “head and front of their offending.” For Ali had a sword, much like himself, A crooked blade, guilty of human gore-- The trophies it had lopp’d from many an elf Were stuck at his _head_-quarters by the score-- Nor yet in peace he laid it on the shelf, But jested with it, and his wit cut sore; So that (as they of Public Houses speak) He often did his dozen _butts_ a week. Therefore his slaves, with most obedient fears, Came with the sack the lady to enclose; In vain from her stag-eyes “the big round tears Coursed one another down her innocent nose;” In vain her tongue wept sorrow in their ears; Though there were some felt willing to oppose, Yet when their heads came in their heads, that minute, Though ’twas a piteous _case_, they put her in it And when the sack was tied, some two or three Of these black undertakers slowly brought her To a kind of Moorish Serpentine; for she Was doom’d to have _a winding sheet of water_. Then farewell, earth--farewell to the green tree-- Farewell, the sun--the moon--each little daughter! She’s shot from off the shoulders of a black, Like a bag of Wall’s-End from a coalman’s back. The waters oped, and the wide sack full-fill’d All that the waters oped, as down it fell; Then closed the wave, and then the surface rill’d A ring above her, like a water-knell; A moment more, and all its face was still’d, And not a guilty heave was left to tell That underneath its calm and blue transparence A dame lay drowned in her sack, like Clarence. But Heaven beheld, and awful witness bore, The moon in black eclipse deceased that night, Like Desdemona smother’d by the Moor-- The lady’s natal star with pale affright Fainted and fell--and what were stars before, Turn’d comets as the tale was brought to light, And all look’d downward on the fatal wave, And made their own reflections on her grave.