The Miracle of the Roses

There dwelt in Bethlehem a Jewish maid, And Zillah was her name, so passing fair That all Judea spake the virgin's praise. He who had seen her eyes' dark radiance, How it revealed her soul, and what a soul Beamed in the mild effulgence, woe to him! For not in solitude, for not in crowds, Might he escape remembrance, nor avoid Her imaged form, which followed everywhere, And filled the heart, and fixed the absent eye. Alas for him! her bosom owned no love Save the strong ardour of religious zeal; For Zillah upon heaven had centred all Her spirit's deep affections. So for her Her tribe's men sighed in vain, yet reverenced The obdurate virtue that destroy'd their hopes.

One man there was, a vain and wretched man, Who saw, desired, despaired, and hated her: His sensual eye had gloated on her cheek E'en till the flush of angry modesty Gave it new charms, and made him gloat the more. She loathed the man, for Hamuel's eye was bold, And the strong workings of brute selfishness Had moulded his broad features; and she feared The bitterness of wounded vanity That with a fiendish hue would overcast His faint and lying smile. Nor vain her fear, For Hamuel vowed revenge, and laid a plot Against her virgin fame. He spread abroad Whispers that travel fast, and ill reports That soon obtain belief; how Zillah's eye, When in the temple heavenward it was raised, Did swim with rapturous zeal, but there were those Who had beheld the enthusiast's melting glance With other feelings filled:—that 'twas a task Of easy sort to play the saint by day Before the public eye, but that all eyes Were closed at night;—that Zillah's life was foul, Yea, forfeit to the law.

Shame—shame to man, That he should trust so easily the tongue Which stabs another's fame! The ill report Was heard, repeated, and believed,—and soon, For Hamuel by his well-schemed villainy Produced such semblances of guilt,—the maid Was to the fire condemned!

Without the walls There was a barren field; a place abhorred, For it was there where wretched criminals Received their death! and there they fixed the stake, And piled the fuel round, which should consume The injured maid, abandoned, as it seemed, By God and man.

The assembled Bethlehemites Beheld the scene, and when they saw the maid Bound to the stake, with what calm holiness She lifted up her patient looks to heaven, They doubted of her guilt.—

With other thoughts Stood Hamuel near the pile; him savage joy Led thitherward, but now within his heart Unwonted feelings stirred, and the first pangs Of wakening guilt, anticipant of hell!

The eye of Zillah as it glanced around Fell on the slanderer once, and rested there A moment; like a dagger did it pierce, And struck into his soul a cureless wound. Conscience! thou God within us! not in the hour Of triumph dost thou spare the guilty wretch, Not in the hour of infamy and death Forsake the virtuous!—

They draw near the stake— They bring the torch!—hold, hold your erring hands! Yet quench the rising flames!—O God, protect, They reach the suffering maid!—O God, protect The innocent one! They rose, they spread, they raged;— The breath of God went forth; the ascending fire Beneath its influence bent, and all its flames, In one long lightning-flash concentrating, Darted and blasted Hamuel—him alone!

Hark what a fearful scream the multitude Pour forth!—and yet more miracles! the stake Branches and buds, and spreading its green leaves, Embowers and canopies the innocent maid Who there stands glorified; and roses, then First seen on earth since Paradise was lost, Profusely blossom round her, white and red, In all their rich variety of hues; And fragrance such as our first parents breathed In Eden, she inhales, vouchsafed to her A presage sure of Paradise regained.