The heavy tears burst from her
downcast eyes, and stole along her pale and pensive cheek. They walked
in silence, the brother and the sister, before the purity of whose
surpassing love even ambition vanished. He opened the lattice gate.
They entered into the valley small and green; before them was the marble
fountain with its columns and cupola, and in the distance the charger of
Alroy and his single attendant.
They stopped, and Alroy gathered flowers, and placed them in the hair of
Miriam. He would have softened the bitterness of parting with a smile.
Gently he relaxed his embracing arm, almost insensibly he dropped her
quivering hand.
'Sister of my soul,' he whispered, 'when we last parted here, I was a
fugitive, and now I quit you a conqueror.'
She turned, she threw herself upon his neck, and buried her face in his
breast.
'My Miriam, we shall meet at Bagdad.'
He beckoned to her distant maidens; they advanced, he delivered Miriam
into their arms. He pressed her hand to his lips, and, rushing to his
horse, mounted and disappeared.
A body of irregular cavalry feebly defended the pass of Kerrund. It
was carried, with slight loss, by the vanguard of Scherirah, and the
fugitives prepared the host of the caliph for the approach of the Hebrew
army.
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