Cumber the heated dust relaxed and cold.
On Himmalaya’s topmost summit lone
The Plague’s Red Fiend ascends his mountain throne,—
In shape an Afrite, or a gloomy Djinn,
Where, underneath the brows of Heaven, begin
The Ganges’ waters, that devolving pour
Through gates of ice and starlit arches hoar.
His bow is bent—the viewless arrows fall
On desert, ocean, vale, and capital;
The lonely ship, that ploughs the barren sea,