University of Virginia Library

So went the moonlight hours along,
In this sweet glade; and so, with song
And witching sounds—not such as they,
The cymbalists of Ossa, play'd,
To chase the moon's eclipse away ,
But soft and holy—did each maid

31

Lighten her heart's eclipse awhile,
And win back Sorrow to a smile.
 

This superstitious custom of the Thessalians exists also, as Pietro della Valle tells us, among the Persians.