The traveller tells how, in that ancient clime 
Whose mystic monuments and ruins hoar 
Still struggle with the antiquary's lore, 
To guard the secrets of a by-gone time, 
He saw, uprising from the desert bare, 
Like a white ghost, a city of the dead, 
With palaces and temples wondrous fair, 
Where moon-horn'd Isis once was worshipped. 
But silence, like a pall, did all enfold, 
And the inhabitants were turn'd to stone -- 
Yea, stone the very heart of every one! 
Once to a rich man I this tale re-told. 
"Stone hearts! A traveller's myth!" -- he turn'd aside, 
As Hunger begg'd, pale-featured and wild-eyed.