and the tomb is described thus:
" Then did a sharped spyre of Diamond bright, Ten feete each way in square appeare to mee."
Shelley did the same. In " Alastor " he sees Nature's caves:
" their starry domes Of diamond and of gold expand above Numberless and immeasurable halls."
Similarly the temple is described in his " Revolt of Islam ":
"
We came to a vast hall whose glorious roof Was diamond, which had drunk
the lightning's sheen In darkness, which now poured it through the woof
Of spell-inwoven clouds hung there to screen Its blinding splendor."
These
lines betray acquaintance with the Oriental belief that the
penetration of the earth to its deep places by lightning, was the
origin of diamonds.
Tom
Moore apparently had a better knowledge of jewels, and connected them
with a wider range of ideas than perhaps any other poet. He also
beautifies his conception of a fairy palace with diamonds. In " The
Sylph's Ball," the gnome takes his sylph bride:
" to his mine — A palace paved with diamonds all —"
and he lays the image of Beauty's queen:
« " Upon a diamond shrine."
