Who is she?

RECHA.

Who? a Christian,
Who cared for me in childhood's early years.
You cannot know how little she allowed
That I should miss a mother's tender cares--
May God reward her for it!--but she has
Worried and tortured me.

SITTAH.

Wherefore, and how?

RECHA.

Poor woman, she's a Christian, and from love
Has tortured me: a warm enthusiast,
Who thinks she only knows the real road
That leads to God.

SITTAH.

I understand you now.

RECHA.

And one of those who feel in duty bound
To point it out to every one who strays
From the plain path, to lead, to drag them in.
And who can censure them? for if the road
They travel is the only one that's safe,
They cannot, without pain, behold their friends
Pursue a path that lead to endless woe,
Else, at the self-same time, 'twere possible
To love and hate another. Nor does this
Alone compel me to complain aloud.
Her groans, her prayers, her warnings, and her threats
I could have borne much longer willingly.
They always called up good and wholesome thoughts.
Who is not flattered to be held so dear,
And precious by another, that the thought
Of parting pierces him with lasting pain?

SITTAH.

This is most true.

RECHA.

And yet this goes too far,
And I have nothing to oppose to it--
Patience, reflection, nothing.

SITTAH.

How? to what?

RECHA.

To what she has disclosed to me.

SITTAH.

Say, when?

RECHA.

'Tis scarce an instant. Coming hither
We passed a Christian temple on our way;
She all at once stood still, seemed inly moved,
Raised her moist eyes to heaven, then looked on me.
"Come," she exclaimed at length, "come straight on here,
Through this old fane." She leads, I follow her.
My eyes with horror overrun the dim
And tottering ruin: all at once she stops
By a low ruined