Comes the blind Fury1 with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. "But not the praise,"
Phoebus replied, and touch'd my trembling ears;
"Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies;
But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes,
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;
As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed."

O fountain Arethuse, and thou honour'd flood,
Smooth-sliding Mincius, 2 crown'd with vocal reeds.
That strain I heard was of a higher mood:
But now my oat proceeds,

And listens to the herald of the sea

That came in Neptune's plea ;

He ask'd the waves, and ask'd the felon winds,

What hard mishap hath doom'd this gentle swain ?

And question'd every gust of rugged wings
That blows from off each beaked promontory :

They knew not of his story;

And sage Hippotades3 their answer brings,
That not a blast was from his dungeon stray'd;
The air was calm, and on the level brine
Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd.
It was that fatal and perfidious bark,
Built in the eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark,
That sunk so low that sacred head of thine.

Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow,
His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge,

Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge

Fury: Destiny. streams of pastoral song.

2

36

Arethuse' and 'Mincius:' celebrated ancient Hippotades :' Eolus, the son of Hippotas, ruler of the winds.- Camus:' genius of the river Cam.

Like to that sanguine flower inscrib'd with woe.

"Ah! Who hath reft (qoth he) my dearest pledge?" Last came, and last did go,

The pilot1 of the Galilean lake;

Two massy keys he bore of metals twain

(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain),

He shook his miter'd locks, and stern bespake :
"How well could I have spar'd for thee, young swain,
Enow of such, as for their bellies' sake

Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold?

Of other care they little reckoning make,
Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast,

And shove away the worthy bidden guest;

Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A sheep-hook, or have learn'd aught else the least
That to the faithful herdman's art belongs!

What recks it them? What need they? They are sped;

And when they list, their lean and flashy songs

Grate on their scrannel2 pipes of wretched straw;
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,
But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread:
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing sed :3
But that two-handed engine at the door
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more."
Return, Alpheus, 5 the dread voice is past,
That shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast
Their bells, and flowerets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use

เ

1 'The pilot:' Peter.-2 Scrannel:' screeching.- 'Sed:' old spelling for said. 'Two-handed engine:' the sword with the two edges issuing out of Christ's mouth. Alpheus:' the Sicilian Muse of Theocritus and others.

Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,
On whose fresh lap the swart-star1 sparely looks;
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes,

That on the green turf suck the honied showers,
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,
The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet,
The glowing violet,

The musk-rose, and the well-attir'd woodbine,
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears :
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the laureat herse where Lycid lies.
For, so to interpose a little ease,

Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise;
Ay me! Whilst thee the shores and sounding seas
Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurl'd,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,

Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide,
Visit'st the bottom of the monstrous world;
Or whether thou, to our moist2 vows denied,
Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old,
Where the great Vision of the guarded Mount1
Looks towards Namancos5 and Bayona's hold;

46

1 'Swart-star:' dog-star. -2 Moist:' wet with tears. 3 Bellerus:' a Cornish giant. The guarded Mount:' Mount St Michael; not far from the Land's end in Cornwall, whence at low water it is accessible. The guarded mount, says Mr Warton, is simply the fortified mount;* and the great vision is the famous apparition of the Archangel Michael, who is said to have appeared on the top of the mount, and to have directed a church to be built there. - 'Namancos,' or Numantia: a town of Old Castile, once highly celebrated in the Spanish history.

*Is it not the Archangel rather than the fortress, who guards the mount?

Look homeward, Angel,1 now, and melt with ruth:
And, O ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth.

Weep no more, woful Shepherds, weep no more,
For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead,

Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor;
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed,

And yet anon repairs his drooping head,

And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky:

So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high,

Through the dear might of Him that walk'd the waves;

Where, other groves, and other streams along,

With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,
And hears the unexpressive nuptial song,
In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.
There entertain him all the saints above,
In solemn troops, and sweet societies,
That sing, and, singing, in their glory move,
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more;
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore,
In thy large recompense, and shalt be good
To all that wander in that perilous flood.

Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and rills,
While the still morn went out with sandals gray;
He touch'd the tender stops of various quills,
With eager thought warbling his Dorick lay:
And now the sun had stretch'd out all the hills,
And now was dropt into the western bay:
At last he rose, and twitch'd his mantle blue:
To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.

1. Angel:' Michael, namely.

L'ALLEGRO.1

HENCE, loathed Melancholy,

Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born,
In Stygian cave forlorn,

'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy! Find out some uncouth cell,

Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings, And the night-raven sings ;

There under ebon shades and low-brow'd rocks,

As ragged as thy locks,

In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.

But come, thou goddess fair and free,
In Heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne,
And by Men, heart-easing Mirth;
Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,
With two sister Graces 2 more,
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore:
Or whether (as some sager sing)

The frolic wind that breathes the spring,
Zephyr, with Aurora playing,

As he met her once a-Maying;

There on beds of violets blue,

And fresh-blown roses wash'd in dew,

Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,

So buxom, blithe, and debonair.

Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee

Jest, and youthful Jollity,

1 'L'Allegro:' i. e., The Cheerful Man.-2 'Two sister Graces:' meat and drink.