SONG. ANACREONTIC. INVEST my head with fragrant rose, That on fair Flora's bosom grows ! Distend my veins with purple juice, That mirth may through my soul diffuse. 'Tis wine and love, and love in wine, Inspires our youth with flames divine. Thus, crown'd with Paphian myrtle, I In Cyprian shades will bathing lie; Whose snows if too much cooling, then Bacchus shall warm my blood again. 'Tis wine and love, and love in wine, Inspires our youth with flames divine. Life's short and winged pleasures fly; Who mourning live, do living die. On down and floods then, swan-like, I Will stretch my limbs, and singing die. 'Tis wine and love, and love in wine, Inspires our youth with flames divine. ROBERT AERRICK. THE MAD MAID's SONG. GOOD-morrow to the day so fair ; Good-morrow, Sir, to you; Bedabbled with the dew. Good-morrow to each maid, Wherein my love is laid. The cold, cold earth doth shaké him ; By you, Sir, to awake him. He knows well who do love him ; And who do rudely move him. With bands of cowslips bind him ; That I shall never find him. A It chanc'd a Bee did fly that way, 1 And thus surpris'd, as filchers use, SIR HENRY WOTTON. SONNET. YOU meaner beauties of the night, Which poorly satisfy our eyes More by your number than your light, You common people of the skies, What are you when the sun doth rise? Ye violets that first appear, By your pure purple mantles known, Like the proud virgins of the year, As if the spring were all your own, What are you when the rose is blown? Ye curious chanters of the wood, That warble forth dame nature's lays, Thinking your passions understood By your weak accents, what's your praise When Philomel her voice doth raise ? In sweetness of her looks, and mind ; STANZAS From the Reliquiæ Wottoniane, 1672. HEART-TEARING cares, and quivering fears, Anxious sighs, untimely tears, Where mirth's but mummery, Or the pure azured heav'n, that smiles to see Peace and a secure mind, Which all men seek, we only find. Abused mortals ! did you know Where joy, heart's-ease, and comforts grow, You'd scorn proud towers, And seek them in these bowers. Where winds sometimes our woods perhaps may shake, Bat blust'ring care could never tempest make, Nor murmurs e'er come nigh us, Saving of fountains that glide by us. Here's no fantastic mask, nor dance, But of our kids, that frisk and prance ;: Nor wars are seen, Unless upon the green Two harmless lambs are butting one another, Which done, both pleating run each to his mother; And wounds are never found Save what the plough-share gives the ground. Go! let the diving Negro seek For gems, hid in some forlorn creek, We all pearls scorn, Save what the dewy morn Congeals upon each little spire of grass, Which careless shepherds beat down as they pass ; And gold ne'er here appears Save what the yellow Ceres bears. Blest, silent groves! O may ye be For ever mirth's best nursery ! May pure contents For ever pitch their tents Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks, these mountains, And peace still slumber by these purling fountains ! Which we may every year Find, when we come a-fishing here. Ignoto. Sir Walter Roleigh. |