...embroidery wears: Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed, And daffadillies fill their cups with tears, 130 Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurled; Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides, Where thou perhaps under the whelming...

...beauty shed, And daffadillies fill their cups with tears, 150 To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail...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...

...richly allusive lines in the entire poem. But Milton has to conclude, as well as begin, with an apology: For so, to interpose a little ease, Let our frail...whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Wash far away . . . (152-5) The flowers are strewn on the thoughts of readers, not on 'the laureate hearse' of the...

...embroidery wears (11. 133-47) But even this escapism is undone as the speaker recognizes its falsity: "For so to interpose a little ease, / Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise" (11. 152-53). Milton denies his speaker even the solace of private song that Vergil granted Lycidas...

...his beauty shed, And daffodillies fill their cups with tears To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. For so, to interpose a little ease, Let our...the shores and sounding seas Wash far away, where e'er thy bones are hurl'd, Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides, Where thou perhaps under the whelming...

...beauty shed, And Datfadillies fill their cups with tears, To strew the Laureate hearse where Lycid lies. For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail...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...

...beauty shed, And daffodillies fill their cups with tears, 150 To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. For so to interpose a little ease, Let our frail...thee the shores, and sounding seas Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurled, Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides Where thou perhaps under the whelming...

...that ability in itself is evidence of a vision that is superior even if it is (realistically) dark: "Ay me! Whilst thee the shores and sounding Seas / Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurl'd" (154-155). This is, of course, exactly what he has said before, when...

...lines from Lycidas convey the complex attitudes of sympathy and wariness that he brings to the theme: "For so to interpose a little ease, / Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise" (152-53). Perhaps in this episode the allurements of fantasy stand in for those of female beauty. The...

...while the body is adrift. So Lycidas is prone to the whethers that keep Milton's grammar suspended: Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide Visit'st the bottom of this mounstrous world; Or whether thou to our moist vows denied, Sleep's! by...