And strictly meditate the thankles Muse:
Were it not better don as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neæra's hair?
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth
raise

(That last infirmity of noble mind)

To scorn delights, and live laborious dayes; But the fair guerdon when we hope to find, And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with th'abhorrèd shears,

And slits the thin spun life. But not the praise,

Phoebus repli'd, and touch'd my trembling ears;

Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil, Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to th'world, nor in broad rumour lies,

But lives and spreds aloft by those pure

eyes,

And perfet witnes of all judging Jove; As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

O fountain Arethuse, and thou honour'd floud, Smooth-sliding Mincius, crown'd with vocall reeds,

That strain I heard was of a higher mood:
But now my oate proceeds,

And listens to the Herald of the Sea
That came in Neptune's plea.

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

What hard mishap hath doom'd this gentle swain?

And question'd every gust of rugged wings That blows from off each beakèd promontory,

They knew not of his story,

And sage Hippotades their answer brings, That not a blast was from his dungeon

stray'd,

The ayr was calm, and on the level brine,
Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd.
It was that fatall and perfidious bark
Built in th'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

Like to that sanguine flower inscrib'd with

woe.

Ah; who hath reft (quoth he) my dearest pledge?

Last came, and last did go,
The Pilot of the Galilean lake,

Two massy keyes 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,

Anow of such as for their bellies sake, Creep and intrude, and climb into the fold? Of other care they little reck'ning make, Then how to scramble at the shearers

feast,

And shove away the worthy bidden guest. Blind mouthes! that scarce themselves know how to hold

What recks it them? What need they?

They are sped;

And when they list, their lean and flashy songs

Grate on their scrannel 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 woolf with privy paw

Daily devours apace, and nothing sed,
But that two-handed engine at the door,
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no

more.

Return Alpheus, the dread voice is past, That shrunk thy streams; Return Sicilian Muse,

And call the vales, and bid them hither cast

Their bels, and flourets of a thousand hues. Ye valleys low where the milde whispers

use,

Of shades and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,

On whose fresh lap the swart Star sparely looks,

Throw hither all your quaint enameld eyes,

That on the green terf suck the honied showres,

And purple all the ground with vernal flowres.

Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken

dies.

The tufted crow-toe, and pale gessamine, The white pink, and the pansie freakt with jeat,

The glowing violet,

The musk-rose, and the well attir'd woodbine,

With cowslips wan that hang the pensive hed,

And every flower that sad embroidery

wears:

Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffadillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the laureat herse where Lycid
lies.

For so to interpose a little ease,

surmise.

Ay me! Whilst thee the shores, and sounding seas

Wash far away, where ere thy bones are hurld,

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 moist vows deny'd, Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old,

Where the great vision of the guarded Mount

Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold;

Look homeward angel now, and melt with ruth.

And, O ye dolphins, waft the haples youth. Weep no more, woful shepherds weep no

more,

For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the watry floar; 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 lock's he laves, And hears the unexpressive nuptiall 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; Hence forth 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 th'okes

and rills,

While the still morn went out with sandals

gray;

He touch'd the tender stops of various

quills,

Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides.
Come, and trip it as ye go,
On the light fantastic toe;

And in thy right hand lead with thee
The mountain Nymph, sweet Liberty;
And, if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleasures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And singing startle the dull night,
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled Dawn doth rise;
Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good-morrow,
Through the sweet-briar or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine;
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of Darkness thin;
And to the stack, or the barn-door,
Stoutly struts his dames before:
Oft listening how the hounds and horn
Cheerly rouse the slumbering Morn,
From the side of some hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Sometime walking, not unseen,
By hedgerow elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great Sun begins his state,
Robed in flames and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrowed land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorne in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new
pleasures,

Whilst the landskip round it measures:
Russet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray;
Mountains on whose barren breast
The labouring clouds do often rest;
Meadows trim with daisies pied;
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide.
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosomed high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps some beauty lies,

The cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis met
Are at their savoury dinner set
Of hearbs and other country messes,
Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses;
And then in haste her bower she leaves,
With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;
Or, if the earlier season lead,
To the tanned haycock in the mead.
Sometimes with secure delight
The upland hamlets will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocond rebecks sound
To many a youth and many a maid
Dancing in the chequered shade;
And young
and old come forth to play
On a sunshine holyday,
Till the livelong daylight fail:
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How fairy Mab the junkets eat:
She was pinched and pulled, she said;
And he, by Friar's lanthorn led,
Tells how the drudging Goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flail hath threshed the corn
That ten day-labourers could not end;
Then lies him down, the lubbar fend,
And, stretched out all the chimney's
length,

Basks at the fire his hairy strength,
And crop-full out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering winds soon lulled asleep.
Towered cities please us then,
And the busy hum of men,

Where throngs of knights and barons bold.
In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold,
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit or arms, while both contend
To win her grace whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask and antique pageantry;
Such sights as youthful poets dream.
On summer eves by haunted stream.