Declined the

AWAKE, Æolian lyre, awake,

And give to rapture all thy trembling strings.
From Helicon's harmonious springs

A thousand rills their mazy progress take:
The laughing flowers that round them blow
Drink life and fragrance as they flow.
Now the rich stream of Music winds along
Deep, majestic, smooth, and strong,
Through verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign;
Now rolling down the steep amain
Headlong, impetuous, see it pour :

The rocks and nodding groves re-bellow to the

roar.

O Sovereign of the willing soul,
Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs,
Enchanting shell! the sullen Cares

And frantic Passions hear thy soft control.
On Thracia's hills the Lord of War
Has curbed the fury of his car

And dropt his thirsty lance at thy command.
Perching on the sceptred hand

Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feathered king
With ruffled plumes, and flagging wing:
Quenched in dark clouds of slumber lie

The terror of his beak, and lightnings of his eyc.

Thee the voice, the dance, obey

Tempered to thy warbled lay.
O'er Idalia's velvet-green

The rosy-crowned Loves are seen

On Cytherea's day,

With antic Sport, and blue-eyed Pleasures,

Frisking light in frolic measures;
Now pursuing, now retreating,

Now in circling troops they meet:
To brisk notes in cadence beating
Glance their many-twinkling ect.

Slow melting strains their Queen's approach

declare:

Where'er she turns the Graces homage pay:

With arms sublime that float upon the air
In gliding state she wins her easy way:

O'er her warm cheek and rising bosom move
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of
Love.

Man's feeble race what ills await!
Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,

And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate!
The fond complaint, my song, disprove,
And justify the laws of Jove.

Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Muse?
Night, and all her sickly dews,

Her spectres wan, and birds of boding cry
He gives to range the dreary sky:
Till down the eastern cliffs afar
Hyperion's march they spy, and glittering shafts
of war.

In climes beyond the solar road

Where shaggy forms o'er ice-built mountains

roam,

The Muse has broke the twilight gloom

To cheer the shivering native's dull abode. And oft, beneath the odorous shade

Of Chili's boundless forests laid,

She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat

In loose numbers wildly sweet

Their feather-cinctured chiefs, and dusky loves. Her track, where'er the Goddess roves,

Glory pursue, and generous Shame,

Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame.
Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's steep,
Isles, that crown th' Ægean deep,

Murmured deep a solemn sound:
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour
Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains.
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant Power,

And coward Vice, that revels in her chains.
When Latium had her lofty spirit lost,
They sought, O Albion! next, thy sea-encircled

coast.

Far from the sun and summer-gale

In thy green lap was Nature's Darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon strayed,

To him the mighty Mother did unveil
Her awful face: the dauntless Child
Stretched forth his little arms, and smiled.
This pencil take (she said), whose colours clear
Richly paint the vernal year:

Thine, too, these golden keys, immortal Boy!
This can unlock the gates of Joy;

Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears,
Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears.

Nor second He, that rode sublime
Upon the seraph-wings of Ecstasy

The secrets of the Abyss to spy:

He passed the flaming bounds of Place and Time:

The living Throne, the sapphire-blaze

Where Angels tremble while they gaze,

He saw; but blasted with excess of light,

Closed his eyes in endless night.

Behold where Dryden's less presumptuous car
Wide o'er the fields of Glory bear

Two coursers of ethereal race

With necks in thunder clothed, and long-resound

ing pace.

Hark, his hands the lyre explore!
Bright-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er,
Scatters from her pictured urn
Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.
But ah! 'tis heard no more-

O! Lyre divine, what daring Spirit
Wakes thee now! Though he inherit
Nor the pride, nor ample pinion,

That the Theban Eagle bear,
Sailing with supreme dominion

Through the azure deep of air:
Yet oft before his infant eyes would run

Such forms as glitter in the Muse's ray
With orient hues, unborrowed of the sun :

Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate:

Beneath the Good how far-but far above the Great.

babble and talk, is most tolerable and not to be endured.

Sec. Watch. We will rather sleep than talk: we know what belongs to a watch.

Dog. Why, you speak like an ancient and most quiet watchman, for I cannot see how sleeping should offend: only, have a care that your bills be not stolen.-Well, you are to call at all the alehouses, and bid those that are drunk get them to bed.

Sec. Watch. How if they will not?

Dog. Why, then, let them alone till they are sober: if they make you not then the better answer, you may say they are not the men you took them for.

Sec. Watch. Well, sir.

Dog. If you meet a thief, you may suspect him, by virtue of your office, to be no true man; and, for such kind of men, the less you meddle or make with them, why, the more is for your honesty.

Sec. Watch. If we know him to be a thief, shall we not lay hands on him?

Dog. Truly, by your office, you may; but I think they that touch pitch will be defiled: the most peaceable way for you, if you do take a thief, is to let him show himself what he is, and steal out of your company.

Verg. You have been always called a merciful man, partner.

Dog. Truly, I would not hang a dog by my will, much more a man who hath any honesty in him.

Verg. If you hear a child cry in the night, you must call to the nurse and bid her still it.

Sec. Watch. How if the nurse be asleep and will not hear us?

Dog. Why, then, depart in peace, and let the child wake her with crying; for the ewe that will not hear her lamb when it baes, will never answer a calf when it bleats.

Verg. "Tis very true.

Dog. This is the end of the charge. You, constable, are to present the prince's own person: if you meet the prince in the night, you may stay him.

Very. Nay, by'r lady, that I think 'a cannot. Dog. Five shillings to one on't, with any man that knows the statutes, he may stay him: marry, not without the prince be willing; for, indeed, the watch ought to offend no man; and it is an offence to stay a man against his will.

Verg. By'r lady, I think it be so.

Dog. Ha, ha, ha! Well, masters, good night: an there be any matter of weight chances, call up me: keep your fellows' counsels and your own: and good night. Come, neighbour.

Sec. Watch. Well, masters, we hear our charge: let us go sit here upon the church-bench till two, and then all to bed.

Dog. One word more, honest neighbours. I pray you, watch about Signior Leonato's door; for the wedding being there to-morrow, there is a great coil to-night. Adieu; be vigilant, I be seech you. [Exeunt DOG BERRY and VERGES. Enter BORACHIO and CONRADE. Bora. What, Conrade!Watch. [Aside.] Peace! stir not. Bora. Conrade, I say!—

Con. Here, man; I am at thy elbow. Bora. Mass, and my elbow itched; I thought there would a scab follow.

Con. I will owe thee an answer for that: and now forward with thy tale.

Bora. Stand thee close, then, under this penthouse, for it drizzles rain; and I will, like a trae drunkard, utter all to thee.

Watch. [Aside.] Some treason, masters: yet stand close.

Bora. Therefore know, I have earned of Don John a thousand ducats.

Con. Is it possible that any villany should be so dear?

Bora. Thou shouldst rather ask, if it were possible any villany should be so rich; for when rich villains have need of poor ones, poor ones may make what price they will.

Con. I wonder at it.

Bora. That shows thou art unconfirmed. Thou knowest that the fashion of a doublet, or a hat, or a cloak, is nothing to a man.

Con. Yes, it is apparel.
Bora. I mean, the fashion.

Con. Yes, the fashion is the fashion. Bora. Tush! I may as well say the fool's the fool. But seest thou not what a deformed thief this fashion is?

Watch. [Aside.] I know that Deformed; 'a has been a vile thief this seven year; 'a goes up and down like a gentleman. I remember his name. Bora. Didst thou not hear somebody? Con. No; 'twas the vane on the house. Bora. Seest thou not, I say, what a deformed thief this fashion is? how giddily he turns about all the hot bloods between fourteen and five-andthirty? sometimes fashioning them like Pharaoh's soldiers in the reechy painting; sometimes like good Bel's priests in the old church-window; sometimes like the shaven Hercules in the smirched worm-eaten tapestry?

Con. All this I see; and I see that the fashion wears out more apparel than the man. But art not thou thyself giddy with the fashion too, that thou hast shifted out of thy tale into telling me of the fashion?

Bora. Not so, neither: but know, that I have to-night wooed Margaret, the Lady Hero's gentlewoman, by the name of Hero: she leans me out at her mistress' chamber-window, bids me a thou

sand times good night,-I tell this tale vilely:-I should first tell thee how the prince, Claudio, and my master, planted, and placed, and possessed by my master Don John, saw afar off in the orchard this amiable encounter.

Con. And thought they Margaret Hero?

was

Bora. Two of them did, the prince and Claudio; but the devil, my master, knew she was Margaret; and partly by his oaths, which first possessed them, partly by the dark night, which did deceive them, but chiefly by my villany, which did confirm any slander that Don John had made, away went Claudio enraged; swore he would meet her, as he was appointed, next morning at the temple, and there, before the whole congregation, shame her with what he saw o'ernight, and serd her home again without a husband.

315

First Watch. We charge you, in the prince's name, stand!

Sec. Watch. Call up the right master constable. We have here recovered the most dangerous piece of witchery that ever was known in the commonwealth.

First Watch. And one Deformed is one of them; I know him; 'a wears a lock.

Con. Masters, masters,

Sec. Watch. You'll be made bring Deformed forth, I warrant you.

Con. Masters,—

First Watch. Never speak: we charge you, let us obey you to go with us.

Bora. We are like to prove a goodly commodity, being taken up of these men's bills.

Con. A commodity in question, I warrant you. Come, we'll obey you. [Exeunt.

THE Baron of Smaylho'me rose with day,
He spurred his courser on,

Without stop or stay, down the rocky way
That leads to Brotherstone.

He went not with the bold Buccleuch,
His banner broad to rear;

He went not 'gainst the English yow,

To lift the Scottish spear.

Yet his plate-jack was braced, and his helmet was laced,

And his vaunt-brace of proof he wore;
At his saddle-gerthe was a good steel sperthe,
Full ten pound weight and more.

The Baron returned in three days' space,

And his looks were sad and sour; And weary was his courser's pace As he reached his rocky tower.

He came not from where Ancram Moor

Ran red with English blood;

Where the Douglas true, and the bold Buccleuch, 'Gainst keen Lord Evers stood.

Yet was his helmet hacked and hewed.

His acton pierced and tore;

His axe and his dagger with blood imbrued,

But it was not English gore.

He lighted at the chapellage,

He held him close and still;

And he whistled thrice for his little foot-page,
His name was English Will.

"Come thou hither, my little foot-page,
Come hither to my knee;

Thou art young, and tender of age,

I think thou art true to me.

"Come tell me all that thou hast seen,
And look thou tell me true!
Since I from Smaylho'me tower have been,
What did thy lady do ?"-

"My lady, each night, sought the lonely light
That burns on the wild Watchfold;
For, from height to height, the beacons bright
Of the English foemen told.

"The bittern clamoured from the moss,
'The wind blew loud and shrill;
Yet the craggy pathway she did cross,
To the eiry Beacon Hill.

"I watched her steps, and silent came
Where she sat her on a stone;

No watchman stood by the dreary flame;
It burned all alone.