From “Britannia’s Pastorals,” Bk. I. Song 5
THEN as a nimble squirrel from the wood,
Ranging the hedges for his filbert-food,
Sits pertly on a bough his brown nuts cracking,
And from the shell the sweet white kernel taking,
Till with their crooks and bags a sort of boys,
To share with him, come with so great a noise
That he is forced to...
FAIRE daffadills, we weep to see
You haste away so soone;
As yet the early-rising sun
Has not attained his noone.
Stay, stay,
Until the hastening day
Has run
But to the even-song;
And having prayed together, we
Will goe with you along.
We have short time to stay as you,
We...
Welcome, maids of honor!
You doe bring
In the Spring,
And wait upon her.
She has virgins many,
Fresh and faire;
Yet you are
More sweet than any.
Y’ are the maiden Posies,
And, so grac’t,
To be plac’t
’Fore damask roses.
Yet though thus respected,
By and by...
Fair pledges of a fruitful tree,
Why do ye fall so fast?
Your date is not so past
But you may stay yet here awhile
To blush and gently smile,
And go at last.
What! were ye born to be
An hour or half’s delight,
And so to bid good-night?
’T is pity Nature brought ye forth,
Merely to...
O Nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still,
Thou with fresh hopes the lover’s heart dost fill,
While the jolly hours lead on propitious May.
Thy liquid notes, that close the eye of day,
First heard before the shallow cuckoo’s bill,
Portend success in love. Oh, if Jove’s will
Have linked...
From “Music’s Duel”
NOW westward Sol had spent the richest beams
Of noon’s high glory, when, hard by the streams
Of Tiber, on the scene of a green plat,
Under protection of an oak, there sat
A sweet lute’s-master, in whose gentle airs
He lost the day’s heat and his own hot cares.
Close in the covert of the leaves there stood
A...
Shepherds all, and maidens fair,
Fold your flocks up; for the air
’Gins to thicken, and the sun
Already his great course hath run.
See the dew-drops, how they kiss
Every little flower that is;
Hanging on their velvet heads,
Like a string of crystal beads.
See the heavy clouds low falling
And bright Hesperus down calling...
Where the remote Bermudas ride
In the ocean’s bosom unespied,
From a small boat that rowed along
The listening winds received this song:
“What should we do but sing His praise
That led us through the watery maze
Where he the huge sea monsters wracks,
That lift the deep upon their backs,
Unto an isle so long unknown,
And...
From “Comus”
THE LADY.—This way the noise was, if mine ear be true,
My best guide now; methought it was the sound
Of riot and ill-managed merriment,
Such as the jocund flute or gamesome pipe
Stirs up amongst the loose, unlettered hinds,
When for their teeming flocks and granges full
In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan,
...
From “Comus”
SPIRIT.—There is a gentle nymph not far from hence
That with moist curb sways the smooth Severn stream.
Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure;
Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine,
That had the sceptre from his father Brute.
She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit
Of her enragèd stepdame Guendolen,
Commended her...
