1

wear.

And, when they list, their lean and flashy songs With eager thought warbling his Dorie lay:
Grate on their serannel pipes of wretched straw; And now the Sun had stretch'd out all the hills,
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, And now was dropt into the western bay: 191
But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they At last he rose, and twitch'd his mantle blue:
draw,

To morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread:
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily derours apace, and nothing sed :
But that two-handed engine at the door 130 ORIGINAL VARIOUS READINGS OF LYCIDAS,
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.”
Return, Alpheus, the dread voice is past,

From Milton's MS, in his own hand.
That shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast Ver. 10. Who would not sing for Lycidas, be
Their bells, and flowerets of a thousand hues.

well knew.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use Ver. 22. To bid faire peace, &c.
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks, Ver. 26. Under the glimmering eye-lids, &c.
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks; Ver. 30. Oft till the even-starre bright
Throw hither all your quaint enamelld eyes,

Towards Heaven's descent had sloapt
That on the green turf suck the honied showers,

his burnisht wheel. And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. Ver. 47. Or frost to flowres that their gay but Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, 142

tons wear. The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,

Here bear had been written, and erased, before The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet, The glowing violet,

Ver. 58. What could the golden-hayrd Calliope The musk-rose, and the well-attir'd woodbine,

For her inchaunting son, With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,

When she beheld (the gods far-sighted And every flower that sad embroidery wears:

bee) Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,

His goarie scalpe roule downe the ThraAnd daffadillies fill their cups with tears, 150

cian lee. To strew the laureat herse where Lycid lies. Here, after inchaunting son, occurs in the For, so to interpose a little ease,

margin Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise ;

Whome universal Nature might lament, Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas

And Heaven and Hel deplore, Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurl'd,

When his divine head downe the streame Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,

was sent. Where thou perhaps, under the whelming tide, The line And Heaven, &c. is erased : divine Visit'st the bottom of the monstrous world ;

head is also altered to divine visage, and af. Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,

terwards to goary visage. Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old, 160 | Ver. 69. Hid in the tangles, &c. Where the great vision of the guarded mount Ver. 85. Oh fountain Aretluse, and, thou sooLI Looks toward Namancos and Bayona's hold ;

food, Look homeward, angel, now, and melt with ruth:

Soft-sliding Mincius.
And, O) ye dolphins, waft the hapless youth. Smooth is then altered to fam'd, and next to ko-

Weep no more, woful shepherds, weep no nourd: And soft-sliding to smooth-sliding.
For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead, (more, Ver. 105. Scrauld ore with figures dim.
Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor ; Inwrought is in the margin.
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed,

Ver. 129. Daily derours apace, and little sed.
And yet anon repairs his drooping head, 169 Nothing is erased.
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore Ver. 138. On whose fresh lap the swart star stinl.
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky:

ly looks. So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high,

At first sparely, as at present. Through the dear might of him that walk'd the Ver. 139. Bring hither, &c. waves;

Ver. 142. Bring the rathe primrose that unsed. Where, other groves and other streams along,

ded dies, With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves,

Colouring the pale check of uninjoy'dlove; And hears the unexpressive nuptial song,

And that sad floure that strue In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love.

To write his own wocs on the verrel There entertain hiin all the saints above,

graine: In solemn troops, and sweet societies,

Next, adde Narcissus t' at still trees in That sing, and, singing in their glory, move,

caine; And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.

The woolbine, and the papcie freak't Now, Lycidas, the shepberds weep no more;180

with jet, Henceforth thou art the genius of the shore,

The glowing violet, In thy large recompense, and shalt be good

The couslip wan that hangs kis pensive To all that wander in that perilous flood.

head, Thus sang the uncouth swain to the oaks and

And every bud that sorrotc's litcrie weares; rills,

Let daffadillies fill their cupswith leares, While the still Morn went out with sandals gray;

Bid amaranthus all his beautie shed. He touch'd the tender stops of various quills, Here also the well-atti'd woodbine appears as at

a

present, altered from garish columbine ; and sæd | Oft listening how the hounds and born embroidery, an alteration of sad escocheon, in- Cheerly rouse the slumbering Morn, stead of sorrow's liverie.

From the side of some hoar hill, Ver. 153. Let our sad thought, &c.

Through the high wood echoing shrill: Ver. 154. Ay mee, whilst thee the floods and some time walking, not unseen, sounding seas.

By hedge-row elms, on billocks green,
Ver. 160. Sleep'st by the fable of Corineus old. Right against the eastern-gate
But Bellerus is a correction.

Where the great Sun begins bis state, Ver. 176. Listening the unexpressive nuptial Rob'd in flames, and amber light, song

The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o er the furrow'd land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,

And the mower whets his sithe,
L'ALLEGRO.

And every shepherd tells his tale

Under the hawthorn in the dale. Hence, loathed Melancholy,

Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born, Whilst the landscape round it measures ; In Stygian cave forlorn,

Russet lawns, and fallows gray, 'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights Where the nibbling flocks do stray; unholy!

Mountains, on whose barren breast, Find out some uncouth cell,

The labouring clouds do often rest; Where brooding Darkness sads his jealous Meadows trim with daisies pide, wings,

Shallow brooks, and rivers wide: And the night-raven sings ;

Towers and battlements it sees There under ebon shades, and low-brow'd Bosom'd high in tufted trees, As ragged as thy locks,

[rocks, Where perhaps some beauty lies, In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.

The Cynosure of neigbbouring eyes. But come, thou goddess fair and free,

Hard by, a cottage chimney smoaks, In Heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne,

From betwixt two aged oaks, And by men, heart-easing Mirth ;

Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met, Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,

Are at their savoury dinner set With two sister Graces more,

Of herbs, and other country messes, To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore:

Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses; Or whether (as some sager sing)

And then in haste her lower she leaves, The frulic wind, that breathes the spring, With Thestylis to bind the sheaves; Zephyr, with Aurora playing,

Or, if the earlier season lead, As he met ber once a-maying ;

To the tann'd haycock in the mead. There on beds of violets blue,

Sometimes with secure delight And fresh-blown roses wash'd in dew,

The upland hamlets will invite, Fillid her with thee a danghter fair,

When the merry bells ring round,
So buxom, blithe, and debonair.

And the jocund rebecks sound
Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee To many a youth, and many a maid,
Jest, and youthful Jollity,

Daneing in the chequer'd shade;
Quips, and Cranks, and wantom Wiles,

And young and old come forth to play Nods, and Becks, and wreathed Smiles,

On a sun-shine holy-day, Such as bang on Hebe's check,

Till the live-long day-light fail : And love to live in dimple sleek ;

Then to the spicy nut-brown ale, Sport that wrinkled Care derides,

With stories told of many a feat, And Laughter holding both his sides.

How faery Mab the jankets eat; Come, and tripit, as you go,

She was pinch’d, and palld, she sed; On the light fantastic toe;

And he, by friars lantern led, And in thy right hand lead with thee

Tells how the drudging goblin swet, The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty ;

To earn bis cream-bowl duly set, And, if I give thee honour due,

When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, Mirth, admit me of thy crew,

His shadowy fail hath thresh'd the corn, To live with her, and live with thee,

That ten day-labourers could not end; In unreproved pleasures free;

Then lies him down the lubbar fiend, To hear the lark begin his flight,

And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length, And singing startle the dull Night,

Basks at the fire his hairy strength; From his watch-tower in the skies,

And crop-full out of doors he flings, Till the dappled Dawn doth rise;

Ere the first cock his matin rings. Then to come, in spite of sorrow,

Thus done the tales, to bed they creep, And at my window bid good morrow,

By whispering winds soon lulld asleep. Through the sweet-briar, or the vine,

Tower'd cities please us then, Or the twisted eglantine :

And the busy bum of men, While the cock, with lively din,

Where throngs of knights and barons bold, Scatters the rear of Darkness thin.

In weeds of peace, high triumphs bold, And to the stack, or the barn-door,

With store of ladies, whose bright eyes Stoutly struts his dames before :

Rain influence, and judge the prize

Of wit, or arms, while both contend

And sable stole of Cyprus lawn, 'To win her grace, whom all commend.

Over thy decent shoulders drawn. There let Hymen oft appear

Come, but keep thy wonted state, In saffron robe, with taper clear,

With even step, and musing gait; And pomp, and feast, and revelry,

And looks commércing with the skies, With mask, and antique pageantry ;

Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes: Such sights as youthful poets dream

There, held in holy passion still, On summer eves by haunted stream.

Forget thyself to marble, till Then to the well-trod stage anon,

With a sad leaden downward cast If Jonson's learned sock be on,

Thou fix them on the earth as fast: Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child,

And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, Warble his native wood-notes wild.

Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet, And ever, against eating cares,

And hears the Muses in a ring Lap me in soft Lydian airs,

Aye round about Jove's altar sing: Married to immortal verse;

And add to these retired Leisure, Such as the meeting soul may pierce,

That in trim gardens takes his pleasure: In potes, with many a winding bout

But first, and chiefest, with thee bring, Of linked sweetness long drawn out,

Him that yon soars on golden wing, With wanton heed and giddy cunning;

Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne, The melting voice through mazes running, The cherub Contemplation; Untwisting all the chains that tie

And the mute Silence hist along, The hidden soul of harmony;

'Less Philomel will deign a song, That Orpheus' self may heave his head

In her sweetest saddest plight, From golden slumber on a bed

Smoothing the rugged brow of Night, · Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear

While Cynthia checks her dragoa yoke, Such strains as would have won the ear

Gently o'er the accustom'd oak: Of Pluto, to bave quite set free

Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of foly, His balf-regain'd Eurydice.

Most musical, most melancholy ! These delights if thou canst give,

Thee, chantress, oft, the wcods among, Mirth, with thee I mean to live.

I woo, to hear thy even-song ;
And, missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven green,

To behold the wandering Moon,
IL PENSEROSO.

Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that had been led astray

Through the Heaven's wide patbless way ; Hence, rain deluding Joys,

And oft, as if her head she bow'd, The brood of Folly without father bred !

Stooping through a fleecy clouch How little you bested,

Oft, on a plat of rising ground, Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys ! I hear the far-off Curieu sound, Dwell in some idle brain,

Over some wide-water'd sbore,
And fancies fund with gaudy shapes possess, Swinging slow with sullen roar:
As thick and numberless

Or, if the air will not permit,
As the gay motes that people the sun-beams; Some still removed place will fit,
Or likest hovering dreams,

Where glowing embers through the room
The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' trajn. Teach light to counterfeit a gloom;
But hail, thou goddess, sage and holy,

Far from all resort of mirth, Hail, divinest Melancholy !

Save the cricket on the hearth, Whose saintly visage is too bright

Or the belman's drowsy charm, To hit ihe sense of human sight,

To bless the doors from nightly harm. And therefore to our weaker view

Or let my lamp at midnight bour, O’erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue; Be seen in some high lonely tower, Black, but such as in esteem

Where I may oft out-watch the Bear, Prince Memnon's sister might beseem,

With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove The spirit of Plato, to unfold To set her beauty's praise above

What worlds or what vast regions hold The sea-nymphs, and their powers offended : The immortal mind, that bath forsook Yet thou art higher far descended:

Her mansion in this fleshly nook : Thee bright-hair'd Vesta, long of yore,

And of those demons that are found To solitary Saturn bore;

In fire, air, flood, or under ground, His daughter she; in Saturn's reign,

Whose power hath a true consent Such mixture was not held a stain:

With planet, or with element. Oft in glimmering bowers and glades

Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy He met her, aud in secret shades

In scepter'd pall come sweeping by, Of woody Ida's inmost grore,

Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line, Whilst yet there was no fear of Jove.

Or the tale of Troy divine; Come, pensive Nun, devout and pure,

Or what (though rare) of later age Sober, stedfast, and demure,

Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage. All in a robe of darkest grain,

But, O sad virgin, that thy power Flowing with majestic train,

Might raise Musæus froin his bower!

a

OR

Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing

These pleasures, Melancholy, give,
Such notes, as, warbled to the string,

And I with thee will choose to live.
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell grant what love did seek!
Or call up him that left half-told

ARCADES.
The story of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarsife,

PART OF A MASK,
And who had Canace to wife,
That own'd the virtuous ring and glass;
And of the wonderous horse of brass.

Entertainment presented to the countess On which the Tartar king did ride:

Dowager of Derby at Harefield, by some And if aught else great bards besiile

noble persons of her family; who appear on In sage and solemn tunes have sung,

the scene in pastoral habit, moving toward Of turneys, and of trophies hung,

the seat of state, with this song. Of forests, and enchantments drear, Where more is meant than meets the ear.

(UNQUESTIONABLY this mask was a much longer Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career, performance. Milton seems only to have writTill civil-suited Morn appear,

ten the poetical part, consisting of these Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont

three songs and the recitative soliloquy of the With the Attic boy to hunt,

Genius. The rest was probably prose and maBut kercheft in a comely cloud,

chinery. In many of Jonsour's masques, the While rocking winds are piping loud,

poet but rarely appears, amidst a cumbersome Or usher'd with a shower still,

exhibition of beathen gods and mythology. When the gust hath blown his fill,

Alice, countess dowager of Derby, married Ending on the russling leaves,

Ferdinando lord Strange; who on the death of With minute drops from off the eaves.

his father Henry, in 1594, became earl of Derby, And, when the Sun begins to fling

but died the next year. She was the sixth daughHis flaring beams, me, goddess, bring

ter of sir John Spenser of Althorpe in NorthampTo arched walks of twilight groves,

tonshire. She was afterwards married (in 1600) And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves,

to lord chancellor Egerton, who died in 1617. Of pine, or monumental oak,

She died Jan. 26, 1635-6, and was buried at Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke,

Harefield.]
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt,

I. SONG.
There in close covert by some brook,

Look, nymphs, and shepherds, look, Where no profaner eye may look,

What sudden blaze of majesty, Hide me from day's garish eye,

Is that which we from hence descry. While the bee with honied thigh,

Too divine to be mistook : That at her flowery work doth sing,

This, this is she And the waters murmuring,

To whom our vows and wishes bend;
With such consort as they keep,

Here our solemn search bath end.
Entice the dewy feather'd Sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream

Fame, that, her high worth to raise,
Wave at his wings in aery stream

Seem'd erst so lavish and profuse, Of lively portraiture display'd,

We may justly now accuse

10 Softly on my eye-lids laid.

Of detraction from her praise ; And, as I wake, sweet music breathe

Less than half we find exprest,
Above, about, or underneath,

Envy bid conceal the rest.
Sent by some spirit to mortal good,
Or the unseen genius of the wood,

Mark, what radiant state she spreads,
But let my due feet never fail

In circle round her shining throne, To walk the studious cloysters pale,

Shooting her beams like silver threads ; And love the high-embowed roof,

This, this is she alone, With antic pillars massy proof,

Sitting like a goddess bright,
And storied windows richly dight,

In the centre of her light.
Casting a dim religious light:
There let the pealing organ blow,

Might she the wise Latona be,

2) To the full-voic'd quire below,

Or the tower'd Cybele In service high and anthems clear,

Mother of a hundred gods? As may with sweetness, through mine ear,

Juno dares not give her odds : Dissolve me into ecstasies,

Who had thought this clime had held
And bring all Heaven before mine eyes.

A deity so unparallel’d?
And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,

As they come forward the Genius of the wood apThe hairy gown and mossy cell,

pears, and turning towards them speaks. Where I may sit and rightly spell

Genius,
Of every star that Heaven doth shew,
And every herb that sips the dew;

Stay, gentle swains; for, though in this Till old experience do attain

disguise, To something like prophetic strain.

I see bright honour sparkle through your eyes ;

of famous Arcardy pe are, and sprang

Follow me;
Of that renowned flood, so often sung,

I will bring you where she sits;
Divine Alphéus, who by secret sluce 30 Clad in splendour as befits
Stole under seas to meet his Arethuse;

Her deity.
And ye, the breathing roses of the wood, Such a rural queen
Fair silver-buskin'd nymphs, as great and good; All Arcadia hath not soen.
I know, this quest of yours, and free intent,
Was all in honour and devotion meant

III. SONG.
To the great mistress of yon princely shrine,
Whom with low reverence Ladore as mine;

Nymphs and shepherds, dance no more

By sandy Ladon's lilied banks ;
And, with all helpful service, will comply
To further this night's glad solemnity;

On old Lycæus, or Cyllene hoar,
And lead ye, where ye may more near behold 40 Trip no more in twilight ranks ;

300 What shallow-searching Fame hath left untold; Though Erymanth your loss deplore, Which I full oft, amidst these shades alone,

A better soil shall give ye. thanks. Have set to wonder at, and gaze upon:

From the stony Mænalus Por know, by lot from Jove I am the power

Bring your flocks, and live with us; of this fair wood, and live in oaken bower,

Here ye shall have greater grace, To nurse the sapplings tall, and curl the grove

To serve the lady of this place. With ringlets quaint, and wanton windings wove.

Though Syrinx your Pan's mistress were, And all my plants I save from nightly ill

Yet Syrinx well might wait on her.

Such a rural queen
Of noisome winds, and blasting vapours chill:

All Arcadia hath not seen.
And from the boughs brush off the evil dew, 50
And heal the harms of thwarting thunder blue,
Or what the cross dire-looking planet smites,
Or burtful worm with canker'd venom bites.

ORIGINAL Various READINGS OF ARCADES.
When Evening grey doth rise, 1 fetch my round
Over the mount, and all this hallow d ground;

From Milton's MS, in his own band.
And early, ere the odorous breath of Morn
Awakes the slumbering leaves, or tassel'd born Ver. 10. Now seems guiltie of abuse
Shakes the high thicket, haste I all about,

And detraction from her praise,
Number my ranks, and visit every sprout

Lesse than halfe she hath exprest: With puissant words, and murmurs made to

Envie bid her hide the rest. bless.

Here her hide is erased, and conceale written over it. But else in deep of night, when drowsiness 61

Ver. 18. Seated like a goddess bright. Hath lock'd up mortal sense, then listen I

But sealed is also expunged, and sitting supplied. To the celestial Syrens' harmony,

Ver. 23. Ceres dares not give her odds: That sit upon the nine infolded spheres,

Who would have thought, &c. And sing to those that hold the vital shears,

Both these readings are erased, and Juno and And turn the adamantine spindle round,

had, as the printed copies now read, are written On which the fate of gods and men is wound.

over them. Such sweet compulsion doth in music lie,

Ver. 41. Those virtues which dull Fame, &c. To lull the danghters of Necessity,

This likewise is expunged, and What shallow is And keep unsteady Nature to her law, 70 substituted. And the low world in measur'd motion draw

Ver. 44. For know, by lot from Jore I have After the heavenly tune, which none can hear, Of human mould, with gross unpurged ear; Here again the pen is drawn through have, and And yet such music worthiest were to blaze am is written over it. The peerless height of her immortal praise, Ver. 47. In ringlets quaint. Whose lustre leads us, and for her most fit, But With is placed over In expunged. If my inferior hand or voice could hit

Ver. 49. Of noisome winds, or blasting vaInimitable sounds: yet, as wergo, Whate'er the skill of lesser gods can show, Ver. 50. And from the leaves brush off, &c. I will assay, her worth to celebrate,

80 So it was at first. But the pen is drawn through And so attend ye toward her glittering state; leaves, and boues supplied. Where ye may all, that are of noble stem,

Ver. 52. Or what the crosse, &c. Approach, and kiss her sacred vesture's hem. It was at first And, as in the printed copies;

but that is erased, and Or substituted.

Ver. 59. And number all my ranks, and II, SONG.

every sprout.

Here And and all are expunged with the peo, O'er the smooth enamell'd green

and visit, as in the printed copies, completes the

line.
Where no print of step hath been,
Follow me, as I sing.

Ver. 62. Hath chaind mortalitie.
And touch the warbled string,

This also is erased, and lacki up mortal serve writUnder the shady roof

ten over it. of branching elm star-proof.

Ver. 81. And so attend you toward, &c.
Ven 9. I will being ye where she sits.

the power.

pours chill.