(List, mortals, if your ears be true) Celestial Cupid, her famed son, advanced But now my task is smoothly done · I can fly, or I can run Quickly to the green earth's end, Where the bowed welkin slow doth bend, Heaven itself would stoop to her. 1000 ΠΟΙΟ 1020 LYCIDAS. In this Monody the Author bewails a learned Friend, unfortunately drowned in his passage from Chester on the Irish Seas, 1637; and, by occasion, foretells the ruin of our corrupted Clergy, then in their height. YET once more, O ye laurels, and once more, I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude, Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. Begin, then, Sisters of the sacred well That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring; So may some gentle Muse With lucky words favour my destined urn, And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud! For we were nursed upon the self-same hill, We drove a-freld, and both together heard What time the grey-fly winds her sultry horn, 20 Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night, Oft till the star that rose at evening bright Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel. Tempered to the oaten flute Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns with cloven heel From the glad sound would not be absent long; 30 And old Damotas loved to hear our song. But, oh! the heavy change, now thou art gone, The willows, and the hazel copses green, Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays. Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze, Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear. Where were ye, Nymphs, when the remorseless deep 40 50 Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie, Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream. Ay me! I fondly dream "Had ye been there," . . . for what could that have done? What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore, The Muse herself, for her enchanting son, Whom universal nature did lament, 60 When, by the rout that made the hideous roar, Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise (That last infirmity of noble mind) 70 To scorn delights and live laborious days; And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears, And slits the thin-spun life. "But not the praise," Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies, 80 But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyeş As he pronounces lastly on each deed, Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed." O fountain Arethuse, and thou honoured flood, And listens to the Herald of the Sea, That came in Neptune's plea. He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds, What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain? They knew not of his story; And sage Hippotades their answer brings, That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed: Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark, Next, Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow, "Ah! who hath reft," quoth he, "my dearest pledge?" Last came, and last did go, The Pilot of the Galilean Lake; Two massy keys he bore of metals twain (The golden opes, the iron shuts amain). He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake : "How well could I have spared for thee, young swain, Enow of such as, for their bellies' sake, Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold! Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast, Of other care they little reckoning make And shove away the worthy bidden guest. Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold A sheep-hook, or have learnt aught else the least What recks it them? What need they? They are sped; 120 And, when they list, their lean and flashy songs The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw, But that two-handed engine at the door The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet, The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine, 130 140 150 To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise. Ay me whilst thee the shores and sounding seas Look homeward, Angel, now, and melt with ruth: 160 Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more, For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor. 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 170 So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high, Through the dear might of Him that walked the waves, With nectar pure his oozy locks he laves, And hears the unexpressive nuptial song, |