May thy billows roll ashore The beryl and the golden ore; May thy lofty head be crown'd With many a tower and terrace round, And here and there thy banks upon With groves of myrrh and cinnamon. Come, lady, while Heaven lends us grace, Let us fly this cursed place, Lest the sorcerer us entice With some other new device. Not a waste or needless sound, Till we come to holier ground; I shall be your faithful guide Through this gloomy covert wide; And not many furlongs thence Is your father's residence, Where this night are met in state Many a friend to gratulate His wish'd presence; and beside All the swains, that there abide, With jigs and rural dance resort; We shall catch them at their sport, And our sudden coming there
Will double all their mirth and cheer: Come, let us haste, the stars grow high,
But night sits monarch yet in the mid sky.
The Scene changes, presenting Ludlow town, and the President's castle; then come in country dancers; after them the attendant Spirit, with the two Brothers and the Lady.
Spir. Back, shepherds, back; enough your play
Till next sun-shine holiday:
Here be, without duck or nod,
Other trippings to be trod
Of lighter toes, and such court guise As Mercury did first devise
With the mincing Dryades,
On the lawns, and on the leas.
This second song presents them to their Father and Mother.
Noble lord, and lady bright,
I have brought ye new delight; Here behold so goodly grown Three fair branches of your own; Heaven hath timely tried their youth, Their faith, their patience, and their truth, And sent them here through hard assays With a crown of deathless praise, To triumph, in victorious dance, O'er sensual folly and intemperance.
The dances being ended, the Spirit epilogises. Spir. To the ocean now I fly, And those happy climes that lie Where day never shuts his eye,
Up in the broad fields of the sky; There I suck the liquid air,
All amidst the gardens fair
Of Hesperus, and his daughters three
That sing about the golden tree: Along the crisped shades and bowers
Revels the spruce and jocund Spring, The Graces, and the rosy-bosom'd Hours, Thither all their bounties bring; There eternal Summer dwells, And west-winds, with musky wing, About the cedarn alleys fling,
Nard and cassia's balmy smells. Iris there, with humid bow,
Waters the odorous banks, that blow Flowers of more mingled hue Than her purfled scarf can show; And drenches with Elysian dew (List, mortals, if your ears be true), Beds of hyacinth and roses, Where young Adonis oft reposes, Waxing well of his deep wound In slumber soft, and on the ground Sadly sits the Assyrian queen: But far above, in spangled sheen, Celestial Cupid, her famed son, advanced. Holds his dear Psyche sweet entranced, After her wandering labours long, Till free consent the gods among Make her his eternal bride, And from her fair unspotted side Two blissful twins are to be born, Youth and Joy; so Jove hath sworn.
But now my task is smoothly done,
I can fly, or I can run,
Quickly to the green earth's end,
Where the bow'd welkin slow doth bend, And from thence can soar as soon To the corners of the moon.
Mortals, that would follow me, Love virtue; she alone is free: She can teach ye how to climb Higher than the sphery chime; Or if virtue feeble were,
Heaven itself would stoop to her.
PART OF A MASK, OR ENTERTAINMENT,
COUNTESS DOWAGER OF DERBY,
BY SOME NOBLE PERSONS OF HER FAMILY.
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