If she be right invoked in warbled song, For maidenhood she loves, and will be swift 855 To aid a virgin, such as was herself, And add the power of some adjuring verse. SABRINA fair, SONG. Listen where thou art sitting 860 Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave, The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair; 865 Listen and save. Listen, and appear to us In name of great Oceanus, By th' earth-shaking Neptune's mace, 870 By hoary Nereus' wrinkled look, 875 And her son that rules the strands, By dead Parthenope's dear tomb, 880 By all the nymphs that nightly dance 885 And bridle in thy headlong wave, Till thou our summons answer'd have. Listen and save. 872. The Carpathian wizard; Proteus, who had a cave at Carpathus, an island in the Mediterranean. 879. Parthenope and Ligea were two sirens; the former had, it is said, a tomb at Naples; the latter is here introduced according to the usual representations of mermaids. 889. The alniost unparalleled beauty of this and the following passage, the variety of epithets and images, the rapidity of the verse, sparkling and gleaming with the brightest sunshine of poetry, are a feast of roses to the imagination. Sabrina rises, attended by water nymphs, and sings. By the rushy-fringed bank, Where grows the willow and the osier dank, My sliding chariot stays, Thick set with agate, and the azure sheen That in the channel strays; Whilst from off the waters fleet O'er the cowslip's velvet head, 890 895 To wait in Amphitrite's bower. Sabrina descends, and the Lady rises out of her seat. 923. Locrine was the son of Brutus, who was immediately descended from Anchises. Summer drought, or singed air, 930 With many a tower and terras round, 935 And here and there thy banks upon With groves of myrrh and cinnamon. Come, Lady, while Heav'n lends us grace, 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. SONG. Spi. 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 936. Upon, crown'd, understood from line 934. 960 With the mincing Dryades On the lawns, and on the leas. 965 This second song presents them to their Father and Mother. Noble Lord, and Lady bright, I have brought ye new delight, Heav'n hath timely tried their youth, 970 Their faith, their patience, and their truth, And sent them here through hard assays To triumph in victorious dance, O'er sensual folly and intemperance. 975 The dances ended, the Spirit epiloguizes. Spi. 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. Of Hesperus, and his daughters three 960 That sing about the golden tree; Along the crisped shades and bowers Revels the spruce and jocund Spring, 985 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 cedar'd alleys fling 990 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 shew, 995 And drenches with Elysian dew (List, mortals, if your ears be true) Beds of hyacinth and roses, Where young Adonis oft reposes, 976. This farewell of the spirit is in close imitation of Ariel's song in the Tempest, Act 5. Sc. 3. 995. Purfled, embroidered. After her wand'ring labours long, Till free consent the Gods among 1010 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 low doth bend, 1015 And from thence can soar as soon To the corners of the moon. Mortals that would follow me, 1002. Th' Assyrian queen; Venus, so called because first worshipped by the Assyrians. 1020 There is a moral in this poem as sweetly and purely delicate as the verse is exquisite for its lovely images and melody. It was performed as a drama at Ludlow Castle, in 1634, before the Earl of Bridgewater, President of Wales, and was printed in 1637. L'ALLEGRO. HENCE, loathed Melancholy, Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born, In Stygian cave forlorn, [unholy! 'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights This celebrated little descriptive poem and its companion, have preserved their distinct originality amid the crowd of similar compositions with which they are surrounded. They owe both their excellence and their popularity to the domestic character of their imagery, and to their direct appeal to the emotions which belong to the enjoyment of external nature. In other poems of the same kind, the sentiments introduced are frequently those of the writer only, and not those which must, by the most general |