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Shep. See, Love, the blushes of the morn appear,
And now she hangs her pearly store,
Robbed from the eastern shore,

In the cowslip's bell and roses rare;
Sweet, I must stay no longer here!

Nym. Those streaks of doubtful light usher not day,
But show my sun must set; no morn

Shall shine till thou return;

The yellow planets and the grey

Dawn shall attend thee on thy way.

Shep. If thine eyes gild my paths, they may forbear
Their useless shine. Nym. My tears will quite
Extinguish their faint light.

Shep. Those drops will make their beams more clear,
Love's flames will shine in every tear.

Cho. They kissed and wept, and from their lips and eyes,
In a mixed dew, of briny sweet

Their joys and sorrows meet;

But she cries out. Nym. Shepherd, arise,

The sun betrays us else to spies.

Shep. The winged hours fly fast whilst we embrace,
But when we want their help to meet,

They move with leaden feet.

Nym. Then let us pinion time, and chase

The day forever from this place.

Shep. Hark! Nym. Ay me! stay! Shep. Forever: Nym. No!

arise!

We must be gone! Shep. My nest of spice!

Nym. My soul! Shep. My Paradise!

Cho. Neither could say farewell, but through their eyes
Grief interrupted speech with tears' supplies.

6
FROM THE RAPTURE.'

Meanwhile the bubbling stream shall court the shore,
The enamoured chirping wood-choir shall adore

In varied tunes the deity of Love,

The gentle blasts of western winds shall move

The trembling leaves, and through their close boughs breathe
Still music, while we rest ourselves beneath
Their dancing shade, till a soft murmur, sent
From souls entranced in amorous languishment,
Rouse us, and shoot into our veins fresh fire,
Till we in their sweet extasy expire.

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Daphne hath broke her bark, and that swift foot,
Which th' angry gods had fastened with a root
To the fixed earth, doth now unfettered run
To meet the embraces of the youthful Sun;
She hangs upon him, like his Delphic lyre,
Her kisses blow the old, and breathe new fire,
Full of her god, she sings inspired lays,
Sweet odes of love, such as deserve the bays
Which she herself was. Next her, Laura lies
In Petrarch's learned arms, drying those eyes,
That did in such sweet smooth-paced numbers flow
As made the world enamoured of his woe.
These, and ten thousand beauties more, that died
Slave to the tyrant, now, enlarged, deride

His cancelled laws, and, for their time misspent,
Pay into Love's exchequer double rent.

EPITAPH ON THE LADY MARY VILLERS.

The Lady Mary Villers lies

Under this stone; with weeping eyes
The parents that first gave her birth,
And their sad friends, laid her in earth.
If any of them, reader, were
Known unto thee, shed a tear;
Or if thyself possess a gem
As dear to thee as this to them,
Though a stranger to this place,
Bewail in theirs thy own hard case,
For thou, perhaps, at thy return
May'st find thy darling in an urn.

SONG.

Would you know what's soft? I dare
Not bring you to the down, or air,
Nor to stars to show what's bright,
Nor to snow to teach you white;

Nor, if you would music hear,
Call the orbs to take your ear;

Nor, to please your sense, bring forth
Bruised nard, or what's more worth;

Or on food were your thoughts placed,
Bring you nectar for a taste;
Would you have all these in one,
Name my mistress, and 'tis done!

THE PROTESTATION.

No more shall meads be decked with flowers,
Nor sweetness dwell in rosy bowers,

Nor greenest buds on branches spring,
Nor warbling birds delight to sing,
Nor April violets paint the grove,
If I forsake my Celia's love.

The fish shall in the ocean burn,
And fountains sweet shall bitter turn,
The humble oak no flood shall know
When floods shall highest hills o'erflow,
Black Lethe shall oblivion leave,
If ere my Celia I deceive.

Love shall his bow and shaft lay by,
And Venus' doves want wings to fly,
The Sun refuse to show his light,

And day shall then be turned to night,
And in that night no star appear,
If once I leave my Celia dear.

Love shall no more inhabit earth,
Nor lovers more shall love for worth,
Nor joy above in heaven dwell,
Nor pain torment poor souls in hell,
Grim death no more shall horrid prove,
If ere I leave bright Celia's love.

IN PRAISE OF HIS MISTRESS.

You that will a wonder know,
Go with me ;

Two suns in a heaven of snow
Both burning be,-

All they fire that do but eye them,
Yet the snow's unmelted by them.

Leaves of crimson tulips met
Guide the way

Where two pearly rows be set,
As white as day;

When they part themselves asunder
She breathes oracles of wonder.

All this but the casket is

Which contains

Such a jewel, as to miss

Breeds endless pains,—

That's her mind, and they that know it

May admire, but cannot show it.

ROBERT HERRICK.

[ROBERT HERRICK was born in Cheapside, in August 1594, and died at Dean Prior, in Devonshire, on the 15th of October, 1674. He published one volume, containing Hesperides, dated 1648, and Noble Numbers, dated 1647.]

Among the English pastoral poets, Herrick takes an undisputed precedence, and as a lyrist generally he is scarcely excelled, except by Shelley. No other writer of the seventeenth century approached him in abundance of song, in sustained exercise of the purely musical and intuitive gifts of poetry. Shakspeare, Milton, and perhaps Fletcher, surpassed him in the passion and elevated harmony of their best lyrical pieces, as they easily excelled him in the wider range of their genius and the breadth of their accomplishment. But while these men exercised their art in all its branches, Herrick confined himself very narrowly to one or two, and the unflagging freshness of his inspiration, flowing through a long life in so straitened a channel, enabled him to amass such a wealth of purely lyrical poetry as no other Englishman has produced. His level of performance was very high; he seems to have preserved all that he wrote, and the result is that we possess more than twelve hundred of his little poems, in at least one out of every three of which we may find something charming or characteristic. Of all the Cavalier lyrists Herrick is the only one that followed the bent of his genius undisturbed, and lived a genuine artist's li ́e. Consequently, while we have to lament, in the case of Lovelace or Suckling, a constant waste of energy, and unthrifty drain of poetic power, in Herrick all is wisely husbanded, and we feel satisfied that we possess the best that he could produce. His life was an ideal one so far as quiet and retirement went; to fourteen years of seclusion at Cambridge there succeeded twenty years of unbroken Arcadian repose in a Devonshire vicarage, and it was not till the desire to rhyme had left him that the poet was brought rudely face to face with the

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