100

INVOCATION TO DIANA.

INVOCATION TO DIANA.

QUEEN and huntress, chaste and fair,
Now the sun is laid to sleep,
Seated in thy silver chair,
State in wonted manner keep.
Hesperus entreats thy light,
Goddess excellently bright!

Earth, let not thy envious shade
Dare itself to interpose;

Cynthia's shining orb was made
Heaven to clear, when day did close.
Bless us then with wished sight,
Goddess excellently bright!

Lay thy bow of pearl apart,

And thy crystal-shining quiver:

Give unto the flying hart

Space to breathe how short soever;
Thou that mak'st a day of night,
Goddess excellently bright!

B. Jonson.

TO APOLLO.

ΤΟΙ

TO APOLLO.

SING to Apollo, god of day,

Whose golden beams with morning play,
And make her eyes so brightly shine,
Aurora's face is called divine.

Sing to Phoebus and that throne
Of diamonds which he sets upon.
Io Pæans let us sing

To Physic and to Poesy's king.

Crown all his altars with bright fire,
Laurels bind about his lyre,
A Daphnean coronet for his head,
The Muses dance about his bed;
When on his ravishing lute he plays,
Strew his temple round with bays.
Io Pæans let us sing

To the glittering Delian king.

J. Lylye.

102

TO BACCHUS.

TO BACCHUS.

GOD Lyæus ever young,
Ever renowned, ever sung,

Stain'd with blood of lusty grapes
In a thousand lusty shapes;

Dance

upon the mazer's brim;

In the crimson liquor swim!
From thy plenteous hand divine
Let a river run with wine!

F. Beaumont.

DANCING CHORUS.

SHAKE off your heavy trance,
And leap into a dance

Such as no mortals use to tread;

Fit only for Apollo

To play to, for the moon to lead, And all the stars to follow!

F. Beaumont,

HOLIDAY IN ARCADIA.

103

HOLIDAY IN ARCADIA.

WOODMEN, shepherds, come away,
This is Pan's great holiday,
Throw off cares,

With your heaven-aspiring airs
Help us to sing,

While valleys with your echoes ring.

Nymphs that dwell within these groves,
Leave your arbours, bring your loves,
Gather posies,

Crown your golden hair with roses;

Joy crown our bowers! Philomel,
Leave of Tereus' rape to tell.

Let trees dance,

As they at Thracian lyre did once;

Mountains play,

This is the shepherds' holiday.

F. Shirley.

104

SONG OF A SATYR.

SONG OF A SATYR.

THROUGH yon same bending plain
That flings his arms down to the main,
And through these thick woods, have I run,
Whose bottom never kissed the sun
Since the lusty spring began;
All to please my Master Pan,
Have I trotted without rest
To get him fruit; for at a feast
He entertains, this coming night,
His paramour, the Syrinx bright.

Here be grapes, whose lusty blood
Is the learned poet's good;

Sweeter yet did never crown

The head of Bacchus! nuts more brown
Than the squirrel's teeth that crack them;

Deign, oh fairest fair, to take them!

For these black-eyed Dryope

Hath often-times commanded me

With my claspèd knee to climb:

See how well the lusty time

Hath decked their rising cheeks in red,

Such as on your lips is spread!

Here be berries for a queen,

Some be red, some be green;
These are of that luscious meat,

The great god Pan himself doth eat:
All these, and what the woods can yield,

The hanging mountain, or the field,