Fear not; for pardon justly hope he may
Who plunders him that does deny to pay."

Thus she, rekindling her half-quench'd desires,
Her cheeks with blushes, heart with boldness fires.
Then forward moves a little; and anon,
Full speed, unto the lake does madly run.
But in the midst of her career repents,
And stops; suspended 'twixt two cross intents,
Like to a wavering balance: on, afraid;
Back, loath to go; and yet to either sway'd.
Now she advances; then again retreats:
Her fears now conquers, then her hopes defeats.
Struck with love's powerful thyrsus, at the last
(True Manad like) her lighter robes off cast,
She hurries to the lake, then in she skips;
And in her wanton arms' th' unwilling clips.

He, who love's fires ne'er felt in his cold breast, With fear at such a strange surprise possess'd, For help began to cry; when she at this,

Ah, peace!" says, and his mouth stopp'd with a kiss.

Yet struggling, he her wishes did deny,

And from her shunn'd embraces strove to fly.
But whilst he labours to get loose, t' his breast
She faster cleaves; and his lips harder prest.
So when Jove's bird a snake hath truss'd, his wings
The more that plies, the more that 'bout 'em clings;
Aud leaves it doubtful to the gazer's view,
To tell which more is pris'ner of the two,
Fearful to lose yet her new-gotten prize,
The nymph to Heaven (sighing) erects her eyes:
"And shall my love" (says she) "triumph in vain,
Nor other trophy than a bare kiss gain?

O Jove! if what Fame sings of thee be true,
If e'er thou didst a bull's fierce shape indue,
And on thy back from the Phænician shore,
Thro' seas thy amorous theft in triumph bore,
Assist my vows; and grant that I may prove
As happy in this conquest of my love:
No force let our embraces e'er disjoin;
Breast unto breast unite; our souls entwine;
Tie heart to heart; and let the knitting charms
Sweet kisses be; the fetters, our soft arms.
Or if thou hast decreed that we must part,
Let that divorce divide life from my heart."
Jove heard her prayers; and, suddenly as strange,
Made of them both a mutual interchange;
And by an undiscern'd conjunction,
Two late divided bodies kait in one:
Her body straight a manly vigour felt,
And his did to a female softness melt.

Yet thus united, they with difference
Retain'd their proper reason, speech, and sence,
He liv'd and she apart, yet each in either;
Both one might well be said, yet that one neither.
This story by a river's side (as they
Sat and discours'd the tedious hours away)
Amintas to the coy Iole told:

Then adds: “O thou more fair, in love more cold
Than he! Heaven yet may make thee mine in spite,

That can such difference, ice and fire, unite."
This with a sigh the shepherd spake; whilst she
With a coy smile mock'd his simplicity.
But now the setting Sun posting away,
Put both an end to their discourse and day.

THE METAMORPHOSIS OF LYRIAN AND

SYLVIA.

BY ST. AMANT.

OUT OF FRENCH.

UNDER that pleasant clime, where Nature plac'd
Those islands, with the name of Happy grac'd,
There liv'd a young and gentle shepherd late,
And, had he never lov'd, too fortunate;
His name was Lyrian: she whose looks enthrall'd
His amorous heart, was the fair Sylvia call'd.

The natives there, 'mongst whom still lives his
name,

(Nor shall the waste of time impair its fame)
Report, he bare, for sweetness of his song,
The prize from all Apollo's learned throng.
Yet nor his voice, nor worth that did exceed,
And even in envy admiration breed,
Could e'er move her, that o'er his heart did reign,
To pleasing joys to turn his amorous pain.

The cheerful fields, and solitary groves,
(Once loyal secretaries to his loves)
Are still the witnesses, and still shall be,
Of his chaste thoughts, and firm fidelity.
For they alone were conscious of his grief,
They only gave his wounded soul relief,
When, with the weight of his sad woes opprest,
They pitying heard him ease in plaints his breast.
Ye gods! how oft resolv'd he, yet declin'd,
(Altho' he felt his heart with flames calcin'd)
Before those eyes h' ador'd so, to display
His griefs such modesty his soul did sway.
And tho' h' had learn'd, and knew to suffer much,
Yet were his manners and discretion such,
Silence should first in death have quench'd his flame,
E'er he'd have rudely voic'd it unto fame.
Nor had it yet to any (had not stone
And stocks discover'd it) been ever known;
Which (for on them he us'd his plaints t' incise)
By chance presented it to Sylvia's eyes.

This seen, in her does scorn and anger move:
O Reavens is 't possible that such a love
She should despise, and him, who had profest
Himself her captive, as her foe detest?
Or that love's magic characters his hand
Had grav'd, should in her eye for cyphers stand?
Or she should read them yet with so much spite,
Ne'er more to see them, 'less to rase them quite ?
Ah, 'tis too true! nor's that sufficient,

Unless her tongue to her hard heart consent,
And 'gainst her faithful love, with cruel breath,
Pronounce the rigid sentence of his death.

What said he not his passion to excuse ?
What flourishes us'd not his willing Muse,
To prove, his love (of which the noble ground
Was her perfections) could no crime be found,
If neither reason's self, nor justice, ought

(Those for which Heaven is lov'd) as crimes be

thought!

That the world's sovereign planet which the Earth
And mortals' fates does govern from their birth,
By firm decrees inrolled in the skies
Had destin'd him a servant to her eyes.
And could his will be led another way,

Yet being forc'd, he could not disobey: So that his soul, in this her captive state,

Did only yield to her impulsive fate.

FORSAKEN LYDIA.

OUT OF THE TALIAN OF CAVALIER MARINO.

IN thunder now the hollow cannon roar'd,
To call the far-fam'd warriors aboard,
Who that great feud (enkindled 'twixt the French
And German) with their blood attempt to quench.
Now in the open sea they proudly ride,
And the soft crystal with rude oars divide:
Perfidious Armillus at once tore

His heart from Lydia, anchor from the shore.

'Twas night, and aged Proteus had driv'n home His numerous herd, fieec'd with the sea's white foam;

The winds were laid to rest, the fishes slept,
The wearied world a general silence kept,
No noise, save from the surges' hollow caves,
Or liquid silver of the justling waves,
Whilst the bright lanthorns shot such trembling
As dazzled all the twinkling eyes of night.

The fair inamorata (who from far

[light,

Had spy'd the ship which her heart's treasure bare,
Put off from land; and now quite disembas'd,
Her cables coiled, and her anchors weigh'd,
Whilst gentle gales her swelling sails did court
To turn in scorn her poop upon the port)
With frantic speed from the detested town
To the deserted shore comes hurrying down.

As the Idean shepherd stood amaz'd,
Whilst on the sacred ravisher he gaz'd,
Who snatch'd the beauteous Trojan youth away,
And wafted through the yielding clouds his prey :
Or as that artist whose bold hand, durst shape
Wings to his shoulders, (desperately to 'scape
A loathed servitude) through untrac'd skies
Crete's king pursu'd with fierce, yet wond'ring eyes.

The flying navy Lydia so beheld,

Her eyes with tears, her heart with passion swell'd;
In sighs to these she gave continual vent,
And those in brinish streams profusely spent:
But tears and sighs, alas! bestows in vain,
Borne by the sportive wind to the deaf main.
The main, who grief inexorably mocks,
As she herself is scorn'd by steady rocks.

O! what a black eclipse did straight disguise
In clouds the sunshine of her lovely eyes!
She tore her cheeks, hair, garments, and imprest
Marks of his falsehood on her guiltless breast.
She calls on her disloyal lover's name,
And sends such sad loud accents to reclaim
The fugitive, as if at every cry

Her weary soul forth with her voice would fly.

"Whither, ah, cruel !" There, full grief represt Her tongue, and taught her eyes to weep the rest: Whither, ah, cruel!" from the hollow side Of the next rock the vocal nymph replied. In tears and sighs the water and the air Contend which in her sorrows most shall share; And the sad sea-horse with incessant groans Wakens her faint grief, aud suppl.es her moans. "Oh! stop, kind Zephyr, but one minute's space," (She cries)" the swelling sail's impetuous race,

That my expiring groans may reach the ear
Of him who flies from her he will not hear!
Perhaps, though whilst alive I cannot please,
My dying cries his anger may appease;
And my last fall, trophy of his disdain,
May yield delight, and his lost love regain.
"Receive my heart in this extreme farewel,
Thou, in whom cruelty and beauty dwell:
With thee it fled; but what, alas! for me
Is it to lose my heart, who have lost thee?
Thou art my better self! Thou of my heart,
The soul, more than the soul that moves it, art:
And if thou sentence me to suffer death,
(My life) to thee let me resign my breath.
"Alas! I do not ask to live content,
That were a blessing me Fate never meant:
All that my wishes aim at is, that I

(And that's but a poor wish) content may die;
And if my heart, by thee already slain,
Some reliques yet of a loath'd life retain,
Oh! let them by thy pity find release,
And in thy arms breathe forth their last in peace.

"No greater happiness than death I crave,
So in thy dearest sight I death may have;
And if thy hand, arm'd with relentless pride,
Shall the small thread of my poor life divide,
What pleasure than that sorrow would be higher?
When I in Paradise at least expire,

And so at once the different arrows prove,
Of death from thy hand, from thy eyes of love.
"Ah! if so pleas'd thou art with war's alarms;
If that be it that calls thee from my arms;
If thou aspir'st, by some advent'rous toils,
To raise proud trophiesdeck'd with glorious spoils;
Why fondly dost thou seek for these elsewhere?
Why leav'st thou me a pris'ner to despair?
Turn; nor thy willing captive thus forsake,
And thou shalt all my victories partake.
"Though I to thy dear eyes a captive be,
Thousands of lover: are no less to me.
Unhappy! who contend and sue for sight
Of that, which thou unkindly thus dost slight.
Is't not a high attempt that can comprise
Within one act so many victories;
To triumph over triumphs, and subdue
At once the victor and the vanquish'd too?
"But if to stay with me thou dost refuse,
And the rude company of soldiers choose,
Yet give me leave to go along with thee,
And in the army thy attendant be.
Love, tho' a child and blind, the wars hath known,
Can handle arms, and buckle armour on ;
And thou shalt see, my courage will disdain
(Save of thy death) all fear to entertain.
"I will securely 'midst the arm'd troops run,
Venus hath been Mars' his companion;
And though the heart in thy obdurate breast
Be with an adamantine corslet drest,
Yet I in steel (to guard thee from all harm)
With my own hands will thy fair body arm,
And the reward love did from me detain
In peace, in war shall by this service gain.
"And if it fortune that thou undergo
Some dangerous hurt by the prevailing foe,
I sadly by thy side will sit to keep
Thee company, and as thou groan'st will weep.

[wind,

And, far more cruel than the rough seas are,
Laughs at my sighs, and slights my juster prayer.
See, whilst thou spread'st thy sails to catch the
What a sad object thou hast left behind!
Of war, alas! why dost thou go in quest?
Thou leav'st a fiercer war within my breast.
"Thou fly'st thy country and more happy state,
To seek in some strange land a stranger fate;
And under foreign climes and unknown stars,
T'encounter hazards of destructive wars;
Eager to thrust thyself (lavish of breath)
Upon disasters, dangers, blood, and death,
Changing (ah! too unwary, too unwise!)
Thy certain joys for an uncertain prize.

"Can it be true, thou more thyself should'st please
With busy troubles, than delightful ease,
And lik'st th' enraged deep's rough toils above
The calmer pleasures and sweet sports of love?
Canst thou from a soft bosom fly, (ah! lost
To gentleness!) to be on rude waves tost?
And rather choose in seas a restless grave,
Than in these arms a quiet port to have?

"With furrowing keel thou plough'st the foaming main,

And (O obdurate!) hear'st not me complain;
Too swift thou fly'st for Love's slow wings t'o'ertake,
Love, whom perfidiously thou didst forsake;
And all the way thou swell'st with pride, to know
The suff'rings for thy sake I undergo,
Whilst the mild East, to flatter thy desires,
With his soft breath thy flagging sail inspires.
"Go, faithless youth! faithless and foolish too,
Thy fate, or folly rather, still pursue;
Go, and now thou art from my fetters free,
Never take care who sighs or dies for thee.
Oh! if the Heavens are just, if ever they
With eyes impartial human wrongs survey,
Heaven, Heaven, my tears implore, to Heaven I
Avenge my suff'rings, and his treachery! [cry,

"Be seas and skies thy foes! no gentle gale
Blow on thy shrouds! destruction fill thy sail !
No star to thee (lost in despair and night)
When thou invok'st, disclose its friendly light!
To Scythian pirates (such as shall despise
Thy fruitless tears) may'st thou become a prize,
By whose inhuman usage may'st thou be
Spoil'd of the liberty thou took'st from me.
"Then thou the difference shalt understand
Betwixt the shafts shot from a Thracian hand,
And lover's eye; the odds betwixt a rude
Insulting foe, and love's soft servitude:

The breast his golden darts not pierc'd, shall feel
The sharp impression of more cruel steel,
And thou, enslav'd, which are the stronger prove,
The fetters of barbarians, or of love.

"Ye seas and skies, which of my amorous care
The kindly faithful secretaries are,
To you my crying sorrows I address,
To you, the witnesses of my distress:
Shores by the loss of my fair sun forlorn,
Winds, who my sole delight away have borne,
Rocks, the spectators of my hapless fate,
And night, that hear'st me mourn disconsolate.
"Nor without reason is 't (alas!) that I
To stars and sands bewail my misery;
For with my state they some proportion bear,
And numberless as are my woes appear.
Heaven in this choir of beauteous lights doth seem
To represent what I have loss in him :
The sea, to whom his flight I chiefly owe,
His heart in rocks, my tears in waves doth show.

"And since to these eternal fires, whose light
Makes Sleep's dark mansion so serenely bright,
I turn, what one amongst them shall I find
To pity me above the rest inclin'd?
She who in Naxos, when forsook, did meet
A better spouse than him she chose in Crete,
Though all the rest severely are intent

To work me harm, should be more mildly bent.

"O thou, who gild'st the pompous train of night,
With the addition of thy glorious light,
Whose radiant hair a crown adorns, whence streams
The dazzling lustre of seven blazing gems:
If that extremity thou not forget,

If thy own sorrows thou remember yet,
Stop at my sighs awhile, and make the crew
Of thy bright fellows stay and hearken too.
"Thou know'st the like occasions of our fate,
Both circumvented by unkind deceit;
A cruel I, a love ungrateful thou
Didst follow, both to equal suff'rings bow;
In this to thine a near resemblance bears,
The cause that dooms me to eternal tears;
I now am left, as thou wert heretofore,
Alone upon the solitary shore.

"But howsoever our misfortunes share
The same effects, their causes diff'rent are:
I my poor self no other have deceiv'd ;
Thy brother was thro' thee of life bereav'd.
Sleep thy betrayer was, but love was mine,
Thou by thy short eclipse didst brighter shine,
And in the skies a crown of stars obtain,
But I on Earth (forsaken) still remain.

Fool, to whose care dost thou thy grief impart? What dost thou talk, or know'st thou where thou She, 'midst a dancing bevy of fair lights, [art? Trips it away, and thy misfortune slights: Yet happy may she go, and her clear beams, Whilst I lament, drench in the brinish streams; Perhaps the sea, to my afflicted state, Will prove than her less incompassionate. "But how on seas for help should I rely, Where nothing we but waves and rocks can spy? Yet so small hopes of succour hath my grief,. That of those rocks and waves I beg relief.

་་