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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.

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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;

Heav'n hath timely tried their youth,

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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 ended, the SPIRIT epiloguises.

SP. 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

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972 hard] Milton is fond of this expression. P. L. iv. 932. 'from hard assays.' P. Reg. i. 264. iv. 478. Todd. 979 broad] MS. 'plain fields.' Fairfax, B. viii. st. 57. O'er the broad fields of heaven's bright wildernesse.' Warton and Todd.

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,

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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 th' Assyrian queen;

But far above in spangled sheen
Celestial Cupid her fam'd son advanc'd,

1000

988 There] Milton's own edition, 1673, reads 'That there, but in the errata directs 'That' to be omitted; so it is by Tickell and Fenton, but silently readopted by Newton.

Warton.

989 musky] See Cowley's Silva. p, 56, and Love's Riddle, 'The musky kisses of the west wind.'

P. 93.

1002 Assyrian] Tickel and Fenton read ‘the Cyprian Queen.'

Holds his dear Psyche sweet intranc'd,
After her wand'ring 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

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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,

Heav'n itself would stoop to her.

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1017 corners] Macbeth, a. 3. s. 5. Upon the corner of the moon.' Warton.

1021 sphery] 'sphery chime' is the chime or music of the spheres. Mids. N. Dream, act ii. sc. 7, Hermia's sphery eyne.' Machin's Dumbe Knight, (Reed's Old Pl. iv. 447), 'It was as silver as the chime of spheres.' Herrick's Hesp. p. 116, Fall down from those thy chiming spheres.' Warton and Todd.

1023 stoop]bow.' MS.

LYCIDAS.

In this Monody, the author bewails a learned friend, unfortunately drowned in his passage from Chester on the Irish seas, 1637; and by occasion foretells the ruin of our corrupted clergy, then in their height.

YET once more, O ye laurels, and once more
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,
And with forc'd fingers rude,

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year. 5
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due:
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer:
Who would not sing for Lycidas? He knew 10
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhime.
He must not float upon his watery bier

2 myrtles brown] Hor. Od. i. 25. 17. • Pulla magis atque myrto.' Warton.

8 dead] 'Phillisides is dead.' Past. Ægl. on Sir P. Sidney's death, by L. B. v. 8 (Todd's Spenser, viii. 76), and v. 71.

'Sweet bowres of myrtel twigs, and lawrel faire.'

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10 Who] Neget quis carmina Gallo.' Virg. Ecl. x. 3. Peck.

12 watery] See Theod. Prodrom. Dos. et Rhod. Am. p. 254, ed. Gaulm.

Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Begin then, Sisters of the sacred well,
That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring,
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse,
So may some gentle Muse

With lucky words favour my destin'd urn,
And as he passes turn,

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.

For we were nurs'd upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill.
Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd
Under the opening eyelids of the morn,

15

20

25

We drove a field, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
Batt'ning our flocks with the fresh dews of night,

14 melodious] Cleveland's Obsequy on Mr. King, 'I like not tears in tune.'

17 sweep] Purg. i. 9.

i.

Todd.

E qui Calliopea alquanto surga,' Dante

19 Muse] Gentle Muse-he passes." See Jortin's Tracts,

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23 nurs'd] Compare Past. Ægl. on Sir P. Sidney's death, by L. B. ver. 85.

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Through many a hill and dale, &c.'

26 opening] Middleton's Game at Chess.

Like a pearl,

Dropp'd from the opening eyelids of the morn.'

And Crashaw's Translation of Marino, 'The lids of day.'

29 Batt'ning] Drayton's Ecl. ix.

Warton, Todd.

'Their battening flocks on grassie leas to hold.' Warton.

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