552

553

554

the hearts of men, they must perforce have melted, and barbarism itself have pitied him.

SAMSON

MY griefs not only pain me

as a lingering disease,

W. SHAKESPEARE

but, finding no redress, ferment and rage;
nor less than wounds immedicable,

rankle and fester and gangrene,

to black mortification.

Thoughts, my tormentors, armed with deadly stings, mangle my apprehensive tenderest parts,

exasperate, exulcerate and raise

dire inflammation, which no cooling herb
or medicinal liquor can assuage,

nor breath of vernal air from snowy Alp.
Sleep hath forsook and given me o'er

to death's benumbing opium as my only cure;
thence faintings, swoonings of despair,

and sense of Heaven's desertion.

J. MILTON

THE EARTH TO PROMETHEUS

OR know there are two worlds of life and death:

FOR

one that which thou beholdest; but the other

is underneath the grave, where do inhabit
the shadows of all forms that think and live
till death unite them and they part no more;
dreams and the light imaginings of men,
and all that faith creates or love desires,
terrible, strange, sublime, and beauteous shapes.
There thou art, and dost hang, a writhing shade
'mid whirlwind-peopled mountains; all the gods
are there, and all the powers of nameless worlds,
vast sceptred phantoms, heroes, men, and beasts;
and Demogorgon, a tremendous gloom;
and he, the supreme Tyrant, on his throne
of burning gold.

THE PARENTS' WARNING

P. B. SHELLEY

THREE children sliding on the ice

all on a summer's day,

as it fell out, they all fell in,
the rest they ran away.

Now had these children been at school,

or sliding on dry ground,

ten thousand pounds to one penny
they had not all been drowned.
You parents that have children dear
and eke you that have none,
if you will have them safe abroad,
pray keep them safe at home.

GAMMER GURTON

555

MILTON TO HIS DAUGHTER

PLACE me once more, my daughter, where the sun

may shine upon my old and time-worn head,
for the last time perchance. My race is run;
and soon amidst the dead I must repose.
Child, is the sun abroad? I feel my hair
borne up and wafted by the gentle wind,
I feel the odours that perfume the air,
and almost can forget that I am blind
and old, and hated by my fellow men.
Yet would I fain once more behold the light
of day before I die, and gaze again
upon its living and rejoicing face.

Fain would I see thy countenance, my child,
but I will bend me calmly to my doom,
and wait the hour which is approaching fast.

W. E. AYTOUN

556 KING ARTHUR'S FAREWELL TO QUEEN GUINEVERE

OW must I hence.

Not the night I hear the trumpet blow:

they summon me their King to lead mine hosts
far down to that great battle in the west,
where I must strike against my sister's son,
leagued with the lords of the White Horse and knights
once mine, and strike him dead, and meet myself
death, or I know not what mysterious doom.
And thou remaining here wilt learn the event;
but hither shall I never come again,
never lie by thy side, see thee no more,
farewell!'

557

5.58

559

And while she grovelled at his feet,

she felt the King's breath wander o'er her neck,
and in the darkness o'er her fallen head,
perceived the waving of his hands that blest.

THE NIGHTINGALE

A. TENNYSON

BUT let not chief the nightingale lament

her ruined care, too delicately framed
to brook the harsh confinement of the cage.
Oft when, returning with her loaded bill,
the astonished mother finds a vacant nest,
by the hard hand of unrelenting clowns
robbed, to the ground the vain provision falls;
her pinions ruffle, and, low-drooping, scarce
can bear the mourner to the poplar shade;
where, all abandoned to despair, she sings

her sorrows through the night; and, on the bough
sole sitting, still at every dying fall

takes up again her lamentable strain

of winding woe; till, wide around, the woods
sigh to her song, and with her wail resound.

TE have gone too far

WE

to think now of retiring; in our courage,
and daring, lies our safety: if you are not
slaves in your abject minds, as in your fortunes,
since to die is the worst, better expose
our naked breasts to their keen swords, and sell
our lives with the most advantage, than to trust
in a forestalled remission, or yield up

our bodies to the furnace of their fury,

thrice heated with revenge. Hear and obey me:
and I will either save you, or fall with you.

Man the walls strongly, and make good the ports;
boldly deny their entrance-'Tis no time

to talk, but do: a glorious end, or freedom,
is now proposed us: stand resolved for either,
and live or die together.

Euph. THIS

EUPHRASIA-ERIXENA

HIS way, my virgins, this way bend your steps.
Lo! the sad sepulchre where, hearsed in death,

the pale remains of my dear mother lie.
There, while the victims at yon altar bleed
and with your prayers the lofty roof resounds,
there let me pay the tribute of a tear.

Erix. Forbear, Euphrasia, to renew your sorrows. Euph. My tears have dried their source; then let me here pay this sad visit to the honour'd one

who moulders in the tomb.

These sacred viands

I'll burn an offering to a parent's shade,

and sprinkle with this wine the hallowed mould, that duty paid, I will return my virgins.

Erix. Look down, propitious powers! behold that virtue; and heal the pangs that desolate her soul.

560

Evan.

EVANDER-EUPHRASIA

HE blood but loiters in these frozen veins.

THE

Do you, whose youthful spirit glows with life, do you go forth, and leave the mouldering corpse. To me had Heav'n decreed a longer date, it ne'er had suffered a fell monster's reign, nor let me see the carnage of my people. Farewell, Euphrasia; in one lov'd embrace to these remains pay the last obsequies, and leave me here to sink to silent dust. Euph. And will you then, on self-destruction bent,

reject my prayer, nor trust your fate with me? Evan. Tho' life's a burden I could well lay down,

yet I will prize it, since bestowed by thee.
Oh thou art good; thy virtue soars a flight
for the wide world to wonder at.

561. DONUSA ATTEMPTING TO CONVERT VITElli to

THE MOHAMMEDAN FAITH, IN ORDER TO

SAVE HERSELF

OE wise and weigh

BE

the prosperous success of things; if blessings are donatives from heaven, (which, you must grant, were blasphemy to question,) and that

they are call'd down and pour'd on such as are
most gracious with the great Disposer of them,
look on our flourishing empire, if the splendor,
the majesty and glory of it dim not

your feeble sight: and then turn back and see

the narrow bounds of yours, yet that poor remnant
rent in as many factions and opinions

as you have petty kingdoms;—and then, if
you are not obstinate against truth and reason,
you must confess the Deity you worship

wants care or power to help you.

P. MASSINGER

562 to shake my steady purpose; for thy threats

`HINK not with impotent parade of words

563

and boasted power I equally contemn.

I know thou pridest thee in supposed possession
of art and courage: which thou'lt find too late
a weak resource. Thy disaffected nobles

are anxious for occasion to shake off

with fair pretext the galling yoke they bear,
to pay with happier omens their allegiance.

None but through fear or hope of aggrandizement
obey or follow thee; and such, if once
thy rapid fortunes stop in their career,

will instantly fly off and leave thee friendless.
I came not hither for thy sage advice,"

to learn of thee the art of government.

THE KING AND PIRATE

MARSDEN

'HERE lived a King in the most Eastern East,

Tessedihan 1, yet older, for my blood

hath earnest in it of far springs to be.

A tawny pirate anchored in his port,

whose bark had plundered twenty nameless isles;
and passing one, at the high peep of dawn,
he saw two cities in a thousand boats,

all fighting for a woman on the sea.

And, pushing his black craft among them all,
he lightly scattered theirs, and brought her off,

with loss of half his people, arrow-slain;

a maid so smooth, so white, so wonderful,

they said a light came from her, when she moved; and since the pirate would not yield her up,

the King impaled him for his piracy.

A. TENNYSON