Aspires, till at the top his eyes
Have lost the safety of the plain,
Then begs of Fate the vales againe.
The now confounded shepheard cries:
Ye all-confounding destines!
How did you make that voice so sweet
Without that
glorious form to it?
Thou
sacred spirit of my deare,
Where e're thou hoverst o're us, hear!
Imbark thee in the lawrell tree,
And a new Phebus follows thee,
Who, 'stead of all his burning rayes,
Will
strive to catch thee with his layes;
Or, if within the Orient Vine,
Thou art both deity and wine;
But if thou takest the mirtle grove,
That Paphos is, thou, Queene of Love,
And I, thy swain who (else) must die,
By no beasts, but thy cruelty:
But you are rougher than the winde.
Are souls on earth then heav'n<33.18> more kind?
Imprisoned in mortality
Lucasta would have answered me.
Lucasta, Amarantha said,
Is she that virgin-star? a maid,
Except her prouder livery,
In beauty poore, and cheap as I;
Whose glory like a
meteor shone,
Or aery apparition,
Admir'd a while, but slighted known.
Fierce, as the chafed lyon hies,
He rowses him, and to her flies,
Thinking to answer with his speare----
Now, as in warre
intestine where,
Ith' mist of a black battell, each
Layes at his next, then makes a breach
Through th' entrayles of another, whom
He sees nor knows
whence he did come,
Guided alone by rage and th' drumme,
But stripping and
impatient wild,
He finds too soon his onely child.
So our expiring desp'rate lover
Far'd when, amaz'd, he did discover
Lucasta in this nymph; his sinne
Darts the
accursed javelin
'Gainst his own breast, which she puts by
With a soft lip and gentle eye,
Then closes with him on the ground
And now her smiles have heal'd his wound.
Alexis too again is found;
But not untill those heavy crimes
She hath kis'd off a thousand times,
Who not
contented with this pain,
Doth
threaten to
offend again.
And now they gaze, and sigh, and weep,
Whilst each cheek doth the other's steep,
Whilst tongues, as exorcis'd, are calm;
Onely the rhet'rick of the palm
Prevailing pleads, untill at last
They[re] chain'd in one another fast.
Lucasta to him doth relate
Her various chance and diffring fate:
How chac'd by Hydraphil, and tract
The num'rous foe to Philanact,
Who
whilst they for the same things fight,
As Bards decrees and Druids rite,
For
safeguard of their proper joyes
And shepheards freedome, each destroyes
The glory of this Sicilie;
Since seeking thus the remedie,
They fancy (building on false ground)
The means must them and it confound,
Yet are
resolved to stand or fall,
And win a little, or lose all.
From this sad storm of fire and blood
She fled to this yet living wood;
Where she 'mongst
savage beasts doth find
Her self more safe then humane<33.19> kind.
Then she relates, how Caelia--<33.20>
The lady--here strippes her array,
And girdles her in home-spunne bayes
Then makes her conversant in layes
Of birds, and swaines more innocent,
That kenne not guile [n]or
courtship ment.
Now walks she to her bow'r to dine
Under a shade of Eglantine,
Upon a dish of Natures cheere
Which both grew, drest and serv'd up there:
That done, she feasts her smell with po'ses
Pluckt from the
damask cloath of Roses.
Which there
continually doth stay,
And onely frost can take away;
Then wagers which hath most content
Her eye, eare, hand, her gust or sent.
Intranc't Alexis sees and heares,
As walking above all the spheres:
Knows and adores this, and is wilde,<33.21>
Untill with her he live thus milde.<33.22>
So that, which to his thoughts he meant
For losse of her a punishment,
His armes hung up and his sword broke,
His ensignes folded, he betook
Himself unto the
humble crook.
And for a full
reward of all,
She now doth him her shepheard call,
And in a see of flow'rs install:
Then gives her faith immediately,
Which he returns religiously;
Both vowing in her peacefull cave
To make their bridall-bed and grave.
But the true joy this pair conceiv'd,
Each from the other first bereav'd,
And then found, after such alarmes,
Fast-pinion'd in each other's armes,
Ye panting virgins, that do meet
Your loves within their winding sheet,
Breathing and
constant still ev'n there;
Or souls their bodies in yon' sphere,
Or angels, men return'd from hell
And separated mindes--can tell.
<33.1> The
punctuation of this piece is in the original edition
singularly
corrupt. I have found it necessary to amend it
throughout.
<33.2> The marigold.
<33.3> A flower so called.
<33.4> More
commonly known as THE GILLIFLOWER.
<33.5> i.e. the lady gathers the flowers, and binds them in her
hair with a
silken fillet, making of them a kind of chaplet
or crown.
<33.6> i.e.
silvery or white milk.
<33.7> An
uncommon word, signifying WRINKLED. Bishop Hall seems
to be, with the
exception of Lovelace, almost the only
writer who
used it. Compare, however, the following passage:--
"Like to a WRITHEL'D Carion I have seen
(Instead of fifty, write her down fifteen)
Wearing her bought
complexion in a box,
And ev'ry morn her closet-face unlocks."
PLANTAGENET'S TRAGICALL STORY, by T. W. 1649, p. 105.
<33.8> Original has PRIZE THEIR.
<33.9> The fish with their
silvery scales.
<33.10> Fins.
<33.11> Original reads BUT LOOK.
<33.12> Original has THERE.
<33.13> i.e. condemned.
<33.14> This word does not appear to have any very exact meaning.
See Halliwell's DICTIONARY OF ARCHAIC WORDS, art. POSSE, and
Worcester's Dict. IBID, &c. The context here requires TO TURN
SHARPLY OR QUICKLY.
<33.15> Original has SIGHT.
<33.16> Original reads I. The meaning seems to be, "I crave
that my woes may be smothered in me, and I may be smothered
in my grave."
<33.17> Reverence.
<33.18> i.e. in heaven.
<33.19> i.e. than among human kind.
<33.20> It may be presumed that LUCASTA had adopted the name
of CAELIA during her sylvan retreat.
<33.21> Impatient.
<33.22> Tranquil or secluded.
TO ELLINDA, THAT LATELY I HAVE NOT WRITTEN.
I.
If in me anger, or disdaine
In you, or both, made me refraine
From th' noble
intercourse of verse,
That only vertuous thoughts rehearse;
Then,
chaste Ellinda, might you feare
The
sacred vowes that I did sweare.
II.
But if alone some pious thought
Me to an
inward sadnesse brought,
Thinking to
breath your soule too welle,
My tongue was charmed with that spell;
And left it (since there was no roome
To voyce your worth enough) strooke dumbe.
III.
So then this silence doth reveal
No thought of negligence, but zeal:
For, as in adoration,
This is love's true devotion;
Children and fools the words repeat,
But anch'rites pray in tears and sweat.
ELLINDA'S GLOVE.
SONNET.
I.
Thou snowy farme with thy five tenements!<34.1>
Tell thy white mistris here was one,
That call'd to pay his dayly rents;
But she a-gathering flowr's and hearts is gone,
And thou left voyd to rude possession.
II.
But
grieve not, pretty Ermin cabinet,
Thy alabaster lady will come home;
If not, what
tenant can there fit
The
slender turnings of thy narrow roome,
But must ejected be by his owne dombe?<34.2>
III.
Then give me leave to leave my rent with thee:
Five kisses, one unto a place:
For though the lute's too high for me,
Yet servants,
knowing minikin<34.3> nor base,
Are still allow'd to
fiddle with the case.