123

A

THE TAKING OF QUEBEC

MIDST the clamour of exulting joys,

which triumph forces from the patriot heart, grief dares to mingle her soul-piercing voice, and quells the raptures which from pleasures start. O Wolfe, to thee a streaming flood of woe,

sighing, we pay, and think e'en conquest dear; Quebec in vain shall teach our breast to glow, whilst thy sad fate extorts the heart-wrung tear. Alive the foe thy dreadful vigour fled,

and saw thee fall with joy-pronouncing eyes: yet shall they know thou conquerest, though dead! since from thy tomb a thousand heroes rise!

O. GOLDSMITH

124

FOR

ASTROPHEL

OR he could pipe and daunce and caroll sweet emongst the shepheards in their shearing feast; as Somers larke that with her song doth greet the dawning day forth comming from the East: and layes of love he also could compose; thrise happie she, whom he to praise did chose!

Full many Maydens often did him woo, them to vouchsafe emongst his rimes to name, or make for them, as he was wont to doo for her that did his heart with love inflame: for which they promised to dight for him gay chapelets of flowers and gyrlonds trim, 125And many a Nymph, both of the wood and brooke, soone as his oaten pipe began to shrill,

both christall wells and shadie groves forsooke,
to heare the charmes of his enchanting skill;

and brought him presents, flowers if it were prime,
or mellow fruit if it were harvest time.

But he for none of them did care a whit,
yet wood Gods for them often sighed sore:
ne for their gifts, unworthie of his wit,
yet not unworthie of the countries store:
for one alone he cared, for one he sight,
his lifes desire and his deare loves delight.

E. SPENSER

127

UR life is but an idle play
and various as the wind:

we laugh and sport our hour away,
nor think of woe behind.

See the fair cheek of beauty fade,
frail glory of an hour;

and blooming youth with sickening head
droops as the dying flower.

Our pleasures like the morning sun
diffuse a flattering light;

but gloomy clouds obscure their noon,
and soon they sink in night.

ZEFI

PRIMAVERA

EFIRO già di bei fioretti adorno
avea da' monti tolta ogni pruina:
avea fatto al suo nido già ritorno
la stanca rondinella peregrina;
risonava la selva intorno intorno
soavemente all' ora mattutina;

e l'ingegnosa pecchia, al primo albore,
giva predando or uno or altro fiore.

A. POLIZIANO

128

THE SNOW-DROP

BENEATH the chilling air when I behold

thee, lovely flower, recline thy languid head :
when I behold thee drooping, pale and cold,
and sorrowing for thy vernal sisters dead;
methinks I mark in thee the child of woe,
exposed to hardship from his earliest birth,
bending beneath the wintry storms that blow,
his only portion a rude spot of earth;

yet sure, like thine, meek flower, his spring draws near,
and heaven's sweet sunshine shall inhale each tear.

W. SCROPE

129

130

131

EVE

THE HEART FLED AGAIN

VEN so the gentle Tyrian dame,
when neither grief nor love prevail,
saw the dear object of her flame,

th' ungrateful Trojan, hoist his sail:
aloud she called to him to stay;

the wind bore him and her lost words away.
The doleful Ariadne so

on the wide shore forsaken stood:
"False Theseus, whither dost thou go?"
Afar false Theseus cut the flood.

But Bacchus came to her relief;

Bacchus himself's too weak to ease my grief.

THE SOLDIER'S FUNERAL

HARK! to the shrill trumpet calling,

it pierceth the soft summer air! Tears from each comrade are falling, for the widow and orphan are there! The bayonets earth-ward are turning,

A. COWLEY

and the drum's muffled breath rolls around,
but he hears not the voice of their mourning,
nor awakes to the bugle's sound.
Sleep, Soldier! tho' many regret thee
who stand by thy cold bier to-day,
soon shall the kindest forget thee

and thy name from the earth pass away.

D%

UNFADING BEAUTY

O not say that life is waning,
or that hope's sweet day is set,
while I've thee and love remaining,
life is in the horizon yet.

Do not think those charms are flying,
tho' thy roses fade and fall;
beauty hath a grace undying,

which in thee survives them all.
Not for charms the newest, brightest,
that on other cheeks may shine,
would I change the least, the slightest,
that is lingering now on thine.

C. NORTON

T. MOORE

132

VISIONS OF FRENZY

I've cliffs, and held the rambling brier;

'VE hung upon the ridgy steep

I've plunged below the billowy deep
where air was sent me to respire;.

I've been where hungry wolves retire;
and (to complete my woes) I've ran
where Bedlam's crazy crew conspire
against the life of reasoning man.
I've furled in storms the flapping sail,
by hanging from the top-mast head,
I've served the vilest slaves in jail,
have picked the dunghill's spoil for bread.

133 Those fiends upon a shaking fen

134

fixed me in dark tempestuous night;
there never trod the foot of men,
there flocked the fowl in wintry flight.

They hung me on a bough so small
the rook could build her nest no higher;
they fixed me on the trembling ball

that crowns the steeple's quivering spire.
On sand, where ebbs and flows the flood,
midway they placed and bade me die;
propt on my staff, I stoutly stood

when the swift waves came rolling by;

and high they rose, and still more high,
till my lips drank the bitter brine;
I sobbed convulsed, then cast mine eye
and saw the tide's re-flowing sign.

THE

CHERRY-RIPE

HERE is a garden in her face where roses and white lilies blow; a heavenly paradise is that place,

wherein all pleasant fruits do grow; there cherries grow that none may buy, till Cherry ripe themselves do cry.

G. CRABBE

Her eyes like angels watch them still,
her brows like bended bows do stand;
threatening with piercing frowns to kill
all that approach with eye or hand
these sacred cherries to come nigh,
-till Cherry ripe themselves do cry!

ANON.

135

THE

YOUTH AND AGE

'HE seas are quiet when the winds are o'er,
so calm are we when passions are no more!
for then we know how vain it was to boast
of fleeting things, so certain to be lost.
Clouds of affection from our younger eyes
conceal that emptiness which age descries:
the soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed,
lets in new light through chinks that time hath made.
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become

as they draw near to their eternal home,
leaving the old, both worlds at once they view
that stand upon the threshold of the new.

E. WALLER

136

TO A LADY SINGING A SONG OF HIS OWN
COMPOSING

HLORIS, yourself you so excel,
When you vouchsafe to breathe my thought,

that like a spirit with this spell

of my own teaching I am caught.

That eagle's fate and mine are one,

which on the shaft, that made him die, espied a feather of his own

wherewith he wont to soar so high.

Had Echo, with so sweet a grace,
Narcissus' loud complaints returned,
not for reflexion of his face

but of his voice the boy had burned.

E. WALLER