OCCASIONED BY A LADY'S MAKING A COPY OF VERSES

IN ancient Greece, when Sappho sung

And touched with matchless art the lyre,
Apollo's hand her music strung

And all Parnassus formed the quire.

But sweeter notes and softer lays
From your diviner numbers spring,
Such as himself Apollo plays,
Such as the Heavenly Sisters sing.

369.
A HUNTING SONG
THE dusky night rides down the
sky,

And ushers in the morn;
The hounds all join in glorious cry,
The huntsman winds his horn,
And a-hunting we will go.

The wife around her husband
throws

Her arms, and begs his stay; 'My dear, it rains, and hails, and

snows,

You will not hunt to-day?'
But a-hunting we will go.

H. FELTON.

A brushing fox in yonder wood
Secure to find we seek :
For why? I carried, sound and
good,

A cartload there last week,

And a-hunting we will go.'

Away he goes, he flies the rout, Their steeds all spur and switch,

Some are thrown in, and some
thrown out,

And some thrown in the ditch;
But a-hunting we will go.

At length his strength to faintness worn,
Poor Reynard ceases flight;

Then, hungry, homeward we return,
To feast away the night.

Then a-drinking we will go.

H. FIELDING.

370. IN THE MUSES' PATHS I STRAY

IN the Muses' paths I stray;

Among their groves and by their sacred springs

My hand delights to trace unusual things,

And deviates from the known and common way:
Nor will in fading silks compose

Faintly the inimitable rose,

Fill up an ill-drawn bird, or paint on glass

The Sovereign's blurred and undistinguished face,

The threatening angel, and the speaking ass.

ANNE FINCH, COUNTESS OF WINCHELSEA (The Spleen).

371. TO DEATH

O KING of Terrors! whose unbounded sway
All that have life must certainly obey;

The king, the priest, the prophet, all are thine,
Nor would even God (in flesh) thy stroke decline.
My name is on thy roll, and sure I must
Increase thy gloomy kingdom in the dust.
My soul at this no apprehension feels,

But trembles at thy swords, thy racks, thy wheels,
Thy scorching fevers, which distract the sense,
And snatch us raving, unprepared from hence;
At thy contagious darts, that wound the heads
Of weeping friends who wait at dying beds.—
Spare these, and let thy time be when it will;
My office is to die, and thine to kill.

Gently thy fatal sceptre on me lay,

And take to thy cold arms, insensibly, thy prey.
ANNE FINCH, COUNTESS OF WINCHELSEA.

372. TO SILVIA

SILVIA, let us from the crowd retire,

For what to you and me

(Who but each other do desire)

Is all that here we see?

Apart we'll live, though not alone;
For who alone can call

Those who in deserts live with one

If in that one they've all?

The world a vast meander is,

Where hearts confusedly stray;

Where few do hit, whilst thousands miss,

The happy mutual way.

ANNE FINCH, COUNTESS OF WINCHELSEA (The Cautious Lovers).

373. FROM THE 'RUBAIYÁT OF OMAR KHAYYÁM’

AWAKE! for Morning in the Bowl of Night

Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to flight,
And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught

The Sultán's Turret in a Noose of Light.

Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring
The Winter Garment of Repentance fling:
The Bird of Time has but a little way
To fly and Lo! the Bird is on the Wing.

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse-and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.

Think, in this battered Caravanserai

Whose Doorways are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp
Abode his Hour or two, and went his way.

They say the Lion and the Lizard keep

The Courts where Jamshýd gloried and drank deep;
And Bahrám, that great Hunter-the Wild Ass
Stamps o'er his Head, and he lies fast asleep.

I sometimes think that never blows so red
The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled;
That every Hyacinth the Garden wears
Dropt in its Lap from some once lovely Head.

And this delightful Herb whose tender Green
Fledges the River's Lip on which we lean-

Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows
From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen!
Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears
TO-DAY of past Regrets and future Fears-

To-morrow ?-Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Seven Thousand Years.
Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and best
That Time and Fate of all their Vintage prest,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to Rest.

Oh, come with old Khayyám, and leave the Wise To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;

One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies; The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument
About it and about: but evermore
Came out by the same Door as in I went.

With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with my own hand laboured it to grow:
And this was all the Harvest that I reaped—
'I came like Water, and like Wind I go.'

There was a Door to which I found no Key:
There was a Veil past which I could not see:

Some little Talk awhile of ME and THEE
There seemed-and then no more of THEE and ME.

'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays :

Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays, And one by one back in the Closet lays.

The Ball no Question makes of Ayes and Noes,
But Right or Left as strikes the Player goes;

And He that tossed Thee down into the Field,
He knows about it all-He knows-He knows!

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.

Oh, Thou, who didst with Pitfall and with Gin
Beset the Road I was to wander in,

Thou wilt not with Predestination round
Enmesh me, and impute my Fall to Sin?

Oh, Thou, who Man of baser Earth didst make,
And who with Eden didst devise the Snake;

For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man
Is blackened, Man's Forgiveness give-and take!

Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide,
And wash my Body whence the Life has died,
And in a Winding-sheet of Vine-leaf wrapt,
So bury me by some sweet Garden-side.

That even my buried Ashes such a Snare
Of Perfume shall fling up into the Air,
As not a True Believer passing by
But shall be overtaken unaware.

Indeed the Idols I have loved so long

Have done my Credit in Men's Eye much wrong:
Have drowned my Honour in a shallow Cup,
And sold my Reputation for a Song.

Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before

I swore but was I sober when I swore ?

And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand My thread-bare Penitence apieces tore.

And much as Wine has played the Infidel,
And robbed me of my Robe of Honour-well,
I often wonder what the Vintners buy
One half so precious as the Goods they sell.
Alas, that Spring should vanish with the Rose !
That Youth's sweet-scented Manuscript should close!
The Nightingale that in the Branches sang,
Ah, whence, and whither flown again, who knows!
Ah Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things' entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits-and then

Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire! E. FITZGERALD.

374. OH, THE SAD DAY!

Он, the sad day!

When friends shall shake their heads, and say

Of miserable me :—

Hark, how he groans!

Look how he pants for breath!

See how he struggles with the pangs of death!'

When they shall say of these dear eyes :

'How hollow, oh, how dim they be!

Mark how his breast doth rise and swell

Against his potent enemy!'

When some old friend shall step to my bedside,

Touch my chill face, and thence shall gently slide,

But when his next companions say:

'How does he do? What hopes? shall turn away,
Answering only, with a lift-up hand :-
'Who can his fate withstand ?'

Then shall a gasp or two do more

Than e'er my rhetoric could before:

Persuade the world to trouble me no more-
Persuade the world to trouble me no more.

375. SONG TO PAN

T. FLATMAN.

ALL ye woods and trees and He is great, and he is just,

bowers,

All ye virtues and ye powers
That inhabit in the lakes,

In the pleasant springs or brakes,

Move your feet

To our sound

Whilst we greet

All this ground

With his honour and his name
That defends our flocks from

blame.

He is ever good, and must
Thus be honoured. Daffadillies,

Roses, pinks, and loved lilies,
Let us fling,

Whilst we sing
'Ever holy,

Ever holy,

Ever honoured, ever young!'

Thus great Pan is ever sung.

J. FLETCHER

(The Faithful Shepherdess).