ENCE, loathed Melancholy,
Of Cerberus, and blackest Midnight born! In Stygian cave forlorn
'Mongst horrid fhapes, and fhrieks, and fights unholy
Find out fome uncouth cell,
Where brooding darkness spreads his jealous.
And the night raven fings;
There under ebon fhades, and low-brow'd rocks,
As ragged as thy locks,
In dark Cimmerian defart ever dwell.
But come, thou Goddess fair and free,
In heav'n yclep'd Euphrofyne,
And by men heart-eafing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth
With two fifter Graces more
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;
Or whether (as fome fages fing)
The frolic wind that breathes the spring,
Zephyr with Aurora playing
As he met her once a maying,
There on beds of violets blue,
And fresh blown roses wash'd in dew,
Fill'd her with thee a daughter fair,
So buckfome, blithe, and debonair.
Hafte thee, nymph, and bring with thee
Jeft and youthful jollity,
Quips and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple fleek;
Sport that wrinkled care derides,
And Laughter holding both his fides.
Come and trip it as you go
On the light fantastic toe;
And in thy right hand lead with thee l
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty ;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleafures free
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And finging ftartle the dull night,
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Then to come in fpite of forrow,
And at my window bid good-morrow,
Through the sweet briar or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack, or the barn door,
Stoutly ftruts his dames before :
Oft lift'ning how the hounds and horn
Clearly roufe the flumb'ring morn,
From the fide of fome hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill :
Some time walking not unfeen
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great fun begins his ftate,
Rob'd in flames, and amber light
The clouds in thousand liveries dight:
While the plow-man, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land, 12
And the milkmaid fingeth blithe,
And the mower whets his fcythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Whilst the landskip round it measures;
Ruffet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do fray:
Mountains on whose barren breast
The lab'ring clouds do often reft;
Meadows trim with daifies pied;
Shallow brooks and rivers wide:
Towers and battlements it fees
Bofom'd high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps fome beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Hard by a cottage chimney finokes,
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrfis met,
Are at their favoury dinner fet
Of herbs, and other country meffes,
Which the neat handed Phillis dreffes;
And then in hafte her bower the leaves,
With Theftylis to bind his fheaves;
Or if the earlier feafon lead
To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
Sometimes with fécure delight
The upland hamlet will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecks found
To many a youth and many a maid,
Dancing in the chequer'd fhade;
And young and old come forth to play
On a funshine holiday,
Till the live-long day-light fail;
Then to the spicy nut brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How Fairy-Mab the junkets eat;
She was pinch'd, and pull'd, she said,
And he by friars lanthorn led;
Tells how the drudging Goblin fwet
To earn his cream-bowl duly fet,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn
His fhadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn
That ten day-labourers could not end,
Then lies him down the lubber fiend,
And ftretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Bafks at the fire his hairy ftrength;
And crop-full out of doors he flings.
Ere the first cock his mattin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering winds foon lull'd asleep.
Tow'red cities please us then,
And the bufy hum of men,
Where throngs of knights and barons bold, In weeds of peace high triumphs hold, With ftores of ladies, whofe bright eyes. Rain influence, and judge the prize
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