COMUS. Can any mortal mixture of earth's mold
Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment!
Sure something holy lodges in that breast,
And with these raptures moves the vocal air
To testify his hidden residence.
How sweetly did they float upon the wings
Of silence, through the empty-vaulted night,
At every fall smoothing the raven-down
Of darkness till it smiled! I have oft heard
My mother Circe with the Syrens three,
Amidst the flowery-kirtled Naiades,
Culling their potent herbs and baleful drugs;
Who, as they sung, would take the prison'd soul,
And lap it in Elysium: Scylla wept,
And chid her barking waves into attention;
And fell Charybdis murmur'd soft applause:
Yet they in pleasing slumber lull'd the sense,
And in sweet madness robb'd it of itself;
But such a sacred and home-felt delight,
Such sober certainty of waking bliss,
I never heard till now.-I'll speak to her,
And she shall be my queen.-Hail, foreign wonder!
Whom certain these rough shades did never breed,
Unless the goddess that in rural shrine
Dwell'st here with Pan, or Silvan; by bless'd song
Forbidding every bleak unkindly fog
To touch the prosperous growth of this tall wood.
LADY. Nay, gentle Shepherd! ill is lost that
That is address'd to unattending ears.
Not any boast of skill, but extreme shift
How to regain my sever'd company,
Compell'd me to awake the courteous Echo
To give me answer from her
mossy couch. COMUS. What chance, good Lady! hath bereft you thus ?
LADY. Dim darkness, and this leafy labyrinth. COMUS. Could that divide you from near-ushering guides?
LADY. They left me weary on a grassy turf. COMUS. By falsehood, or discourtesy, or why? LADY. To seek i' the valley some cool friendly
COMUS. And left your fair side all unguarded,
LADY. They were but twain, and purposed quick COMUS. Perhaps forestalling night prevented
LADY. How easy my misfortune is to hit! COMUS. Imports their loss, beside the present need?
LADY. No less than if I should my brothers lose. COMUS. Were they of manly prime, or youthful bloom?
LADY. As smooth as Hebe's their unrazor'd lips.
COMUS.TWO Such I saw,what time the labor'd ox
In his loose traces from the furrow came,
And the swink'd hedger at his supper sat.
I saw them under a green mantling vine,
That crawls along the side of yon small hill,
Plucking ripe clusters from the tender shoots.
Their port was more than human as they stood:
I took it for a faery vision
Of some gay creatures of the element,
That in the colors of the rainbow live,
And play in the plighted clouds. I was awe-struck,
And, as I past, I worshipp'd: if those you seek,
It were a journey like the path to Heaven,
To help you find them.
What readiest way would bring me to that place? COMUS. Due west it rises from this shrubby point.
LADY. To find out that, good Shepherd! I sup-
In such a scant allowance of star-light, [pose,
Would overtask the best land-pilot's art,
Without the sure guess of well-practised feet.
COMUS. I know each lane,and every alley green,
Dingle, or bushy dell of this wild wood,
And every bosky bourn from side to side,
My daily walks and ancient neighbourhood;
And if your stray attendance be yet lodged,
Or shroud within these limits I shall know
Ere morrow wake, or the low-roosted lark
From her thatch'd pallet rouse; if otherwise,
I can conduct you, Lady! to a low
But loyal cottage, where you may be safe
Till further quest.
Shepherd! I take thy word, And trust thy honest offer'd courtesy, Which oft is sooner found in lowly sheds With smoky rafters, than in tapestry halls In courts of princes, where it first was named, And yet is most pretended. In a place Less warranted than this, or less secure, I cannot be, that I should fear to change it.— Eye me, bless'd Providence! and square my trial To my proportion'd strength!-Shepherd! lead on. [Exeunt.
Enter THE TWO BROTHERS.
FIRST B. Unmuffle, ye faint stars! and thou, fair moon!
That wont'st to love the traveller's benison,
Stoop thy pale visage through an amber cloud,
And disinherit Chaos, that reigns here
In double night of darkness and of shades:
Or, if your influence be quite damm'd up
With black usurping mists, some gentle taper,
Though a rush-candle from the wicker hole
Of some clay habitation, visit us
With thy long-levell'd rule of streaming light;
And thou shalt be our star of Arcady,
Be barr'd that happiness, might we but hear
The folded flocks penn'd in their wattled cotes,
Or sound of pastoral reed with oaten stops,
Or whistle from the lodge, or village cock
Count the night watches to his feathery dames,
"Twould be some solace yet, some little cheering,
In this close dungeon of innumerous boughs.
But, O that hapless virgin, our lost sister!
Where may
she wander now, whither betake her
From the chill dew, among rude burs and thistles?
Perhaps some cold bank is her bolster now,
Or 'gainst the rugged bark of some broad elm
Leans her unpillow'd head, fraught with sad fears:
What, if in wild amazement and affright?
Or, while we speak, within the direful grasp
Of savage hunger, or of savage heat?
FIRST B. Peace, Brother! be not over-exquisite
To cast the fashion of uncertain evils:
For grant they be so, while they rest unknown,
What need a man forestall his date of grief,
And run to meet what he would most avoid?
Or if they be but false alarms of fear,
How bitter is such self-delusion!
I do not think my sister so to seek,
Or so unprincipled in virtue's book,
And the sweet peace that goodness bosoms ever,
As that the single want of light and noise
(Not being in danger, as I trust she is not)
Could stir the constant mood of her calm thoughts,
And put them into misbecoming plight.
Virtue could see to do what Virtue would
By her own radiant light, though sun and moon
Were in the flat sea sunk. And Wisdom's self
Oft seeks to sweet retired solitude;
Where, with her best nurse, Contemplation,
She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings,
That in the various bustle of resort
Were all too ruffled, and sometimes impair'd.
He that has light within his own clear breast,
May sit in the centre, and enjoy bright day:
But he, that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts,
Benighted walks under the mid-day sun;
Himself is his own dungeon.
That musing Meditation most affects
The pensive secresy of desert cell,
Far from the cheerful haunt of men and herds,
And sits as safe as in a senate house;
For who would rob a hermit of his weeds,
His few books, or his beads, or maple dish,
Or do his grey hairs any violence?
But Beauty, like the fair Hesperian tree
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