Page:The Complete Poetical Works of John Milton.djvu/103

 LYCIDAS

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��Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft

lays.

As killing as the canker to the rose, Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that

graze, Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe

wear,

When first the white-thorn blows; Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear. Where were ye, Nymphs, when the re- morseless deep 50 Closed o'er the head of your loved Lyci- das ?

For neither were ye playing on the steep Where your old Bards, the famous Druids,

lie,

Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high, Nor yet where Deva spreads her wisard

stream.

Ay me ! I fondly dream " Had ye been there,". . . for what could

that have done ? What could the Muse herself that Orpheus

bore,

The Muse herself, for her inchanting son, Whom universal nature did lament, 60

When, by the rout that made the hideous

roar, His gory visage down the stream was

sent, Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian

shore ?

Alas ! what boots it with uncessant care To tend the homely, slighted, Shepherd's

trade,

And strictly meditate the thankless Muse ? Were it not better done, as others use, To sport with Amaryllis in the shade, Or with the tangles of Nesera's hair ? Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth

raise 70

(That last infirmity of noble mind) To scorn delights and live laborious days; But the fair guerdon when we hope to

find,

And think to burst out into sudden blaze, Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred

shears, And slits the thin-spun life. " But not the

praise," Phoebus replied, and touched my trembling

ears: " Fame is no plant that grows on mortal

soil,

��Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies, 80

But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes

And perfet witness of all-judging Jove;

As he pronounces lastly on each deed,

Of so much fame in heaven expect thy

meed."

O fountain Arethuse, and thou honoured flood,

Smooth-sliding Mincius, crowned with vocal reeds,

That strain I heard was of a higher mood.

But now my oat proceeds,

And listens to the Herald of the Sea,

That came in Neptune's plea. 90

He asked the waves, and asked the felon winds,

What hard mishap hath doomed this gentle swain ?

And questioned every gust of rugged wings

That blows from off each beaked promon- tory.

They knew not of his story;

And sage Hippotades their answer brings,

That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed:

The air was calm, and on the level brine

Sleek Pauope with all her sisters played.

It was that fatal and perfidious bark, 100

Built in the eclipse, and rigged with curses dark,

That sunk so low that sacred head of thine. Next, Camus, reverend Sire, went footing slow,

His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge,

Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge

Like to that sanguine flower inscribed with woe.

" Ah ! who hath reft," quoth he, " my dear- est pledge ? "

Last came, and last did go,

The Pilot of the Galilean Lake; 109

Two massy keys he bore of metals twain

(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain).

He shook his mitred locks, and stern be- spake :

" How well could I have spared for thee, young swain,

Anow of such as, for their bellies' sake,

Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold!

Of other care they little reckoning make

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