Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 1.pdf/168

34 Ægle came in, to make their Party good; The fairest Nais of the neighbouring Flood, And, while he stares around, with stupid Eyes, His Brows with Berries, and his Temples dies. He finds the Fraud, and, with a Smile, demands On what design the Boys had bound his Hands. Loose me, he cry'd; 'twas Impudence to find A sleeping God, 'tis Sacrilege to bind. To you the promis'd Poem I will pay; The Nymph shall be rewarded in her way. He rais'd his voice; and soon a num'rous throng Of tripping Satyrs crowded to the Song. And Sylvan Fauns, and Savage Beasts advanc'd, And nodding Forests to the Numbers danc'd. Not by Haemonian Hills the Thracian Bard, Nor awful Phœbus was on Pindus heard, With deeper silence, or with more regard. He sung the secret Seeds of Nature's Frame; How Seas, and Earth, and Air, and active Flame, Fell through the mighty Void; and in their fall Were blindly gather'd in this goodly Ball. The tender Soil then stiffning by degrees, Shut from the bounded Earth, the bounding Seas. Then Earth and Ocean various Forms disclose; And a new Sun to the new World arose. And Mists condens'd to Clouds obscure the Sky; And Clouds dissolv'd, the thirsty Ground supply.