While organs yet were mute, Timotheus, to his breathing flute And sounding lyre, Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire. At last divine Cecilia came, Inventress of the vocal frame; The sweet enthusiast from her sacred store Enlarged the former narrow bounds, And added length to solemn sounds, With Nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown be fore. Let old Timotheus yield the prize, Or both divide the crown; He raised a mortal to the skies; She drew an angel down! John Dryden. LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCY "AH! what can ail thee, wretched wight, The sedge is withered from the lake, "Ah! what can ail thee, wretched wight, And the harvest's done. "I see a lily on thy brow, With anguish moist and fever-dew; And on thy cheek a fading rose Fast withereth, too." "I met a lady in the meads, Full beautiful, a fairy's child; · Her hair was long, her foot was light, "I set her on my pacing steed, And nothing else saw all day long; For sideways would she lean and sing A fairy's song. "I made a garland for her head, And bracelets, too, and fragrant zone; "She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild, and manna-dew; And sure in language strange she said, 'I love thee true.' "She took me to her elfin grot, And there she gazed and sighed full sore, And there I shut her wild, sad eyes With kisses four. “And there she lullèd me asleep, And there I dreamed, ah! woe betide, The latest dream I ever dreamed, On the cold hillside : "I saw pale kings and princes, too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all; 66 Who cried, 'La Belle Dame Sans Mercy "I saw their starved lips in the gloom, With horrid warning gapèd wide; And I awoke, and found me here On the cold hillside. "And this is why I sojourn here, Alone and palely loitering; Though the sedge is withered from the lake, And no birds sing." John Keats. THE WANDERING KNIGHT'S SONG From the Spanish My ornaments are arms, My pastime is in war, My bed is cold upon the wold, My lamp yon star. My journeyings are long, My slumbers short and broken; I ride from land to land, I sail from sea to sea; Some day more kind I fate may find, Some night, kiss thee. John Gibson Lockhart. TO THE NIGHT SWIFTLY walk over the western wave, Out of the misty eastern cave, Wrap thy form in a mantle gray, Blind with thine hair the eyes of day, Kiss her until she be wearied out, Then wander o'er city, and sea, and land, When I arose and saw the dawn, When light rode high, and the dew was gone, And the weary Day turned to his rest, Thy brother Death came, and cried, Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, Shall I nestle near thy side? Death will come when thou art dead, Sleep will come when thou art fled; Percy Bysshe Shelley. ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S HOMER MUCH have I traveled in the realms of gold, That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne; Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold: Then felt I like some watcher of the skies John Keats. |