O God if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be aveng'd on my misdeeds,
Yet execute thy wrath on me alone ;
O spare my guiltless wife, and my poor children !
I prithee, Brakenbury, stay by me :
My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.
O THEN I see Queen Mab has been with you.
She is the fancy's mid-wife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies,
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep :
Her waggon spokes made of long spinners' legs ;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers:
The traces of the smallest spider's web ;
The collars of the moonshine's wat'ry beams;
Her whip, of cricket's bones; the lash, of film;
Her waggoner, a small grey-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm,
Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid.
Her chariot is an empty hazel nut,
Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub,
Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers.
And in this state she gallops, night by night,
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of
On courtiers' knees, that dream on curtsies straight:
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on ee
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream;
Sometimes she gallops o'er a lawyer's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit:
And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig's tail,
Tickling the parson as he lies asleep;
'Then dreams he of another benefice.
Sometimes she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then he dreams of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep and then anon Drums in his ears, at which he starts and wakes ; And being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two, And sleeps again.
APOTHECARY.
I DO remember an Apothecary,
And hereabouts he dwells, whom late I noted
In tatter'd weeds, with overwhelming brows,
Culling of simples; meagre were his looks;
Sharp Misery had worn him to the bones:
And in his needy shop a tortoise hung,
An alligator stuff'd, and other skins
Of ill-shap'd fishes; and about his shelves
A beggarly account of empty boxes;
Green earthen pots, bladders, and musty seeds,
Remnants of pack thread, and old cakes of roses
Were thinly scatter'd to make up a show.
Noting this pen'ry, to myself I said,
An' if a man did need a poison now,
Whose sale is present death in Mantua,
Here lives a cantiff wretch would sell it him.
Oh, this same thought did but forerun`my need,
And this same needy man must sell it me.
As I remember, this should be the house.
Being holiday, the beggar's shop is shut.
IF aught of oaten stop, or past'ral song,
Many hope, chaste Eve, to sooth thy modest ear,
Like thy own solemn springs,
Thy springs, and dying gales,
O Nymph reserv'd, while now the bright-hair'd sun
Sits on yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts
With brede ethereal wove,
O'erhang his wayy bed:
Now air is hush'd, save where the weak ey'd bat,
With short shrill shrieks flits by on leathern wing,
Or where the beetle winds
His small but sullen horn,
As oft he rises 'midst the twilight path,
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum:
Now teach me, maid compos'd,
To breathe some soften'd strain,
Whose numbers stealing through thy dark'ning vale,
May not unseemly with its stillness suit,
As musing slow, I hail
Thy genial lov'd return!
For when thy folding star arising shows
His paly circlet, at his warning lamp
The fragrant Hours, and Elves
Who slept in flow'rs the day,
And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge,
And sheds the fresh'ning dew, and lovelier still,
The pensive Pleasures sweet
Prepare thy shadowy car,
Then lead, calm Vot'ress, where some sheety lake
Cheers the lone heath, or some time hallow'd pile,
Or upland fallows gray
Reflect its last cool gleam.
But when chill blust'ring winds, or driving rain,
Forbid my willing feet, be mine the hut,
That from the mountain's side,
Views wilds, and swelling floods,
And hamlets brown, and dim discover'd spires,
And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er all
Thy dewy fingers draw
The gradual dusky veil.
While Spring shall pour his show'rs, as oft he wont,
And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!
While summer loves to sport
Beneath thy ling'ring light;
While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;
Or Winter bell'wing through the troublous air,
Affrights thy shrinking train,
And rudely rends thy robes;
So long, sure found beneath thy Sylvan shed,
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, rose-lip'd Health,
Thy gentlest influence own,
And hymn thy fav'rite name!
SWEET daughter of a rough and stormy sire,
Hoar Winter's blooming child, delightful Spring
Whose unshorn locks with leaves
And swelling buds are crown'd;
From the green islands of eternal youth,
(Crown'd with fresh blooms and ever-springing shade}
Turn, hither turn thy step,
O thou, whose powerful voice,
More sweet than softest touch of Doric reed,
Or Lydian flute, can sooth the madding winds,
And through the stormy deep
Breathe thy own tender calm.
Thee, best belov'd! the virgin train await
With songs and festal rites, and joy to rove
Thy blooming wilds among,
And vales and downy lawns,
With untir'd feet! and cull thy earliest sweets
To weave fresh garlands for the glowing brow
Of him, the favour'd youth,
That prompts their whisper'd sigh.
Unlock thy copious stores; those tender showers
That drop their sweetness on the infant buds,
And silent dews that swell
The milky ear's green stem,
And feed the flow'ring osier's early shoots; And call those winds which through the whispering boughs
With warm and pleasant breath
Salute the blowing flow'rs.
Now let me sit beneath the whit'ning thorn,
And mark thy spreading tints steal o'er the dale;
And watch with patient eye
Thy fair unfolding charms.
O Nymph! approach, while yet the temp❜rate sun,
With bashful forehead, through the cool moist air
Throws his young maiden beams,
And with chaste kisses woos
The Earth's fair bosom; while the streaming veil
Of lucid clouds with kind and frequent shade.
Protects thy modest blooms
From his severer blaze.
Sweet is thy reign, but short; the red dog star
Shall scorch thy tresses, and the mower's scythe
Thy greens, thy flow'rets all,
Remorseless shall destroy.
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