The express resemblance of the gods, is changed
Into some brutish form-of wolf, or bear,
Or ounce, or tiger, hog, or bearded goat—
All other parts remaining as they were;
And they,-
—so perfect is their misery,—
Not once perceive their foul disfigurement,

But boast themselves more comely than before;
And all their friends and native home forget,
To roll with pleasure in a sensual sty.
Therefore when any, favoured of high Jove,
Chances to pass through this adventurous glade,
Swift as the sparkle of a glancing star

I shoot from Heaven, to give him safe convoy,
As now I do: but first I must put off
These my sky-robes spun out of Iris' woof,
And take the weeds and likeness of a swain,
That to the service of this house belongs,

Who with his soft pipe, and smooth-dittied song,
Well knows to still the wild winds when they roar,
And hush the waving woods; nor of less faith,
And in this office of his mountain watch,
Likeliest, and nearest to the present aid
Of this occasion.-But I hear the tread
Of hateful steps.--I must be viewless now.

Comus enters with a charming-rod in one hand, his glass in the other; with him a rout of monsters, headed like sundry sorts of wild beasts, but otherwise like men and women, their apparel glistering; they come in, making a riotous and unruly noise, with torches in their hands.

Com. The star that bids the shepherd fold,

Now the top of Heaven doth hold;

And the gilded car of Day,

His glowing axle doth allay

In the steep Atlantic stream;

And the slope Sun his upward beam
Shoots against the dusky pole,
Pacing toward the other goal
Of his chamber in the East.

Meanwhile welcome Joy and Feast,

Imitate the starry quire,

Who, in their nightly watchful spheres,
Lead in swift round the months and years.

The sounds and seas, with all their finny drove,
Now to the moon, in wavering morrice, move,
And, on the tawny sands and shelves,

Trip the pert fairies and the dapper elves.

By dimpled brook and fountain-brim,

The wood-nymphs, decked with daisies trim,
Their merry wakes and pastimes keep:

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What hath night to do with sleep?
Night hath better sweets to prove;—

Venus now wakes, and wakens Love.
Come let us our rites begin!

'Tis only day-light that makes sin,

Which these dun shades will ne'er report.
Hail Goddess of nocturnal sport,

Dark-veiled Cotytto! to whom the secret flame
Of midnight torches burns; mysterious dame,-
That ne'er art called, but when the dragon-womb
Of Stygian darkness spets her thickest gloom,
And makes one blot of all the air,-

Stay thy cloudy ebon chair,

Wherein thou ridest with Hecatè, and befriend

Us thy vowed priests, till utmost end

Of all thy dues be done, and none left out;

Ere the babbling eastern scout,

The nice Morn, on the Indian steep

From her cabined loop-hole peep,

And to the tell-tale Sun descry

Our concealed solemnity.—

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Come, knit hands, and beat the ground
In a light fantastic round.

THE MEASURE.

Break off, break off! I feel the different pace
Of some chase footing near about this ground.
Run to your shrouds, within these brakes and trees;
Our number may affright: some virgin sure
(For so I can distinguish by mine art)

Benighted in these woods. Now to my charms
And to my wily trains; I shall ere long

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Be well stocked with as fair a herd as grazed
About my mother Circe. Thus I hurl
My dazzling spells into the spungy air,—
Of power to cheat the eye with blear illusion,
And give it false presentments, lest the place,
And my quaint habits, breed astonishment,
And put the damsel to suspicious flight;—

Which must not be, for that's against my course:
I, under fair pretence of friendly ends,

And well placed words of glozing courtesy,
Baited with reasons not unplausible,
Wind me into the easy-hearted man,

And hug him into snares. When once her eye
Hath met the virtue of this magic dust,

I shall appear some harmless villager

Whom thrift keeps up about his country gear.

But here she comes;

fairly step aside,

And hearken, if I may, her business here.

The LADY enters.

This way the noise was, if mine ear be true

My best guide now;-methought it was the sound
Of riot and ill-managed merriment,

Such as the jocund flute, or gamesome pipe,
Stirs up among the loose unlettered hinds,
When for their teeming flocks, and granges full,
In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan,
And thank the Gods amiss. I should be loth
To meet the rudeness, and swilled insolence

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Of such late wassailers; yet, oh! where else
Shall I inform my unacquainted feet
In the blind mazes of this tangled wood?
My brothers, when they saw me wearied out
With this long way, resolving here to lodge
Under the spreading favour of these pines,
Stept, as they said, to the next thicket-side
To bring me berries, or such cooling fruit
As the kind hospitable woods provide.
They left me then, when the gray-hooded Even,
Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed,

Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phoebus' wain.
But where they are, and why they came not back,
Is now the labour of my thought; 'tis likeliest
· They had engaged their wandering steps too far,
And envious darkness, ere they could return,
Had stole them from me; else, O thievish Night!
Why shouldst thou, but for some felonious end,
In thy dark lantern thus close up the stars,

That Nature hung in Heaven, and filled their lamps
With everlasting oil, to give due light

To the misled and lonely traveller?

This is the place, as well as I may guess,
Whence even now the tumult of loud Mirth
Was rife, and perfect in my listening ear,
Yet nought but single darkness do I find.
What might this be? A thousand fantasies
Begin to throng into my memory,

Of calling shapes, and beckoning shadows dire,
And airy tongues, that syllable men's names
On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses.
These thoughts may startle well, but not astound
The virtuous mind, that ever walks attended
By a strong-siding champion-Conscience.--
O welcome pure-eyed Faith! white-handed Hope!
Thou hovering angel girt with golden wings,
And thou, unblemished form of Chastity!

I see ye visibly, and now believe

That he, the Supreme Good, to whom all things ill
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance,

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Would send a glistering guardian, if need were,
To keep my life and honour unassailed.
Was I deceived, or did a sable cloud

Turn forth her silver lining on the night ?—

I did not err, there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night,
And casts a gleam over this tufted grove.
I cannot halloo to my brothers; but

Such noise as I can make to be heard furthest
I'll venture, for my new enlivened spirits
Prompt me; and they perhaps are not far off.

SONG.

Sweet Echo! sweetest nymph, that livest unseen
Within thy airy shell,

By slow Meander's margent green,

And in the violet-embroidered vale,

Where the love-lorn nightingale

Nightly to thee her sad song mourneth well;
Canst thou not tell me of a gentle pair

That likest thy Narcissus are?

Oh, if thou have

Hid them in some flowery cave

Tell me but where,

Sweet queen of parley, daughter of the sphere!

So mayst thou be translated to the skies,

And give resounding grace to all Heaven's harmonies.

Com. Can any mortal mixture of Earth's mould
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 Circè with the Sirens three,
Amidst the flowery-kirtled Naiades
Culling their potent herbs, and baleful drugs,

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