And sounding lyre

2 speed

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 before. -Let old Timotheus yield the prize

Or both divide the crown;

He raised a mortal to the skies;

She drew an angel down!

J. DRYDEN.

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD
TO HIS LOVE

COME live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and vallies, dales and fields,
And woods or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull,
Fair-lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold.

A belt of straw and ivy-buds

With coral clasps and amber studs,
An' if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.

Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepar'd each day for thee and me.

The shepherd-swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

MARLOWE.

THE FLOWERS O' THE FOREST

I've heard them lilting, at the ewe-milking,
Lasses a' lilting, before dawn o' day;

But now they are moaning, on ilka green loaning;
The Flowers o' the Forest are a' wede awae.

At bughts, in the morning, nae blythe lads are scorning;
Lasses are lonely, and dowie, and wae;

Nae daffing, nae gabbing, but sighing and sabbing;
Ilk ane lifts her leglin, and hies her awae.

In har'st, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering,
Bandsters are lyart, and runkled, and gray;

At fair, or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching;
The Flowers o' the Forest are a' wede awae.

At e'en, in the gloaming, nae younkers are roaming
'Bout stacks, wi' the lasses at bogles to play;
But ilk maid sits dreary, lamenting her dearie-
The Flowers o' the Forest are weded awae.

Dool and wae for the order, sent our lads to the Border! The English, for ance, by guile wan the day;

The Flowers o' the Forest, that fought aye the foremost, The prime of our land, are cauld in the clay.

We'll hear nae mair lilting, at the ewe-milking;
Women and bairns are heartless and wae:
Sighing and moaning, on ilka green loaning-
The Flowers o' the Forest are a' wede awae.

ELLIOTT.

ULALUME

I

THE skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crispèd and sere,-
The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,

In the misty mid region of Weir,—
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.

II

Here once, through an alley Titanic

Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul,—
Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
As the scoriac rivers that roll,-
As the lavas that restlessly roll

Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek

In the ultimate climes of the pole,That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek In the realms of the boreal pole.

III

Our talk had been serious and sober,

But our thoughts they were palsied and sere,-

Our memories were treacherous and sere;

For we knew not the month was October,
And we marked not the night of the year
(Ah, night of all nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber--

(Though once we had journeyed down here), Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,

Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.