CHARLES COTTON.

(1630-1687.)

ODE: LAURA SLEEPING.

From his Poems on Several Occasions, 1689, reprinted in Chalmers' Poets, vol. vi.

WINDS, whisper gently whilst she sleeps,

And fan her with your cooling wings;
Whilst she her drops of beauty weeps,
From pure, and yet-unrivalled springs.

Glide over beauty's field, her face,
To kiss her lip and cheek be bold.
But with a calm and stealing pace,

Neither too rude, nor yet too cold.

Play in her beams, and crisp her hair,
With such a gale as wings soft love,
And with so sweet, so rich an air,
As breathes from the Arabian grove.

A breath as hushed as lover's sigh,
Or that unfolds the morning's door;
Sweet as the winds that gently fly,
To sweep the Spring's enamelled floor.

Murmur soft music to her dreams,
That pure and unpolluted run,
Like to the new-born crystal streams,
Under the bright enamoured sun

But when she waking shall display
Her light, retire within your bar:
Her breath is life, her eyes are day,

And all mankind her creatures are.

WILLIAM STRODE.

(1600?-1644.)

SONG: IN COMMENDATION OF MUSIC.

From a seventeenth-century miscellany entitled Wit Restored, 1658.

JHEN whispering strains do softly steal

WHEN

With creeping passion through the heart,

And when at every touch we feel

Our pulses beat, and bear a part;
When threads can make
A heart-string quake;—
Philosophy

Can scarce deny

The soul consists of harmony.

Oh, lull me, lull me, charming air,

My senses rocked with wonder sweet!
Like snow on wool thy fallings are,
Soft like a spirit are thy feet.

Grief who need fear

That hath an ear?

Down let him lie,

And slumbering die,

And change his soul for harmony.

SAMUEL SHEPPARD. (?)

(Fl. 1650.)

EPITHALAMIUM.

From The Loves of Amandus and Sophronia, 1650.

HEAVENLY fair Urania's son,

Thou that dwell'st on Helicon, Hymen, O thy brows impale, To the bride the bridegroom hale Take thy saffron robe and come With sweet-flowered marjoram; Yellow socks of woollen wear, With a smiling look appear; Shrill Epithalamiums sing, Let this day with pleasure spring; Nimbly dance; the flaming tree Take in that fair hand of thine. Let good auguries combine For the pair that now are wed; Let their joys be nourishèd Like a myrtle, ever green, Owned by the Cyprian queen, Who fosters it with rosy dew, Where her nymphs their sport pursue.

Leave th' Aonian cave behind

(Come, O come with willing mind!) And the Thespian rocks, whence drill Aganippe waters still.

Chastest virgins, you that are

Either for to make or mar,

Make the air with Hymen ring,

Hymen, Hymenæus sing!

GEORGE DIGBY, EARL OF BRISTOL. (?)

(1612-1676.)

SONG.

From the comedy of Elvira, 1667; in Hazlitt's Dodsley, vol. xv.

SEE, O see!

How every tree,

Every bower,

Every flower,

A new life gives to others' joys,
Whilst that I

Grief-stricken lie,

Nor can meet

With any sweet

But what faster mine destroys.
What are all the senses' pleasures,
When the mind has lost all measures?

Hear, O hear!

How sweet and clear

The nightingale

And waters' fall

In concert join for others' ears,

Whilst to me,

For harmony,
Every air

Echoes despair,

And every drop provokes a tear.

What are all the senses' pleasures,

When the mind has lost all measures?

(M 349)

EDMUND WALLER.

(1605-1687.)

Three editions of Waller's Poems, in which the first three selections given below were published, appeared in 1645. The contents do not vary. The last extract was written by Waller when he was over eighty years of age. Waller's Poems are reprinted in Chalmers' Poets, vol. viii., also in the Muses' Library, 1892, edited by Mr. G. Thorn Drury.

ON A GIRDLE.

THAT which her slender waist confined,
Shall now my joyful temples bind;

No monarch but would give his crown
His arms might do what this has done.
It was my heaven's extremest sphere,
The pale which held that lovely deer;
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love,
Did all within this circle move.

A narrow compass, and yet there
Dwelt all that's good and all that's fair;
Give me but what this ribband bound,
Take all the rest the sun goes round.

SONG.

Go, lovely Rose,

Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows

When I resemble her to thee

How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that's young,

And shuns to have her graces spied,
That had'st thou sprung

In deserts where no men abide,

Thou must have uncommended died.