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The Nymph Complaining

I need not search too much to find
Whose lot it was to send it,

That feel upon me yet the kind,
Soft hand of her who penned it;

And see, through two-score years of smoke,
In by-gone, quaint apparel,
Shine from yon time-black Norway oak
The face of Patience Caryl,—

The pale, smooth forehead, silver-tressed;
The gray gown, primly flowered;
The spotless, stately coif whose crest
Like Hector's horse-plume towered;

And still the sweet half-solemn look
Where some past thought was clinging,
As when one shuts a serious book
To hear the thrushes singing.

I kneel to you! Of those you were,
Whose kind old hearts grow mellow,-
Whose fair old faces grow more fair,
As Point and Flanders yellow;

Whom some old store of garnered grief,
Their placid temples shading,
Crowns like a wreath of autumn leaf
With tender tints of fading.

Peace to your soul! You died unwed--
Despite this loving letter.

And what of John? The less that's said

Of John, I think, the better.

Austin Dobson [1840

1817

THE NYMPH COMPLAINING FOR THE DEATH OF HER FAWN

THE wanton troopers riding by

Have shot my fawn, and it will die.

Ungentle men! They cannot thrive

Who killed thee. Thou ne'er didst, alive,

Them any harm; alas! nor could
Thy death to them do any good.
I'm sure I never wished them ill,
Nor do I for all this; nor will:
But, if my simple prayers may yet
Prevail with Heaven to forget
Thy murder, I will join my tears
Rather than fail.

It cannot die so.

But O my fears!

Heaven's King

Keeps register of everything,

And nothing may we use in vain;
Even beasts must be with justice slain;
Else men are made their deodands.

Though they should wash their guilty hands
In this warm life-blood, which doth part
From thine, and wound me to the heart,
Yet could they not be clean; their stain
Is dyed in such a purple grain,

There is not such another in
The world to offer for their sin.

Inconstant Sylvio, when yet
I had not found him counterfeit,
One morning, I remember well,
Tied in this silver chain and bell,
Gave it to me: nay, and I know
What he said then-I'm sure I do.

Said he, "Look how your huntsman here
Hath taught a fawn to hunt his deer!"

But Sylvio soon had me beguiled:
This waxed tame, while he grew wild,
And, quite regardless of my smart,
Left me his fawn, but took his heart.

Thenceforth I set myself to play
My solitary time away

With this; and very well content
Could so mine idle life have spent;
For it was full of sport, and light
O foot and heart, and did invit

The Nymph Complaining

Me to its game: it seemed to bless
Itself in me. How could I less
Than love it? Oh, I cannot be
Unkind to a beast that loveth me!

Had it lived long, I do not know
Whether it, too, might have done so
As Sylvio did; his gifts might be
Perhaps as false, or more, than he.
But I am sure, for aught that I
Could in so short a time espy,
Thy love was far more better than
The love of false and cruel man.

With sweetest milk and sugar first
I it at mine own fingers nursed;
And as it grew, so every day,

It waxed more white and sweet than they.

It had so sweet a breath! and oft

I blushed to see its foot more soft,

And white, shall I say? than my hand-
Nay, any lady's of the land!

It was a wondrous thing how fleet
'Twas on those little silver feet.
With what a pretty skipping grace
It oft would challenge me the race;
And when't had left me far away,
"Twould stay, and run again, and stay;
For it was nimbler much than hinds,
And trod as if on the four winds.

I have a garden of my own,

But so with roses overgrown,
And lilies, that you would it guess

To be a little wilderness;

And all the spring-time of the year
It loved only to be there.

Among the beds of lilies I

Have sought it oft, where it should lie,

1819

Yet could not, till itself would rise,
Find it, although before-mine eyes;
For in the flaxen lilies' shade,
It like a bank of lilies laid.
Upon the roses it would feed,

Until its lips e'en seemed to bleed;
And then to me 'twould boldly trip,
And print those roses on my lip.
But all its chief delight was still
On roses thus itself to fill;
And its pure virgin lips to fold
In whitest sheets of lilies cold.

Had it lived long, it would have been
Lilies without, roses within.

O help! O help! I see it faint
And die as calmly as a saint!
See how it weeps! the tears do come
Sad, slowly, dropping like a gum.
So weeps the wounded balsam; so
The holy frankincense doth flow;
The brotherless Heliades

Melt in such amber tears as these.

I in a golden vial will

Keep these two crystal tears, and fill
It, till it doth overflow, with mine,
Then place it in Diana's shrine.

Now my sweet fawn is vanished to
Whither the swans and turtles go;

In fair Elysium to endure

With milk-white lambs and ermines pure.

O, do not run too fast, for I

Will but bespeak thy grave, and die.

First my unhappy statue shall

Be cut in marble; and withal

Let it be weeping too; but there

The engraver sure his art may spare;

On the Death of a Favorite Cat 1821

For I so truly thee bemoan

That I shall weep though I be stone,
Until my tears, still dropping, wear
My breast, themselves engraving there;
Then at my feet shalt thou be laid,
Of purest alabaster made;

For I would have thine image be

White as I can, though not as thee.

Andrew Marvell [1621-1678]

ON THE DEATH OF A FAVORITE CAT, DROWNED
IN A TUB OF GOLD FISHES

'TWAS on a lofty vase's side,
Where China's gayest art had dyed
The azure flowers that blow;
Demurest of the tabby kind,
The pensive Selima, reclined,
Gazed on the lake below.

Her conscious tail her joy declared;
The fair round face, the snowy beard,
The velvet of her paws,

Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,
She saw; and purred applause.

Still had she gazed, but 'midst the tide
Two angel forms were seen to glide,

The Genii of the stream:
Their scaly armor's Tyrian hue

Through richest purple to the view
Betrayed a golden gleam.

The hapless Nymph with wonder saw:
A whisker first and then a claw,

With many an ardent wish,

She stretched, in vain, to reach the prize.
What female heart can gold despise?

What Cat's averse to fish?

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