They make their entry through the western gate! Made to mock life, and onely life did want. And angry bus'ness, rushing on in haste. All strange to them, as they to all appear; Yet less like strangers gaz'd than those they see, Who this glad day the duke's spectators were, To mark how with his fame his looks agree. And guess that these are of his fighting train, Renown'd in youth, who by their wonder stay'd, And by their own but slowly passage gain, But now much more their progress is delay'd: For a black beauty did her pride display Thro' a large window, and in jewels shon, As if to please the world, weeping for day, Night had put all her starry jewels on. This beauty gaz'd on both, and Ulfinore Hung down his head, but yet did lift his eyes, As if he fain would see a little more: For much, tho' bashful, he did beauty prise. And even, for fear she would mistrust her snare, She thought she had sufficiently dispos'd. "Be by thy vertue bold! when that Sun shines, All art's false lights are with disgrace put out; The ruffian's cowardise) keep from thy breast! "Tis Indians' furious fear, when they are fed With valiant foes, whose hearts their teeth must tear Before they boldly dare believe them dead. And no broad sword, but a close ponyard, wears, Fam'd talkers, who in schools did wealth despise, Taught doctrine, which at home would empire lose, If not believ'd first by their enemies. "And though in ruling ministers of state, The people wretched poverty adore, (Which fools call innocence, and wise men hate As sloth) yet they rebell for being poore. "And to be rich, be diligent! move on Like Heav'n's great movers that inrich the Earth, The winde which blowes us from the happy shore, Whose moments sloth would show the world un done, And make the Spring straight bury all her birth. "Rich are the diligent! who can command Time, Nature's stock! and could his hour-glass Would, as for seeds of stars, stoop for the sand, "Be kinde to beauty! that unlucky shrine! And honour steal, which beauty makes divine: In his heart's closet lock'd, his faithful brest! And expectation lengthens much their way; E're to his western mines the Sun retir'd, They his great mint for all those mines behold, Verona, which in towres to Heav'n aspir'd, Gilt doubly, for the Sun now gilt their gold. And drives us from the living to the dead! "To bloody slaughters, and perhaps of those Who might beget such beauties as this maid, The sleepy here are never wak'd with foes, [breed Nor are of aught but ladies' frowns afraid." Ere he could more lament, a little page, Clean, and perfum'd, (one whom this dame did To guess at ills, too manly for his age) Steps swiftly to him, and arrests his steed. With civil whisper cries, "My lady, sir !" At this, Goltho alights as swiftly post As posters mount; by lingring loath to err, [lost. As wind-bound men, whose sloth their first wind And when his friend advis'd him to take care, He gravely, as a man new potent grown, Protests he shall in all his fortunes share, And to the house invites him as his own. And, with a rival's wisdom, Ulfinore [astray, Does hope, since this blinde love leads him Where a false saint he can so soon adore, That he to Birtha ne'r will finde the way. They enter, and ascend; and enter then Where Dalga with black eyes does sinners draw; And with her voice holds fast repenting men, To whose warm jett, light Goltho is but straw. Nicely as bridegroom's was her chamber drest, Her bed as bride's, and richer than a throne';, And sweeter seem'd than the circania's nest, Though built in eastern groves of cinamon. The price of princes' pleasures, who her love Findes her tyrannick pow'r must now expire, Tho' weepings are from looser eyes but leaks, To all my sex, I would to women kneel. [fell; Throughout your shape, who late in combate As you in that an inward vertue show, By which to me you all the world excel. "All was he, which the good as greatness see, A crime forbid to all since he is gone. Amongst the streams of men still flowing here, As to believe your heart is kinde and true." She casts on Ulfinore a sudden look; Stares like a mountebank, who bad forgot His viol, and the cursed poison took By dire mistake before his antidote. Prays Goltho that his friend may straight forbear As she must now expire, unless he go! Did never but in plainest dress behold) And in their beds their slaughter'd lovers lic. And though, the Sun now setting, be no lights Saw burning blew, nor steam of sulphur smelt, For not the craft of rivalship (though more Can make him leave his friend, till he restore Though to his fears this cause now serious shows, As old physitians in anatomie. That you are grave, and think you should be so; At midnight, strew'd with simple lovers' bones: For at the garden gate a summons, lond Enough to show authority and haste, heart Sends out in glances, thus to Goltho spake : As jealous as unable husbands are ; But Ulfinore (who doubts that it may tend Ready to break their strings, to get abroad But to a youth wholly design'd to live. He seem'd the heir to prosp'rous parents' toiles, He seem'd, like love and musick, made for sports. But wore bis clothing loose, and wildly cast, This Ulfinore observ'd, and would not yet, In civil pity, undeceive his friend; Great towns, like birds that from the country [come Let's be no travail'd fools, but roost at home." "I see" (reply'd his friend) " you nothing lack Of what is painful, curious, and discreet In travaillers, else would you not look back So often to observe this house and street: "Drawing your city mapp with coasters' care; Not onely marking where safe channels run, But where the shelves, and rocks, and dangers are, To teach weak strangers what they ought to shun. "But, Goltho, fly from lust's experiments! Whose heat we quench much sooner than as- To quench the furnace-lust, stop all the vents; POSTSCRIPT. TO THE READER. I AM here arrived at the middle of the third book, which makes an equal half of the poem; and I was now by degrees to present you (as I promised in the preface) the several keys of the main building, which should convey you through such short walks as give an easie view of the whole frame. But it is high time to strike sail, and cast anchor, (though I have run but halfe my course) when at the helme I am threatned with Death; who, though he can visit us but once, seems troublesome; and even in the innocent may beget such a gravity, as diverts the musick of verse. And I beseech thee (if thou art so civill as to be pleased with what is written) not to take ill, that I run not on till my last gasp. For though I intended in this poem to strip Nature naked, and clothe her again in the perfect shape of Vertue; yet even in so worthy a designe I shall ask leave to desist, when I am interrupted by so great an experiment as dying: and it is an experiment to the most experienced; for no man (though his mortifications may be much greater than mine) can say, he has already dyed. It may be objected by some, (who look not on verse with the eyes of the ancients, nor with the reverence which it still preserves amongst other nations) that I beget a poem in an unseasonable time. But be not thou, reader, (for thine own sake, as well as mine) a common spectator, that can never look on great changes but with tears in his eyes: for if all men would observe, that conquest is the wheels of the world, on which it has ever run, the victorious would not think they have done so new and such admirable actions as must draw men from the noble and beautifull arts, to gaze wholly upon them; neither would the conquered continue their wonder till it involve them in sorrow, which is then the minde's incurable disease, when the patient grows so sullen, as not to listen to remedy: and poesie was that harp of David, which removed from Saul the melancholy spirit, that put him in a continual remembrance of the revolution of empire. I shall not think I instruct military men, by saying, that with poesie, in heroick songs, the wiser ancients prepared their batails; nor would I offend the austerity of such as vex themselves with the manage of civill affairs, by putting them in minde, that whilst the plays of children are punished, the plays of men are but excused under the title of business. But I will gravely tell thee, (reader) he who writes an heroick poem, leaves an estate entayled, and he gives a greater gift to posterity than to the present age; for a publick benefit is best measured in the number of receivers; and our contemporaries are but few, when reckoned with those who shall succeed. Nor could I sit idle, and sigh with such as mourn to hear the drum; for if this age be not quiet enough to be taught vertue a pleasant way, the next may be at leisure: nor could I (like men that have civilly slept till they are old in dark cities) think war a novelty for we have all heard, that Alexander walked after the drum from Macedon into India; and I tell thee (reader) he carryed Homer in his pocket; and that after Augustus, by many batails, had changed the government of the world, he and Mecænas often feasted very peaceably with Horace: and that the last wise cardinall (whilst he was sending armies abroad, and preparing against civil invasion) took Virgill and Tasso aside under the Louvre gallery, and at a great expence of time and treasure sent them forth in new oruaments. And, perhaps, if my poem were not so severe a representation of vertue, (undressing Truth even out of those disguises which have been most in fashion throughout the world) it might arrive at fair entertainment, though it make now for a harbour in a storm. If thou art a malicious reader, thou wilt remember my preface boldly confessed, that a main motive to this undertaking was a desire of fame; and thou maist likewise say, I may very possibly not live to enjoy it. Truly, I have some years ago considered that fame, like time, only gets a reverence by long running; and that, like a river, it is narrowest where it is bred, and broadest afarr off: but this concludes it not unprofitable, for he whose writings divert men from indiscretion and vice, becomes famous, as he is an example to others' endeavours: and exemplary writers are wiser than to depend on the gratuities of this world; since the kind looks and praises of the present age, for reclaiming a few, are not mentionable with those solid rewards in Heaven for a long and continual conversion of posterity. If thou (reader) art one of those, who has been warmed with poetick fire, I reverence thee as my judge; and whilst others tax me with vanity, as if the preface argued my good opinion of the work, I appeal to thy conscience, whether it be more than such a necessary assurance as thou hast made to thy self in like undertakings? For when I ob serve that writers have many enemies, such inward assurance (methinks) resembles that forward confidence in men of armes, which makes them to proceed in great enterprise; since the right examination of abilities begins with inquiring whether we doubt our selves. Cowes-castle, in the Isle of Wight, October 22, 1650. WILL. DAVENANT. TO THE QUEEN, ENTERTAINED AT NIGHT BY THE COUNTESS OF FAIRE ANGLESEY. as unshaded light, or as the day In its first birth, when all the year was May; IN REMEMBRANCE OF ODE. BEWARE (delighted poets !) when you sing, Hangs there the pensive head. Each tree, whose thick and spreading growth hath made Rather a night beneath the boughs than shade, (Unwilling now to grow) Looks like the plume a captain weares, The pitious river wept it self away If you a river there can spie: FOR THE LADY OLIVIA PORTER; GOR! hunt the whiter ermine! and present [found Give it Endimion's love, whose glorious eyes ELEGIE, ON FRANCIS EARLE OF RUTLAND. CALL not the winds! nor bid the rivers stay! [were, Whom like brave ancestors in battaile lost, If these live, and be read, (as who shall dare The lark now leaves his watry nest, And, climbing, shakes his dewy wings; He takes this window for the east; And to implore your light, he sings: "Awake, awake! the Morn will never rise, Till she can dress her beauty at your eies. "The merchant bowes unto the seaman's star, The ploughman from the Sun his season takes; But still the lover wonders what they are, Who look for day before his mistriss wakes. Awake, awake! break thro' your vailes of lawne! Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawne." SONG. THE SOULDIER GOING TO THE FIELD. PRESERVE thy sighs, unthrifty girle! Thy teares to thrid, instead of pearle, The trumpet makes the eccho hoarse, And wakes the louder drum ; Expence of grief gains no remorse, When sorrow should be dumb. For I must go where lazy Peace Will hide her drouzy head; And, for the sport of kings, encrease But first I'le chide thy cruel theft: Can have no heart to fight? THE LONG VÁCATION IN LONDON, IN VERSE BURLESQUE, or moCK-VERSE. Now town-wit sayes to witty friend, To cry thee up to countrey-wit. Our mules are come! dissolve the club! Now gamster poor, in cloak of stammel, Host spies him come, cryes, "Sir, what meat?" Fetch Job, my son, and our dog Ruffe! We'l cry, 'Hay, duck! there, Ruffe! hay, duck!'" She softly says to roaring Swash, Who wears long whiskers, "Go, fetch cash! Ff |