THYRSIS'S PRAISE TO HIS MISTRESS.

[From England's Helicon.]

On a hill that grac'd the plain
Thyrsis sate, a comely swain,

Comelier swain ne'er graced a hill;
Whilst his flock, that wander'd nigh,
Cropt the green grass busily,

Thus he tuned his oaten quill:

Ver hath made the pleasant field
Many several odours yield,
Odours aromatical:
From fair Astra's cherry lip
Sweeter smells for ever skip,

They in pleasing passen all.

Leafy groves now mainly ring
With each sweet bird's sonnetting,

Notes that make the echoes long:
But when Astra tunes her voice,
All the mirthful birds rejoice,

And are list'ning to her song,

Fairly spreads the damask rose,
Whose rare mixture doth disclose

Beauties, pencils cannot feign:
Yet, if Astra pass the bush,
Roses have been seen to blush;
She doth all their beauties stain.

Fields are blest with flow'ry wreath,
Air is blest when she doth breathe,
Birds make happy every grove,
She each bird when she doth sing;
Phoebus heat to earth doth bring,
She makes marble fall in love.

THE SYREN'S SONG.

[In the Inner Temple Mask.]

STEER, hither steer, your winged pines, All beaten mariners!

Here lie love's undiscover'd mines,

A prey to passengers.

Perfumes far sweeter than the best

Which make the phoenix' urn and nest,

Fear not your ships,

Nor any to oppose you, save our lips;

But come on shore,

Where no joy dies 'till love hath gotten more.
For swelling waves, our panting breasts,
Where never storms arise,
Exchange; and be a while our guests;

For stars, gaze on our eyes;

The compass love shall hourly sing,
And, as he goes about the ring,

We will not miss

To tell each point he nameth with a kiss. Then come on shore,

Where no joy dies 'till love hath gotten more.

HENRY KING,

Bishop of Chichester, was born in 1591. He turned the Psalms into verse in 1651, and published in 1657 a small volume of Poems, Elegies, Paradoxes, and Sonnets. His Elegies are written on the deaths of Prince Henry, Sir Walter Raleigh, Gustavus Adolphus, Dr. Donne, and Ben Jonson, whom he laments as his dead friends, and some others; particularly his father, Dr. John King, bishop of London.

His poems are terse and elegant, but, like those of most of his contemporaries, deficient in simplicity. He died in

1669.

A DIRGE.

WHAT is th' existence of man's life?

But open war, or slumber'd strife?
Where sickness to his sense presents
The combat of the elements:

And never feels a perfect peace
Till death's cold hand signs his release.

It is a storm, where the hot blood
Outvies in rage the boiling flood:
And each loose passion of the mind
Is like a furious gust of wind,

Which beats his bark with many a wave
Till he casts anchor in the grave.

It is a flow'r, which buds, and grows,
And withers as the leaves disclose;
Whose spring and fall, faint seasons keep,
Like fits of waking before sleep:
Then shrinks into that fatal mold,
Where its first being was enroll'd.

It is a dream, whose seeming truth
Is moralized in age and youth:
Where all the comforts he can share
As wand'ring as his fancies are;
Till in a mist of dark decay
The dreamer vanish quite away.

It is a dial, which points out
The sun-set, as it moves about;
And shadows out, in lines of night,
The subtle stages of time's flight,
Till all-obscuring earth hath laid
The body in perpetual shade.

It is a weary interlude,

Which doth short joys, long woes include;