Ver. 415. As you imagine, brother; she has a hid-The same corrupt reading accidentally occurs in a modern duodecimo edition of Milton's Poetical Works.

These variations present this charming passage, I Ver. 828. Whoe had the scepter from his father

El. B. By hoarie Nereus wrincled looke,
And the Carpathian wizards hooke,
2 Bro. By scalie Tritons windinge shell,
And ould sooth-saying Glaucus spell,
El. B. By Lewcotheas lovely hands,

And her sonne that rules the strands,
2 Bro. By Thetis tinsel-slipper'd feete,
And the songs of Sirens sweete,
El. B. By dead Farthenopes deare tombe,
And fayer Ligeas golden combe,

Wherewith she sitts on diamond rocks,
Sleekinge her soft allureinge locks,
Dem. By all the imphes of nightly daunce,
Vpon thy streames with wilie glaunce,
Rise, rise, and heave thy rosie head,
From thy corall paven bed,
And bridte in thy headlonge wave,
Till thou our summons answered have.
Listen, and save.

The invocations, assigned to the Brothers in the preceding lines, are recited by the Spirit alone in all other copies of the poem. It is probable, that at Ludlow Castle, this part of the poem was sung; the four first lines perhaps as a trio; the rest by each performer separately.

Ver. 893. Thick set with agate, and the azur'd sheene.

Shakespeare has the "azur'd vault," Tempest,

A. v. S. i. And Greene, the "azur'd skye." Never too late, 1616, P. ii. p. 46. But Milton's own word is azurn. See the Note on Com.

v. 893.

Ver. 897. Thus I rest my printles feete
Ore the couslips head.

Ver. 907. Of vnblest inchaunters vile,
Ver. 911. Thus I sprinkle on this brest.
STAGE-DIRECTION after v. 937. "Songe ends."
Ver. 938. El. Br. Come, Sister, while Heav'n
lends vs grace,

Let vs fly this cursed place, &c.
Dem. I shal be your faithfull guide

Through this gloomie covert wide, &c. Ver. 951. All the swaynes that neere abide, With jiggs and rural daunce resorte; Wee shall catch them at this sporte, &c.

El. B. Come, let vs hast, the starrs are high, But night sitts monarch yet in the mid skye, The Spirit again is the sole speaker of the nineteen preceding lines in the printed copy. STAGE-DIRECTION. "The Sceane changes, then is presented Ludlowe towne, and the President's Castle; then come in Countrie daunces and the like, &c. towards the end of these sports the demon with the 2 brothers and the ladye come in." Then

"The Spiritt singes."

Back, shepheards, back, &c.

Then "2 Songe presents them to their father and mother."

Noble Lord, and Lady bright, &e. STAGE-DIRECTION after v. 975. "They dance, the daunces al ended, the Dæmon singes or sayes,"

Now my taske is smoothly done,
I can flye, or I can run
Quickly to the earthe's greene end,
Where the bow'd welkin slow doeth bend,
And from thence can soare as soone
To the corners of the Moone.

Mortalls, that would follow me,
Love vertue; she alone is free:
She can teach you how to clyme
Higher than the sphearie chime!
Or if vertue feeble were,

Heven it selfe would stoope to her.

The Epilogue, in this manuscript, has not the thirty-six preceding lines, which are in the printed copies. Twenty of them, however, as we have seen, open the drama. Like the Cambridge manuscript, this manuscript does not exhibit what, in the printed copies, relates to Adonis, and to Cupid and Psyche. The four charming verses also, which follow v. 983 in the printed copy, are not in the manuscript. TODD.

SONNETS.
I.

TO THE NIGHTINGALE.
0
NIGHTINGALE, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still;
Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill,
While the jolly Hours lead on propitious May.
Thy liquid notes that close the eye of day,
First heard before the shallow cuckoo's bill,
Portend success in love; O, if Jove's will
Have link'd that amorous power to thy soft lay,
Now timely sing, ere the rude bird of hate

Foretel my hopeless doom in some grove nigh;
As thou from year to year hast sung too late
For my relief, yet hadst no reason why:

Whether the Muse, or Love, call thee his mate,
Both them I serve, and of their train am I.

II.

DONNA leggiadra, il cui bel nome honora
L'herbosa val di Rheno, e il nobil varco;
Bene è colui d'ogni valore scàrco
Qual tuo spirto gentil non innamora;
Che dolcemente mostra si di fuora

De sui atti soavi giamai parco,

Ei don', che son d'amor saette ed arco,
La onde l'alta tua virtu s'infiora,
Quando tu vaga parli, o lieta canti

Che mover possa duro alpestre legno,
Guardi ciascun a gli occhi, ed a gli orecch
L'entrata, chi di te si trouva indegno;
Gratia sola di su gli vaglia, inanti
Che'l disio amoroso al cuor s'invecchi,

III.

QUAL in colle aspro, al imbrunir di sera
L'avezza giovinetta pastorella
Va bagnando l'herbetta strana e bella
Che mal si spande a disusata spera

602

X.

TO THE LADY MARGARET LEY.

DAUGHTER to that good earl, once president
Of England's council and her treasury,
Who liv'd in both, unstain'd with gold or fee,
And left them both, more in himself content,
Till sad the breaking of that parliament
Broke him, as that dishonest victory
At Charonea, fatal to liberty,

Kill'd with report that old man eloquent.
Though later born than to have known the days,
father flourish'd, yet by you,
Wherein your

Madam, methinks, I see him living yet;

So well your words his noble virtues praise,
That all both judge you to relate them true,
And to possess them, honour'd Margaret.

XI.

ON THE DETRACTION WHICH FOLLOWED UPON
MY WRITING CERTAIN TREATISES.

A BOOK was writ of late called Tetrachordon,

And woven close, both matter, form, and style;
The subject new: it walk'd the town awhile,
Numbering good intellects; now seldom por'd

on..

Cries the stall-reader, Bless us! what a word on
A title page is this! and some in file

: Stand spelling false, while one might walk to
[Gordon,
Mile-

End Green. Why is it harder, sirs, than
Colkitto, or Macdonnel, or Galasp?
Those rugged names to our like mouths grow
[gasp.
sleek,
That would have made Quintilian stare and
Thy age, like ours, O soul of sir John Cheek,
Hated not learning worse than toad or asp,
When thou taught'st Cambridge, and king
Edward, Greek.

Ver. 1. Daughter to that good earl,] She was the daughter of sir James Ley, whose singular learning and abilities raised him through all the great posts of the law, till he came to be made earl of Malborough, and lord high treasurer, and lord president of the council to king James I. He died in an advanced age; and Milton attributes his death to the breaking of the parliament; and it is true that the parliament was dissolved the 10th of March 1628-9, and he died on the 14th of the same month. He left several sons and daughters; and the lady Margaret was married to captain Hobson of the Isle of Wight. It appears from the accounts of Milton's life, that in 1643 he used frequently to visit this lady and her husband; about which time we may suppose this sonnet to have been composed.

Ver. 1. A book was writ of late call'd Tetrachordon,] This elaborate discussion, unworthy in many respects of Milton, and in which much acuteness of argument, and comprehension of reading, were idly thrown away, was received with contempt, or rather ridicule, as we learn from Howel's Letters. A better proof that it was treated with neglect, is, that it was attacked by two nameless and obscure writers only; one

XII.

ON THE SAME.

I DID but prompt the age to quit their clogs
By the known rules of ancient liberty,
When straight a barbarous noise environs me
Of owls and cuckoos, asses, apes, and dogs:
As when those hinds that were transform'd to
frogs

Rail'd at Latona's twin-born progeny,
Which after held the Sun and Moon in fee.
But this is got by casting pearl to bogs;
That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood,
And still revolt when truth would set them
free.

Licence they mean when they cry Liberty;
For who loves that, must first be wise and good;
But from that mark how far they rove we see,
For all this waste of wealth, and loos of blood.

XIII.

TO MR. M. LAWES ON THE PUBLISHING HIS
AIRS.

HARRY, whose tuneful and well measur'd song
First taught our English music how to span
Words with just note and accent, not to scan
With Midas ears, committing short and long;
Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the
throng,

With praise enough for Envy to look wan;
To after age thou shalt be writ the man,
That with smooth air could'st humour best our
[wing
tongue.
Thou honour'st verse, and verse must lend her
To honour thee, the priest of Phoebus' quire,
That tun'st their happiest lines in hymn or