Enter COMUS. Comus. Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment? Sure something holy lodges in that breast, And with these raptures moves the vocal air To testify his hidden residence. How sweetly did they float upon the wings Of silence, through the empty-vaulted night, At every fall smoothing the raven-down Of darkness, till it smild! I have oft heard My mother Circe with the Syrens three, Amidst the flowery-kirtled Naiades, Culling their potent herbs and baleful drugs; Who, as they sung, would take the prison’d soul, And lap it in Elysium : Scylla wept, And chid her barking waves into attention, And fell Charybdis murmur'd soft applause: Yet they in pleasing slumber lull'd the sense, And in sweet madness robb’d it of itself ; But such a sacred and home-felt delight, Such sober certainty of waking bliss, I never heard till now. I'll speak to her, And she shall be my queen, Hail, foreign wonder ! Whom certain these rough shades did never breed, Unless the Goddess that in rural shrine Dwell'st here with Pan, or Sylvan ; by blest song Forbidding every bleak unkindly, fog · praise, you thus ? .. ing guides ? spring. Lady? return. them, Lady. How easy my misfortune is to hit! Comus. Imports their loss, beside the present need? Lady. No less than if I should my Brothers lose. Comus. Were they of manly prime, or youthful bloom? Lady. As smooth as Hebe's their unrazor'd lips. Comus. Two such I saw, what time the la bour'd ox In his loose traces from the furrow came, And the swink'd dedger at his supper sat; I saw them under a green mantling vine, That crawls along the side of yon small hill, Plucking ripe clusters from the tender shoots; Their port was more than human, as they stood : I took it for a faery vision Of some gay creatures of the element, That in the colours of the rainbow live, And play i' the plighted clouds. I was aw-struck, And, as I past, I worshipt; if those you seek, It were a journey like the path of Heaven, To help you find them. · Lady. Gentle Villager, What readiest way would bring me to the place ? Comus. Due west it rises from this shrubby point. Lady. To find out that, good Shepherd, I suppose In such a scant allowance of star-light, Would overtask the best land pilot's art, Without the sure guess of well-practis'd feet. Comus. I know each lane, and every alley green, Dingle, or bushy dell of this wild wood, VOL. IV. The express resemblance of the Gods, is chang'd Into some brutish form of wolf, or bear, Or ounce, or tiger, hog, or bearded goat, All other parts remaining as they were ; And they, so perfect is their misery, Not once perceive their foul disfigurement, But boast themselves more comely than before; And all their friends and native home forget, To roll with pleasure in a sensual stye. Therefore when any, favour'd of high Jove, Chances to pass through this adventurous glade, Swift as the sparkle of a glancing star I shoot from heaven, to give him safe convoy, As now I do: But first I must put off These my sky-robes spun out of Iris' woof, And take the weeds and likeness of a swain That to the service of this house belongs, Who with his soft pipe, and smooth-dittied song, Well knows to still the wild winds when they roar, And hush the waving woods; nor of less faith, And in this office of his mountain watch Likeliest, and nearest to the present aid Of this occasion. But I hear the tread Of hateful steps; I must be viewless now, Comus enters with a charming-rod in one hand his glass in the other; with him a rout of monsters, headed like sundry sorts of wild beasts, but otherwise like men and women, their apparel glistering ; they come in making a riotous and, unruly noise, with torches in their hands. .. Comus. |