where he did reside, by my choice, some time for the King, after mine own recess from Venice. "I should think that your best line will be through the whole length of France to Marseilles, and thence by sea to Genoa; whence the passage into Tuscany is as diurnal as a Gravesend barge. I hasten, as you do, to Florence or Siena, the rather to tell you a short story, from the interest you have given me in your safety. "At Siena I was tabled in the house of one Alberto Scipioni, an old Roman courtier in dangerous times; having been steward to the Duca di Pagliano, who with all his family were strangled, save this only man that escaped by foresight of the tempest. With him I had often much chat of those affairs, into which he took pleasure to look back from his native harbour; and, at my departure toward Rome (which had been the centre of his experience), I had won his confidence enough to beg his advice how I might carry myself there without offence of others or of mine own conscience. Signor Arrigo mio,' says he, ‘I pensieri stretti ed il viso sciolto will go safely over the whole world.' Of which Delphian oracle (for so I have found it) your judgment doth need no commentary; and therefore, Sir, I will commit you, with it, to the best of all securities, God's dear love, remaining "Your friend, as much to command as " HENRY WOTTON." Postscript. "Sir: I have expressly sent this my footboy to prevent your departure without some acknowledgment from me of the receipt of your obliging letter; having myself through 30me business, I know not how, neglected the ordinary conveyance. In any part where I shall understand you fixed, I shall be glad and diligent to entertain you with home novelties, even for some fomentation of our friendship, too soon interrupted in the cradle." THE PERSONS. The ATTENDANT SPIRIT, afterwards in the habit of THYRSIS. COMUS, with his Crew. THE LADY. FIRST BROTHER. SECOND BRother. SABRINA, the Nymph. The Chief Persons which presented were : The Lord Brackley; Mr. Thomas Egerton, his Brother; The Lady Alice Egerton. [This list of the Persons, etc., appeared in the Edition of 1645, but was omitted in that of 1673.1 COMUS. The first Scene discovers a wild wood. The ATTENDANT SPIRIT descends or enters. BEFORE the starry threshold of Jove's court Which men call Earth, and, with low-thoughted care, To such my errand is; and, but for such, By course commits to several government, And gives them leave to wear their sapphire crowns And wield their little tridents. But this Isle, The greatest and the best of all the main, He quarters to his blue-haired deities; IO 20 And all this tract that fronts the falling sun 30 40 Lies through the perplexed paths of this drear wood, 50 Whom therefore she brought up, and Comus named: At last betakes him to this ominous wood, And, in thick shelter of black shades imbowered, Offering to every weary traveller 60 To quench the drouth of Phoebus; which as they taste Not once perceive their foul disfigurement, But boast themselves more comely than before, I shoot from heaven, to give him safe convoy, Of hateful steps; I must be viewless now. 70 80 90 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. The star that bids the shepherd fold Now the top of heaven doth hold; And the gilded car of day His glowing axle doth allay |