Of their alarm, and how their foes
Difcover'd were, this Canto fhows.
THO'rocks fo high about this island rise,
That well they may the num'rous Turk despise,
Yet is no human fate exempt from fear,
Which shakestheir hearts, while thro'the ifle they hear
A lafting noife, as horrid and as loud
As thunder makes before it breaks the cloud.
Three days they dread this murmur ere they know From what blind caufe th' unwonted found may grow; At length to monsters of unequal fize,
Hard by the fhore, a fisherman efpies;
Two mighty whales! which fwelling feas had toft,
And left them pris'ners on the rocky coaft:
One as a mountain vaft, and with her came
A cub, not much inferiour to his dam.
Here in a pool, among the rocks engag'd,
They roar'd, like lions caught in toils, and rag'd.
The man knew what they were, who heretofore
Had feen the like lie murder'd on the fhore;
By the wild fury of fome tempeft caft,
The fate of fhips, and fhipwreck'd men, to taste. 20
As carelefs dames, whom wine and fleep betray
To frantick dreams, their infants overlay ;
So there fometimes the raging ocean fails,
And her own brood expofes; when the whales
Against sharp rocks, like reeling veffels quash'd, 25
Tho' huge as mountains, are in pieces dafh'd:
Along the shore their dreadful limbs lie scatter'd,
Like hills with earthquakes fhaken,torn,and fhatter'd.
Hearts fure of brass they had who tempted fift
Rude feas, that spare not what themselves have nurst.
The welcome news thro' all the nation spread, 31
To fudden joy and hope converts their dread :
What lately was their publick terrour, they
Behold with glad eyes as a certain prey;
Difpofe already of th' untaken spoil,
And, as the purchase of their future toil,
These share the bones, and they divide the oil.
So was the huntfman by the bear oppreft,
Whofe hide he fold-before he caught the beast!
They man their boats, and all their young men arm
With whatsoever may the monsters harm;
Pikes, halberts, fpits, and darts that wound fo far,
The tools of peace, and inftruments of war.
Now was the time for vig'rous lads to show,
What love or honour could invite them to:
A goodly theatre! where rocks are round
With rev'rend age and lovely laffes crown'd.
Such was the lake which held this dreadful pair
Within the bounds of noble Warwick's fhare:
Warwick's bold Earl! than which no title bears 50
A greater found among our British
peers;
And worthy he the mem❜ry to renew,
The fate and honour to that title due,
Whose brave adventures have transferr'd his name, And thro' the new worldspread his growing fame. But how they fought, and what their valour gain'd, Shall in another Canto be contain'd.
The bloody fight, fuccefslefs toil,
And how the fishes fack'd the ifle.
THE boat which on the first affault did go,
Strook with a harping-ir'n the younger foe;
Who, when he felt his fide fo rudely gor'd,
Loud as the fea that nourish'd him he roar'd.
As a broad bream, to please some curious taste,
While yet alive, in boiling water caft,
Vex'd with unwonted heat he flings about
The scorching brass, and hurls the liquor out;
So with the barbed jav'lin stung, he raves,
And fcourges with his tail the suff'ring waves.
Like Spenfer's Talus with his iron flail,
He threatens ruin with his pond'rous tail ;
Diffolving at one stroke the batter'd boat,
And down the men fall drenched in the moat;
With ev'ry fierce encounter they are forc'd
To quit their boats, and fare like men unhors'd.
The bigger whale like fome huge carrack lay, Which wanteth fea-room with her foes to play: Slowly the fwims, and when, provok'd, she wou'd Advance her tail, her head falutes the mud:
The fhallow water doth her force infringe,
And renders vain her tail's impetuous swinge :
The fhining fteel her tender fides receive,
And there, like bees, they all their weapons leave.
This fees the cub, and does himfelf oppose
Betwixt his cumber'd mother and her foes:
With defp'rate courage he receives her wounds,
And men and boats his active tail confounds.
Their forces join'd, the feas with billows fill,
And make a tempeft tho' the winds be still.
Now would the men with half their hoped prey
Be well content, and with this cub away :
Their wish they have: he (to direct his dam
Unto the gap thro' which they thither came)
Before her (wims, and quits the hoftile lake,
A pris'ner there but for his mother's fake.
She by the rocks compell'd to stay behind,
Is by the vastnefs of her bulk confin'd.
They shout for joy! ad now on her alone
Their fury falls, and all their darts are thrown.
Their lances spent, one, bolder than the rest,
With his broad fword provok'd the sluggish beast ;
Her oily fide devours both blade and haft,
And there his fteel the bold Bermudan left.
Courage the reft from his example take,
And now they change the colour of the lake :
Blood flows in rivers from her wounded fide,
As if they would prevent the tardy tide,
And raife the flood to that propitious height,
As might convey her from this fatal streight.
She swims in blood, and blood does spouting throw
To heav'n, that Heav'n men's cruelties might know.
Their fixed jav'lins in her fide she wears,
And on her back a grove of pikes appears;
You would have thought, had you the monster feen55
Thus dreft, fhe had another island been.
Roaring the tears the air with such a noise,
As well resembled the conspiring voice
Of routed armies, when the field is won,
To reach the ears of her escaped fon.
He, tho' a league removed from the foe,
Haftes to her aid: the pious Trojan * so,
Neglecting for Creufa's life his own,
Repeats the danger of the burning town.
The men, amazed, blufh to fee the feed
Of monsters human piety exceed.
Well proves this kindness, what the Grecian fung,
That Love's bright mother from the Ocean fprung.
Their courage droops, and, hopeless now, they wish
For composition with th' unconquer'd fish.;
So fhe their weapons would reftore again,
Thro' rocks they'd hew her paffage to the main.
But how inftructed in each other's mind?
Or what commerce can men with monsters find?
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