AN ODE ADDRESSED TO MR. JOHN ROUSE

LIBRARIAN OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

ON A LOST VOLUME OF MY POEMS, WHICH HE DESIRED ME TO REPLACE,
THAT HE MIGHT ADD THEM TO MY OTHER WORKS DEPOSITED
IN THE LIBRARY

This Ode is rendered without rhyme, that it might more adequately represent the original, which, as Milton himself informs us, is of no certain measure. It may possibly for this reason disappoint the reader, though it cost the writer more labour than the translation of any other piece in the whole collection.-C.

STROPHE

My twofold book! single in show,

But double in contents,
Neat, but not curiously adorned,
Which, in his early youth,

A poet gave, no lofty one in truth,
Although an earnest wooer of the muse―
Say while in cool Ausonian shades
Or British wilds he roamed,
Striking by turns his native lyre,
By turns the Daunian lute,
And stepped almost in air;

ANTISTROPHE

Say, little book, what furtive hand
Thee from thy fellow-books conveyed,
What time, at the repeated suit

Of my most learned friend,

I sent thee forth, an honoured traveller,
From our great city to the source of Thames,
Cærulean sire;

Where rise the fountains, and the raptures ring
Of the Aonian choir,

Durable as yonder spheres,

And through the endless lapse of years
Secure to be admired?

STROPHE II

Now what god, or demigod,
For Britain's ancient genius moved

(If our afflicted land

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Have expiated at length the guilty sloth
Of her degenerate sons)

Shall terminate our impious feuds,
And discipline, with hallowed voice, recall?
Recall the Muses too,

Driven from their ancient seats

In Albion, and well-nigh from Albion's shore,
And with keen Phœbean shafts

Piercing the unseemly birds,
Whose talons menace us,

Shall drive the harpy race from Helicon afar?

ANTISTROPHE

But thou, my book, though thou hast strayed,
Whether by treachery lost,

Or indolent neglect, thy bearer's fault,
From all thy kindred books,

To some dark cell, or cave forlorn,
Where thou endurest, perhaps,

The chafing of some hard untutored hand,
Be comforted-

For lo! again the splendid hope appears
That thou mayest yet escape

The gulfs of Lethe, and on oary wings
Mount to the everlasting courts of Jove!

STROPHE III

Since Rouse desires thee, and complains
That though by promise his,

Thou yet appearest not in thy place
Among the literary noble stores

Given to his care,

But, absent, leavest his numbers incomplete
He, therefore, guardian vigilant

Of that unperishing wealth,

Calls thee to the interior shrine, his charge,

Where he intends a richer treasure far

Than Ion kept (Ion, Erechtheus' son
Illustrious, of the fair Creüsa born)
In the resplendent temple of his god,
Tripods of gold, and Delphic gifts divine.

ANTISTROPHE

Haste, then to the pleasant groves,
The Muses' favourite haunt;

Resume thy station in Apollo's dome,

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Dearer to him

Than Delos, or the forked Parnassian hill!
Exulting go,

Since now a splendid lot is also thine,

And thou art sought by my propitious friend;
For there thou shalt be read

With authors of exalted note,

The ancient glorious lights of Greece and Rome.

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EPODE

Ye then, my works, no longer vain
And worthless deemed by me!
Whate'er this sterile genius has produced
Expect, at last, the rage of Envy spent,
An unmolested happy home,

Gift of kind Hermes, and my watchful friend;
Where never flippant tongue profane
Shall entrance find,

And whence the coarse unlettered multitude
Shall babble far remote.

Perhaps some future distant age,
Less tinged with prejudice, and better taught,
Shall furnish minds of power

To judge more equally.

Then, Malice silenced in the tomb,
Cooler heads and sounder hearts,
Thanks to Rouse, if aught of praise

I merit, shall with candour weigh the claim.

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90

THE PHILOSOPHER AND THE KING

A Philosopher, included in the same sentence of condemnation with several guilty persons among whom he had been apprehended, sent the following lines, composed suddenly in the moment when he was going to death, to a certain King who had ignorantly condemned him.

KNOW this, O King, that if thou shalt destroy

Me, no man's enemy, and who have lived
Obedient to the laws, thou mayst with ease
Strike off a wise man's head, but, taught the truth
Hereafter, shalt with vain regret deplore

Thy city's loss of one her chief support.

ON THE ENGRAVER OF HIS PORTRAIT

Look on myself, and thou shalt own at once
This copy of me taken by a dunce;

My friends, who gaze and guess not whom ye see,
Laugh! Would ye think it?

He intended me !

TRANSLATIONS OF THE ITALIAN POEMS

SONNET

FAIR Lady; whose harmonious name the Rhine, Through all his grassy vale, delights to hear, Base were indeed the wretch who could forbear To love a spirit elegant as thine,

That manifests a sweetness all divine,

Nor knows a thousand winning acts to spare, And which Love's bow and arrows are, graces, Tempering thy virtues to a softer shine. When gracefully thou speakest, or singest gay, Such strains as might the senseless forest move, Ah then-turn each his eyes and ears away, Who feels himself unworthy of thy love! Grace can alone preserve him, ere the dart Of fond desire yet reach his inmost heart.

SONNET

As on a hill-top rude, when closing day
Imbrowns the scene, some pastoral maiden fair
Waters a lovely foreign plant with care,
Borne from its native genial airs away,
That scarcely can its tender bud display;
So on my tongue these accents, new and rare,
Are flowers exotic, which, Love waters there,
While thus, O sweetly scornful! I essay

Thy praise in verse to British ears unknown,

And Thames exchange for Arno's fair domain ;
So Love has willed, and oft-times Love has shown
That what he wills he never wills in vain.

Oh that this hard and sterile breast might be
To Him, who plants from heaven, a soil as free!

CANZONE

THEY mock my toil-the nymphs and amorous swains— And "whence this fond attempt to write," they cry, "Love-songs in language that thou little knowest? "How darest thou risk to sing these foreign strains? "Say truly,-findest not oft thy purpose crossed, "And that thy fairest flowers here fade and die?” Then, with pretence of admiration high"Thee other shores expect, and other tides; "Rivers, on whose grassy sides

"Her deathless laurel leaf, with which to bind

"Thy flowing locks, already Fame provides;

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Why then this burthen, better far declined?"

Speak, Muse! for me.-The fair one said, who guides

My willing heart, and all my fancy's flights,

"This is the language in which Love delights."

SONNET

TO CHARLES DIODATI

CHARLES-and I say it wondering-thou must know
That I, who once assumed a scornful air
And scoffed at Love-am fallen in his snare;
(Full many an upright man has fallen so.)
Yet think me not thus dazzled by the flow
Of golden locks, or damask cheek; more rare
The heartfelt beauties of my foreign fair,
A mien majestic, with dark brows that show
The tranquil lustre of a lofty mind;

Words exquisite, of idioms more than one,
And song, whose fascinating power might bind,
And from her sphere draw down, the labouring moon:
With such fire-darting eyes that, should I fill
My ears with wax, she would enchant me still.