No less than if I should my brothers lose.
Comus. Were they of manly prime, or youthful bloom?
290 Lady. As smooth as Hebe’s their unrazored lips.
Comus. Two such I saw, what time the laboured ox
In his loose traces from the furrow came,
And the swinked hedger at his supper sat;
I saw them under a green mantling vine
295 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 visïon
Of some gay creatures of the element
300 That in the colours of the rainbow live
And play i’ th’ plighted clouds. I was awe-strook,
And as I passed, I worshipped; if those you seek,
It were a journey like the path to heav’n
To help you find them.
Lady. Gentle villager
305 What readiest way would bring me to that 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,
310 Without the sure guess of well-practised feet.
Comus. I know each lane, and every alley green,
Dingle, or bushy dell of this wild wood,
And every bosky bourn from side to side
My daily walks and ancient neighbourhood,
315 And if your stray attendance be yet lodged,
Or shroud within these limits, I shall know
Ere morrow wake, or the low-roosted lark
From her thatched pallet rouse; if otherwise
I can conduct you Lady to a low
320 But loyal cottage, where you may be safe
Till further quest.
Lady. Shepherd I take thy word,
And trust thy honest offered courtesy,
Which oft is sooner found in lowly sheds
With smoky rafters, than in tap’stry halls
325 And courts of princes, where it first was named,
And yet is most pretended: in a place
Less warranted than this, or less secure
I cannot be, that I should fear to change it.
Eye me blest Providence, and square my trial
330 To my proportioned strength. Shepherd lead on. –
The Two Brothers
Elder Brother. Unmuffle ye faint stars, and thou fair moon
That wont’st to love the traveller’s benison,
Stoop thy pale visage through an amber cloud,
And disinherit Chaos, that reigns here
335 In double night of darkness, and of shades;
Or if your influence be quite dammed up
With black usurping mists, some gentle taper
Though a rush candle from the wicker hole
Of some clay habitation visit us
340 With thy long levelled rule of streaming light,
And thou shalt be our star of Arcady,
Or Tyrian Cynosure.
Second Brother. Or if our eyes
Be barred that happiness, might we but hear
The folded flocks penned in their wattled cotes,
345 Or sound of pastoral reed with oaten stops,
Or whistle from the lodge, or village cock
Count the night watches to his feathery dames,
’Twould be some solace yet, some little cheering
In this close dungeon of innumerous boughs.
350 But O that hapless virgin our lost sister,
Where may she wander now, whither betake her
From the chill dew, amongst rude burs and thistles?
Perhaps some cold bank is her bolster now
Or ‘gainst the rugged bark of some broad elm
355 Leans her unpillowed head fraught with sad fears.
What if in wild amazement, and affright,
Or while we speak within the direful grasp
Of savage hunger, or of savage heat?
Elder Brother. Peace brother, be not over-exquisite
360 To cast the fashion of uncertain evils;
For grant they be so, while they rest unknown,
What need a man forestall his date of grief,
And run to meet what he would most avoid?
Or if they be but false alarms of fear,
365 How bitter is such self-delusïon!
I do not think my sister so to seek,
Or so unprincipled in virtue’s book,
And the sweet peace that goodness bosoms ever,
As that the single want of light and noise
370 (Not being in danger, as I trust she is not)
Could stir the constant mood of her calm thoughts,
And put them into misbecoming plight.
Virtue could see to do what virtue would
By her own radiant light, though sun and moon
375 Were in the flat sea sunk. And Wisdom’s self
Oft seeks to sweet retired solitude,
Where with her best nurse Contemplatïon
She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings
That in the various bustle of resort
380 Were all to-ruffled, and sometimes impaired.
He that has light within his own clear breast
May sit i’ th’ centre, and enjoy bright day,
But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts
Benighted walks under the midday sun;
Himself is his own dungeon.
385 Second Brother. ’Tis most true
That musing meditation most affects
The pensive secrecy of desert cell,
Far from the cheerful haunt of men, and herds,
And sits as safe as in a senate-house;
390 For who would rob a hermit of his weeds,
His few books, or his beads, or maple dish,
Or do his grey hairs any violence?
But beauty like the fair Hesperian tree
Laden with blooming gold, had need the guard
395 Of dragon watch with unenchanted eye,
To save her blossoms, and defend her fruit
From the rash hand of bold Incontinence.
You may as well spread out the unsunned heaps
Of miser’s treasure by an outlaw’s den,
400 And tell me it is safe, as bid me hope
Danger will wink on opportunity,
And let a single helpless maiden pass
Uninjured in this wild surrounding waste.
Of night, or loneliness it recks me not,
405 I fear the dread events that dog them both,
Lest some ill-greeting touch attempt the person
Of our unownèd sister.
Elder Brother. I do not, brother,
Infer, as if I thought my sister’s state
Secure without all doubt, or controversy:
410 Yet where an equal poise of hope and fear
Does arbitrate th’ event, my nature is
That I incline to hope, rather than fear,
And gladly banish squint suspicïon.
My sister is not so defenceless left
415 As you imagine; she has a hidden strength
Which you remember not.
Second Brother. What hidden strength,
Unless the strength of Heav’n, if you mean that?
Elder Brother. I mean that too, but yet a hidden strength
Which if Heav’n gave it, may be termed her own:
420 ’Tis chastity, my brother, chastity:
She that has that, is clad in cómplete steel,
And like a quivered nymph with arrows keen
May trace huge forests, and unharboured heaths,
Infamous hills, and sandy perilous wilds,
425 Where through the sacred rays of chastity,
No savage fierce, bandit, or mountaineer
Will dare to soil her virgin purity:
Yea there, where very desolation dwells,
By grots, and caverns shagged with horrid shades,
430 She may pass on with unblenched majesty,
Be it not done in pride, or in presumption.
Some say no evil thing that walks by night
In fog, or fire, by lake, or moorish fen,
Blue meagre hag, or stubborn unlaid ghost,
435 That breaks his magic chains at curfew time,
No goblin, or swart faery of the mine,
Hath hurtful power o’er true virginity.
Do ye believe me yet, or shall I call
Antiquity from the old schools of Greece
440 To testify the arms of chastity?
Hence had the huntress Dian her dread bow,
Fair silver-shafted queen for ever chaste,
Wherewith she tamed the brinded lioness
And spotted mountain pard, but set at nought
445 The frivolous bolt of Cupid; gods and men
Feared her stern frown, and she was queen o’ th’ woods.
What was that snaky-headed Gorgon shield
That wise Minerva wore, unconquered virgin,
Wherewith she freezed her foes to congealed stone?
450 But rigid looks of chaste austerity,
And noble grace that dashed brute violence
With sudden adoration, and blank awe.
So dear to Heav’n is saintly chastity,
That when a soul is found sincerely so,
455 A thousand liveried angels lackey her,
Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt,
And in clear dream, and solemn visïon
Tell her of things that no gross ear can hear,
Till oft converse with Heav’nly habitants
460 Begin to cast a beam on th’ outward shape,
The unpolluted temple of the mind,
And turns it by degrees to the soul’s essence,
Till all be made immortal: but when lust
By unchaste looks, loose gestures, and foul talk,
465 But most by lewd and lavish act of sin,
Lets in defilement to the inward parts,
The soul grows clotted by contagÏon,
Embodies, and imbrutes, till she quite lose
The divine property of her first being.
470 Such are those thick and gloomy shadows damp
Oft seen in charnel vaults, and sepulchres
Lingering, and sitting by a new-made grave,
As loath to leave the body that it loved,
And linked itself by carnal sensualty
475 To a degenerate and degraded state.
Second Brother. How charming is divine philosophy!
Not harsh, and crabbed as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo’s lute,
And a perpetual feast of nectared sweets,
Where no crude surfeit reigns.
480 Elder Brother. List, list, I hear
Some far-off hallo break the silent air.
Second Brother. Methought so too; what should it be?
Elder Brother. For certain
Either some one like us night-foundered here,
Or else some neighbour woodman, or at worst,
485 Some roving robber calling to his fellows.
Second Brother. Heav’n keep my sister. Again, again, and
near.
Best draw, and stand upon our guard.
Elder Brother. I’ll hallo;
If he be friendly he comes well, if not,
Defence is a good cause, and Heav’n be for us.
The Attendant Spirit habited like a shepherd
490 That hallo I should know, what are you? Speak;
Come not too near, you fall on iron stakes else.
Spirit. What voice is that, my young lord? Speak again.
Second Brother. O brother, ‘tis my father’s shepherd sure.
Elder Brother. Thyrsis? Whose artful strains have oft
delayed
495 The huddling brook to hear his madrigal,
And sweetened every muskrose of the dale,
How cam’st thou here good swain? Hath any ram
Slipped from the fold, or young kid lost his dam,
Or straggling wether the penned flock forsook?
500 How couldst thou find this dark sequestered nook?
Spirit. O my loved master’s heir, and his next joy,
I came not here on such a trivial toy
As a strayed ewe, or to pursue the stealth
Of pilfering wolf; not all the fleecy wealth
505 That doth enrich these downs, is worth a thought
To this my errand, and the care it brought.
But O my virgin Lady, where is she?
How chance she is not in your company?
Elder Brother. To tell thee sadly shepherd, without blame,
510 Or our neglect, we lost her as we came.
Spirit. Ay me unhappy then my fears are true.
Elder Brother. What fears good Thyrsis? Prithee briefly show.
Spirit. I’ll tell ye. ’Tis not vain or fabulous
(Though so esteemed by shallow ignorance)
515 What the sage poets, taught by th’ Heavenly Muse,
Storied of old in high immortal verse
Of dire Chimeras and enchanted isles,
And rifted rocks whose entrance leads to Hell,
For such there be, but unbelief is blind.
520 Within the navel of this hideous wood,
Immured in cypress shades a sorcerer dwells
Of Bacchus and of Circe born, great Comus,
Deep skilled in all his mother’s witcheries,
And here to every thirsty wanderer,
525 By sly enticement gives his baneful cup,
With many murmurs mixed, whose pleasing poison
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks,
And the inglorious likeness of a beast
Fixes instead, unmoulding reason’s mintage
530 Charáctered in the face; this have I learnt
Tending my flocks hard by i’ th’ hilly crofts
That brow this bottom glade, whence night by night
He and his monstrous rout are heard to howl
Like stabled wolves, or tigers at their prey,
535 Doing abhorrèd rites to Hecate
In their obscurèd haunts of inmost bow’rs.
Yet have they many baits, and guileful spells
T’ inveigle and invite th’ unwary sense
Of them that pass unweeting by the way.
540 This evening late, by then the chewing flocks
Had ta’en their supper on the savoury herb
Of knot-grass dew-besprent, and were in fold,
I sat me down to watch upon a bank
With ivy canopied, and interwove
545 With flaunting honeysuckle, and began
Wrapped in a pleasing fit of melancholy
To meditate my rural minstrelsy
Till fancy had her fill; but ere a close
The wonted roar was up amidst the woods,
550 And filled the air with barbarous dissonance,
At which I ceased, and listened them a while,
Till an unusual stop of sudden silence
Gave respite to the drowsy-frighted steeds
That draw the litter of close-curtained Sleep.
555 At last a soft and solemn breathing sound
Rose like a steam of rich distilled perfumes,
And stole upon the air, that even Silence
Was took ere she was ware, and wished she might
Deny her nature, and be never more
560 Still to be so displaced. I was all ear,
And took in strains that might create a soul
Under the ribs of Death. But O ere long
Too well I did perceive it was the voice
Of my most honoured Lady, your dear sister.
565 Amazed I stood, harrowed with grief and fear,
And O poor hapless nightingale thought I,
How sweet thou sing’st, how near the deadly snare!
Then down the lawns I ran with headlong haste
Through paths, and turnings often trod by day,
570 Till guided by mine ear I found the place
Where that damned wizard hid in sly disguise
(For so by certain signs I knew) had met
Already, ere my best speed could prevent,
The aidless innocent Lady his wished prey,
575 Who gently asked if he had seen such two,
Supposing him some neighbour villager;
Longer I durst not stay, but soon I guessed
Ye were the two she meant; with that I sprung
Into swift flight, till I had found you here,
But further know I not.
580 Second Brother. O night and shades,
How are ye joined with Hell in triple knot
Against th’ unarmèd weakness of one virgin
Alone, and helpless! Is this the confidence
You gave me brother?
Elder Brother.
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