The Poetical Works of John Langhorne :: :: University of Virginia Library

O for the soft lays of Himeria's maids!
The strains that died in Arethusa's shades;
Tun'd to wild sorrow on her mournful shore,
When Daphnis, Hylas, Bion breath'd no more!
Thames' vocal wave shall ev'ry note prolong,
And all his villas learn the Doric song.

How Thyrsis mourn'd his long liv'd Damon dead,
What sighs he utter'd, and what tears he shed—
Ye dim retreats, ye wandering fountains know,
Ye desert wilds bore witness to his woe:
Where oft in grief he past the tedious day,
Or lonely languish'd the dull night away.

Twice had the fields their blooming honours bore.
And Autumn twice resign'd his golden store,
Unconscious of his loss, while Thyrsis staid
To woo the sweet muse in the Tuscan shade:

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Crown'd with her favour, when he sought again
His flock forsaken, and his native plain;
When to his old elm's wonted shade return'd—
Then—then, he miss'd his parted friend—and mourn'd.

And go, he cry'd, my tender lambs, adieu!
Your wretched master has no time for you.
Yet are there pow'rs divine in earth or sky?
Gods can they be who destin'd thee to die?
And shalt thou mix with shades of vulgar name;
Lost thy fair honours, and forgot thy fame?
Not he, the god whose golden wand restrains
The pale-ey'd people of the gloomy plains,
Of Damon's fate shall thus regardless be,
Or suffer vulgar shades to herd with thee.
Then go, he cry'd, &c.

Yet while one strain my trembling tongue may try,
Not unlamented, shepherd, shalt thou die.
Long in these fields thy fame shall flourish fair,
And Daphnis only greater honours share;
To Daphnis only purer vows be paid,
While Pan or Pales loves the vulgar shade.
If truth or science may survive the grave,
Or, what is more, a poet's friendship save.
Then go, &c.

These, these are thine: for me what hopes remain?
Save of long sorrow, and of anguish vain.

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For who, still faithful to my side, shall go,
Like thee, through regions clad with chilling snow?
Like thee, the rage of fiery summers bear,
When fades the wan flower in the burning air?
The lurking dangers of the chase essay,
Or sooth with song and various tales the day?
Then go, &c.

To whom shall I my hopes and fears impart?
Or trust the cares and follies of my heart?
Whose gentle councils put those cares to flight?
Whose cheerful converse cheat the tedious night?
The social hearth when autumn's treasures store,
Chill blow the winds without, and thro' the bleak elm roar
Then go, &c.

When the fierce suns of summer noons invade,
And Pan reposes in the green-wood shade,
The shepherds hide, the nymphs plunge down the deep,
And waves the hedge-row o'er the ploughman's sleep.
Ah! who shall charm with such address refin'd,
Such attic wit, and elegance of mind?
Then go, &c.

Alas! now lonely round my fields I stray,
And lonely seek the pasture's wonted way.
Or in some dim vale's mournful shade repose—
There pensive wait the weary day's slow close,

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While showers descend, the gloomy tempest raves,
And o'er my head the struggling twilight waves.
Then go, &c.

Where once fair harvest cloath'd my cultur'd plain,
Now weeds obscene and vexing brambles reign;
The groves of myrtle and the clustering vine
Delight no more, for joy no more is mine.
My flocks no longer find a master's care;
Ev'n piteous as they gaze with looks of dumb despair.
Then go, &c.

Thy hazel, Tyt'rus, has no charms for me;
Nor yet thy wild ash, lov'd Alphesibee.
No more shall fancy weave her rural dream,
By Ægan's willow, or Amynta's stream,
The trembling leaves, the fountain's cool serene,
The murmuring zephyr, and the mossy green—
These smile unseen, and those unheeded play,
I cut my shrubs, and careless walk'd away.
Then go, &c.

Mopsus, who knows what fates the stars dispense,
And solves the grove's wild warblings into sense,
Thus Mopsus mark'd—what thus thy spleen can move?
Some baleful planet, or some hopeless love?
The star of Saturn oft annoys the swain,
And in the dull cold breast long holds his leaden reign.
Then go, &c.

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The nymphs too, piteous of their shepherd's woe,
Came the sad cause solicitous to know.
Is this the port of jocund youth, they cry,
That look disgusted, and that downcast eye?
Gay smiles and love on that soft season wait;
He's twice a wretch whom beauty wounds too late.
Then go, &c.

One gentle tear the British Chloris gave,
Chloris the grace of Maldon's purple wave—
In vain—my grief no soothing words disarm,
No future hopes, nor present good can charm.
Then go, &c.

The happier flocks one social spirit moves,
The same their sports, their pastures and their loves;
Their hearts to no peculiar object tend,
None knows a favo'rite, or selects a friend.
So herd the various natives of the main,
And Proteus drives in crowds his scaly train;
The feather'd tribes too find an easier fate,
The meanest sparrow still enjoys his mate;

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And when by chance or wearing age she dies,
The transient loss a second choice supplies.
Man, hapless man, for ever doom'd to know
The dire vexations that from discord flow,
In all the countless numbers of his kind,
Can scarcely meet with one congenial mind;
If haply found, death wings the fatal dart,
The tender union breaks, and breaks his heart.
Then go, &c.

Ah me! what error tempted me to go
O'er foreign mountains, and thro' Alpine snow?
Too great the price to mark in Tyber's gloom
The mournful image of departed Rome!
Nay, yet immortal, could she boast again
The glories of her universal reign.
And all that Maro left his fields to see,
Too great the purchase to abandon thee!
To leave thee in a land no longer seen!—
Bid mountains rise, and oceans roll between!—
Ah! not embrace thee!—not to see thee die!
Meet thy last looks, or close thy languid eye!
Not one fond farewell with thy shade to send,
Nor bid thee think of thy surviving friend!
Then go, &c.

Ye Tuscan shepherds, pardon me this tear!
Dear to the muse, to me for ever dear!

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The youth I mourn a Tuscan title bore—
See Lydian Lucca for her son deplore!
O days of ecstacy! when wrapt I lay
Where Arno wanders down his flow'ry way,—
Pluck'd the pale violet, press'd the velvet mead,
Or bade the myrtle's balmy fragrance bleed!—
Delighted, heard amid the rural throng,
Menalcas strive with Lycidas in song.
Oft would my voice the mimic strain essay,
Nor haply all unheeded was my lay:
For, shepherds, yet I boast your gen'rous meed,
The osier basket, and compacted reed:
Francino crown'd me with a poet's fame,
And Dati taught his beechen groves my name.

Milton seems to have borrowed this sentiment from Guarini.

Che se t'assale a la canuta etate
Amoroso talento,
Havrai doppio tormento,
E di quel, che potendo non volesti,
E di quel, che volendo non potrai.

The Tuscans were a branch of the Pelasgi that migrated into Europe, not many ages after the dispersion. Some of them marched by land as far as Lydia, and from thence detached a colony under the conduct of Tyrsenus to Italy.

When Milton was in Italy, Carlo Dati was professor of philosophy at Florence—a liberal friend to men of genius and learning, as well foreigners as his own countrymen. He wrote a panegyric and some poems on Lewis XIV. besides other tracts.