LIV.

UPON CUPID.

LOVE like a gypsey lately came,
And did me much importune
To see my hand; that by the same
He might foretell my fortune.

He saw my palm; and then, said he,
I tell thee, by this score here,
That thou, within few months, shalt be
The youthful prince d'amour here.

I smil'd, and bade him once more prove,
And by some cross line shew it;
That I could ne'er be prince of love,
Though here the princely poet.

LV.

UPON A BLACK TWIST ROUND THE ARM OF THE COUNTESS OF CARLISLE.

I saw about her spotless wrist
Of blackest silk à curious twist;

POEM LV. This personage most probably was Margaret, third daughter of Francis Earl of Bedford, and lady of James Hay, the second of that name Earl of Carlisle, who succeeded his father James 1636; she being the then countess at the time Herrick published his Hesperides. Yet might the poet have written his lines on the lady Lucy, second wife of James first earl of Carlisle, who was celebrated for her wit and beauty, and at the time Herrick's book came out must have been about the age of fifty; she was daughter of Henry Percy ninth earl of Northumberland: her character is found drawn up at the head of A Collection of Letters made by Sir Tobie Mathews, Knt. and dedicated to her ladyship; it is a curious, and now rare little book, printed 1660. Waller wrote many elegant verses on this "Bright Carlisle of the court of heaven."

Which, circumvolving gently there,
Inthrall'd her arm as prisoner:

Dark was the jail; but as if light
Had met t'engender with the night,
Or so as darkness made a stay

To shew at once both night and day.
I fancy more-But, if there be
Such freedom in captivity,

I beg of Love, that ever I

May in like chains of darkness lie.

LVI.

A RING PRESENTED TO JULIA.

JULIA, I bring

To thee this ring,

Made for thy finger fit;

To shew by this

That our love is,

Or should be, like to it.

Close though it be,

The joint is free;

So, when love's yoke is on,

It must not gall,

Or fret at all

With hard oppression:

But it must play

Still either way,

And be too such a yoke,
As not too wide

To overslide,

Or be so strait to choak.

So we, who bear

This beam, must rear
Ourselves to such a height,
As that the stay
Of either may
Create the burthen light.

And as this round

Is no where found
To flaw, or else to sever;
So let our love

As endless prove,

And pure as gold for ever.

LVII.

JULIA'S PETTICOAT.

THY azure robe I did behold,

As airy as the leaves of gold,

Which erring here, and wand'ring there,
Pleas'd with transgression ev'ry-where:
Sometimes 'twould pant, and sigh, and heave,
As if to stir it scarce had leave;

But having got it, thereupon,
'Twould make a brave expansion;

And, pounc'd with stars, it shew'd to me

Like a celestial canopy:

Sometimes 'twould blaze, and then abate,
Like to a flame grown moderate:

POEM LVII.] The various undulations of this garment of his fair-one is a trifling circumstance so happily touched upon, as to render it interesting, and exquisite. The torch of genius only could in so small a spark kindle such brilli

ancy.

Sometimes away 'twould wildly fling,
Then to thy thighs so closely cling,
That some conccit did melt me down,
As lovers fall into a swoon;

And all confus'd I there did lie

Drown'd in delights, but could not die.
That leading cloud I follow'd still,
Hoping t'have seen of it my fill;
But ah! I could not; should it move
To life eternal, I could love.

LVIII.

CORINNA'S GOING A MAYING.

GET up, get up for shame; the blooming morn Upon her wings presents the God unshorn : See how Aurora throws her fair, Fresh-quilted colours through the air: Get up, sweet slug-a-bed, and see

The dew bespangling herb and tree:

Each flow'r has wept, and bow'd toward the east, Above an hour since; yet you not drest;

Nay, not so much as out of bed;

When all the birds have mattins said,

And sung their thankful hymns: 'tis sin,
Nay, profanation to keep in;

When as a thousand virgins on this day,

Spring sooner than the lark, to fetch in May !

POEM LVIII. The ceremony of going a Maying, and the May festivities, were once of great notoriety; though now almost in disuse, or but faintly shadowed in the lower orders of people: they were observed by royalty even. Stowe, quoting Hall, gives an account of Henry the eighth's riding a Maying, with his queen, Catharine, to the high ground on Shooter's Hill, accompanied by a train of the nobility.

Rise, and put on your foliage, and be seen
To come forth like the spring time fresh, and green,
And sweet as Flora. Take no care

For jewels for your gown, or hair :
Fear not, the leaves will strew

Gems in abundance upon you:

Besides, the childhood of the day has kept,
Against you come, some orient pearls unwept :
Come, and receive them, while the light

Hangs on the dew-locks of the night,
And Titan on the eastern hill

Retires himself, or else stands still

Till you come forth.

praying;

Wash, dress, be brief in

Few beads are best, when once we go a Maying!

Come, my Corinna, come; and, coming, mark
How each field turns a street, each street a park
Made green, and trimm'd with trees; see how
Devotion gives each house a bough,

Or branch; each porch, each door, ere this,
An ark, a tabernacle is

Made up of whitethorn neatly interwove,
As if here were those cooler shades of love.

Can such delights be in the street,
And open fields, and we not see't?
Come, we'll abroad; and let's obey

The proclamation made for May,

And sin no more, as we have done, by staying;
But my Corinna, come, let's go a Maying!