And as their trees, in our dull region set,
But faintly grow, and no perfection get,
So in this northern tract our hoarser throats
Utter unripe and ill-constrained notes,
While the supporter of the poets' style,
Phoebus, on them eternally does smile.
Oh! how I long my careless limbs to lay
Under the plantain's shade, and all the day
With amorous airs my fancy entertain,
Invoke the Muses, and improve my vein!
No passion there in my free breast should move,
None but the sweet and best of passions, love.
There while I sing, if gentle Love be by,
That tunes my lute, and winds the string so high,
With the sweet sound of Sacharissa's name
I'll make the listening savages grow tame.—
But while I do these pleasing dreams indite,
I am diverted from the promis'd fight.
Of their alarm, and how their foes.
Discover'd were, this Canto shows.
THOUGH rocks so high about this island rise, That well they may the numerous Turk despise, Yet is no human fate exempt from fear,
Which shakes their hearts, while through the isle they A lasting noise, 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 cause the' unwonted sound may
At length two monsters of unequal size, [grow:
Hard by the shore, a fisherman espies;
Two mighty whales! which swelling seas had tost,
And left them prisoners on the rocky coast:
One as a mountain vast, and with her came
A cub, not much inferior 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 seen the like lie murther'd on the shore;
By the wild fury of some tempest cast,
The fate of ships, and shipwreck'd men, to taste.
As careless dames, whom wine and sleep betray
To frantic dreams, their infants overlay ;
So there, sometimes, the raging ocean fails,
And her own brood exposes; when the whales
Against sharp rocks, like reeling vessels quash'd,
Though huge as mountains, are in pieces dash'd;
Along the shore their dreadful limbs lie scatter'd,
Like hills with earthquakes shaken, torn, and shat-
ter'd.
Hearts sure of brass they had who tempted first
Rude seas, that spare not what themselves have
The welcome news through all the nation spread,
To sudden joy and hope converts their dread:
What lately was their public terror, they
Behold with glad eyes as a certain prey;
Dispose already of the' untaken spoil,
And, as the purchase of their future toil,
These share the bones, and they divide the oil.
So was the huntsman by the bear opprest, Whose hide he sold-before he caught the beast! They man their boats, and all their young men arm With whatsoever may the monsters harm; Pikes, halberts, spits, and darts that wound so far, The tools of peace, and instruments of war. Now was the time for vigorous lads to show What love and honour could invite them to: A goodly theatre! where rocks are round With reverend age and lovely lasses crown'd. Such was the lake which held this dreadful pair Within the bounds of noble Warwick's share: Warwick's bold Earl! than which no title bears A greater sound among our British peers; And worthy he the memory to renew, The fate and honour to that title due,
Whose brave adventures have transferr'd his name, And through the new world spread his growing fame.
But how they fought, and what their valour gain'd, Shall in another Canto be contain❜d.
The bloody fight, successless toil,
And how the fishes suck'd the isle.
THE boat which on the first assault did go,
Strook with a harping-iron the younger foe;
Who, when he felt his side so rudely gor'd,
Loud as the sea that nourish'd him he roar'd.
As a broad bream, to please some curious taste,
While yet alive, in boiling water cast,
Vex'd with unwonted heat, he flings about
The scorching brass, and hurls the liquor out;
So with the barbed javelin stung, he raves,
And scourges with his tail the suffering waves.
Like Spenser's Talus with his iron flail,
He threatens ruin with his ponderous tail;
Dissolving at one stroke the batter'd boat,
And down the men fall drenched in the moat;
With every fierce encounter they are forc'd
To quit their boats, and fare like men unhors'd.
The bigger whale like some huge carrack lay,
Which wanteth sea-room with her foes to play:
Slowly she swims, and when, provok'd, she would
Advance her tail, her head salutes the mud:
The shallow water doth her force infringe,
And renders vain her tail's impetuous swinge:
The shining steel her tender sides receive,
And there, like bees, they all their weapons leave.
This sees the cub, and does himself oppose
Betwixt his cumber'd mother and her foes:
With desperate courage he receives her wounds,
And men and boats his active tail confounds.
Their forces join'd, the seas with billows fill,
And make a tempest though the winds be still.
Now would the men with half their hoped prey
Be well content, and wish this cub away:
Their wish they have: he (to direct his dam
Unto the gap through which they thither came)
Before her swims, and quits the hostile lake,
A prisoner there but for his mother's sake.
She, by the rocks compell'd to stay behind,
Is by the vastness of her bulk confin'd.
They shout for joy! and now on her alone
Their fury falls, and all their darts are thrown.
Their lances spent, one, bolder than the rest,
With his broad sword provok'd the sluggish beast:
Her oily side devours both blade and haft,
And there his steel the bold Bermudan left.
Courage the rest from his example take,
And now they change the colour of the lake:
Blood flows in rivers from her wounded side,
As if they would prevent the tardy tide,
And raise 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 javelins in her side she wears,
And on her back a grové of pikes appears;
You would have thought, had you the monster seen
Thus drest, she had another island been.
Roaring she 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 son.
He, though a league removed from the foe,
Hastes to her aid: the pious Trojan 1 so,
Neglecting for Creüsa's life his own,
Repeats the danger of the burning town.
The men, amazed, blush to see the seed
Of monsters human piety exceed.
Well proves this kindness, what the Grecian sung,
That Love's bright mother from the Ocean sprung.
Their courage droops, and, hopeless now, they wish
For composition with the' unconquer'd fish ;
So she their weapons would restore again,
Through rocks they'd hew her passage to the main.
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