Of wit, or arms, while both contend In saffron robe, with taper clear, Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child, And ever, against eating cares, Such as the meeting soul may pierce, These delights if thou canst give, IL PENSEROSO. HENCE, vain deluding Joys, The brood of Folly without father bred ! Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys! And fancies fund with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless As the gay motes that people the sun-beams; Or likest hovering dreams, The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. His daughter she; in Saturn's reign, And sable stole of Cyprus lawn, And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly, Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among, I woo, to hear thy even-song; And, missing thee, I walk unseen On the dry smooth-shaven green, To behold the wandering Moon, Riding near her highest noon, Like one that had been led astray Through the Heaven's wide pathless way; And oft, as if her head she bow'd, Stooping through a fleecy cloud. Oft, on a plat of rising ground, I hear the far-off Curfeu sound, Over some wide-water'd shore, Swinging slow with sullen roar : Or, if the air will not permit, Some still removed place will fit, Where glowing embers through the room Teach light to counterfeit a gloom; Far from all resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth, Or the belman's drowsy charm, To bless the doors from nightly harm Or let my lamp at midnight hour, Be seen in some high lonely tower, Where I may oft out-watch the Bear, With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphere The spirit of Plato, to unfold What worlds or what vast regions hold The immortal mind, that bath forsook Her mansion in this fleshly nook: And of those demons that are found In fire, air, flood, or under ground, Whose power hath a true consent. With planet, or with element. Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy In scepter'd pall come sweeping by, Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line, Or the tale of Troy divine; Or what (though rare) of later age Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage. But, O sad virgin, that thy power Might raise Musæus from his bower! Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career, Till civil-suited Morn appear, Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont Where the rude axe, with heaved stroke, And, as I wake, sweet music breathe But let my due feet never fail As may with sweetness, through mine ear, And bring all Heaven before mine eyes. And may at last my weary age Of every star that Heaven doth shew, These pleasures, Melancholy, give, And I with thee will choose to live. ARCADES. PART OF A MASK, OR Entertainment presented to the countess Dowager of Derby at Harefield, by some noble persons of her family; who appear on the scene in pastoral habit, moving toward the seat of state, with this song. [UNQUESTIONABLY this mask was a much longer performance. Milton seems only to have written the poetical part, consisting of these three songs and the recitative soliloquy of the Genius. The rest was probably prose and machinery. In many of Jonson's masques, the poet but rarely appears, amidst a cumbersome exhibition of heathen gods and mythology. Alice, countess dowager of Derby, married Ferdinando lord Strange; who on the death of his father Henry, in 1594, became earl of Derby, but died the next year. She was the sixth daughter of sir John Spenser of Althorpe in Northamptonshire. She was afterwards married (in 1600) to lord chancellor Egerton, who died in 1617. She died Jan. 26, 1635-6, and was buried at Harefield.] I. SONG. Look, nymphs, and shepherds, look, This, this is she To whom our vows and wishes bend; Here our solemn search hath end. Fame, that, her high worth to raise, Less than half we find exprest, Mark, what radiant state she spreads, Sitting like a goddess bright, Might she the wise Latona be, Mother of a hundred gods? Juno dares not give her odds: Who had thought this clime had held As they come forward the Genius of the wood appears, and turning towards them speaks. Genius. Stay, gentle swains; for, though in this disguise, I see bright honour sparkle through your eyes; Follow me ; I will bring you where she sits, of famous Arcardy ye are, and sprung But else in deep of night, when drowsiness II. SONG. O'er the smooth enamell'd green Where no print of step hath been, Follow me, as I sing And touch the warbled string, Under the shady roof Of branching elm star-proof, 61 Such a rural queen All Arcadia hath not seen. III. SONG. Nymphs and shepherds, dance no more All Arcadia hath not seen. ORIGINAL VARIOUS READINGS OF ARCADES. From Ver. 10. Milton's MS, in his own hand. 90 100 Now seems guiltie of abuse Here her hide is erased, and conceale written over it. 80 Ver. 44. For know, by lot from Jove I have the power, Here again the pen is drawn through have, and Ver. 47. In ringlets quaint. Of noisome winds, or blasting va Ver. 50. And from the leaves brush off, &c. So it was at first. But the pen is drawn through leaves, and bowes supplied. Ver. 52. Or what the crosse, &c. It was at first And, as in the printed copies; but that is erased, and Or substituted. Ver. 59. And number all my ranks, and every sprout. Here And and all are expunged with the pen, and visit, as in the printed copies, completes the line. Ver. 62. Hath chain'd`mortalitie. Ver. 81. And so attend you toward &c. COMUS A MASK, PRESENTED AT LUDLOW CASTLE, 1634, BEFORE To the right honourable MY LORD, THIS poem, which received its first occasion of birth from yourself and others of your noble family, and much honour from your own person in the performance, now returns again to make a final dedication of itself to you. Although not openly acknowledged by the author3, yet it is a legitimate off-spring, so lovely, and so much desired, that the often copying of it hath tired my pen to give my severall friends satisfaction, and brought me to a necessity of producing it to the publike view; and now to offer it up in all rightful devotion to those fair hopes, and rare endowments of your much promising youth, which give a full assurance to all that know you, of a future excellence. Live, sweet lord, to be the honour of your name, and receive this as your own, from the hands of him, who hath by many favours been long obliged to your most honoured parents, and as in this representation your attendant Thyrsis, so now in all reall expression Your faithfull and most humble servant, SIR, From the Colledge, this 13 of April, stowed upon me here the first taste of your ac quaintance, though no longer then to make me know that I wanted more time to value it, and to enjoy it rightly; and in truth, if I could then have imagined your farther stay in these parts, which I understood afterwards by Mr. H.," I would have been bold, in our vulgar phrase, to mend my draught (for you left me with an extreme thirst) and to have begged your conversation again, joyntly with your said learned friend, at a poor meal or two, that we might have banded together som good authors of the ancient time: among which, I observed you to have been familiar. Since your going, you have charged me with new obligations, both for a very kinde letter from you dated the sixth of this month, and for a dainty peece of entertainment which came therwith. Wherin I should much commend the tragical part, if the lyrical did not ravish me with a certain Dorique delicacy in your songs and odes; whereunto I must plainly confess to have seen yet nothing parallel in our language: ipsa mollities. But I must not omit to tell you that I now onely owe you thanks for intimating unto me (how modestly soever) the true artificer. For the work itself I had viewed som good while before with singular delight, having received it from our common friend Mr. R.7 in the very close of the late R.s Poems, printed at Oxford, whereunto it is added (as I now suppose) that the accessary might help out the principal, according to the art of stationers, and to leave the reader con la bocca dolce. Now, sir, concerning your travels wherin I may chalenge a little more privilege of discours with you; I suppose you will not blanch Paris in your way; therefore I have been bold to trouble you with a few lines to Mr. M. B. whom you shall easily find attending the young lord Mr. H.] Mr. Warton in his first edition of Comus says, that Mr. H. was "perhaps Milton's It was a special favour, when you lately be- friend, Samuel Hartlib, whom I have seen men This is the dedication to Lawes's edition of the Mask, 1637, to which the following motto was prefixed, from Virgil's second Eclogue, Eheu! quid volui misero mihi! floribus austrum PerditusThis motto is omitted by Milton himself in the editions of 1645, and 1673. WARTON. ⚫ The First Brother in the Mask. WARTON. > It never appeared under Milton's name, till the year 1645. WARTON. This dedication does not appear in the edition of Milton's Poems, printed under his own inspection, 1673, when lord Brackley, under the title of earl Bridgwater, was still living. Milton was perhaps unwilling to own his early connections with a family, conspicuous for its unshaken loyalty, and now highly patronised by king Charles the Second. WARTON. $ April, 1638.] Milton had communicated to sir Henry his design of seeing foreign countries, and had sent him his Mask. He set out on his travels soon after the receipt of this letter. TODD. tioned in some of the pamphlets of this period, as well acquainted with sir Henry Wotton :" but this is omitted in his second edition. Mr. Warton perhaps doubted his conjecture of the person. I venture to state from a copy of the Reliquiæ Wottonianæ in my possession, in which a few notes are written (probably soon after the publication of the book, 3d edit. in 1672) that the person intended was the "ever-memorable" John Hales. This information will be supported by the reader's recollecting sir Henry's intimacy with Mr. Hales; of whom sir Henry says, in one of his letters, that he gave to his learned friend the title of Bibliotheca ambulans, the walking Library. See Reliq. Wotton. 3d edit. p. 475. TODD. 7 Mr. R.] Ibelieve " Mr. R." to be John Rouse, Bodley's librarian. "The late R." is unquestionably Thomas Randolph, the poet. WARTON. 8 Mr. M. B.] Mr. Michael Branthwait, as I suppose; of whom sir Henry thus speaks in one of his Letters, Reliq. Wotton. 3d edit. p. 546. "Mr. Michael Branthwait, heretofore his majestie's agent in Venice, a gentleman of approved confidence and sincerity," TODD. 480 S.9 as his governour; and you may surely re- I should think that your best line will be which therefore I will briefly refer, trusting that It was built by Roger de Montgomery, who of its erection is fixed by Mr. Warton in the year was related to William the Conqueror. The date 1112. By others it is said to have been erected before the Conquest, and its founder to have Roger de Montgomery was sent by the Conquebeen Edric Sylvaticus, carl of Shrewsbury, whom with those estates in Salop he was afterwards ror into the marshes of Wales to subdue, and rewarded. But the testimonies of various writers assign the foundation of this structure to Roger de Montgomery, soon after the Conquest. At Siena I was tabled in the house of one Alberto Scipioni, an old Roman courtier in dangerous times, having bin steward to the duca di Pagliano, who with all his family were strangled, save this onely man that escaped by foresight of the tempest: with him I had often much chat of those affairs; into which he took pleasure to look back from his native harbour; and at my The son of this nobleman did not long enjoy it, departure toward Rome (which had been the Robert de Belesme, earl of Shrewsbury, forfeited as he died in the prime of life. The grandson, ́center of his experience) I had wonn confidence it to Henry I. by having joined the party of Roenough to beg his advice, how I might carry my-bert duke of Normandy against that king. It self securely there, without offence to others, or became now a princely residence, and was guardof mine own conscience. Signor Arrigo mio, ed by a numerous garrison. Soon after the ac(sayes he) 1 pensieri stretti, et il viso sciolto, will cession of Stephen, however, the governor bego safely over the whole world; Of which Del-trayed his trust, in joining the empress Maud. phian oracle (for so I have found it) your judge-Stephen besieged it; in which endeavour to rement doth need no commentary; and therefore (sir) I will commit you with it to the best of all securities, God's dear love, remaining Your friend as much at command SIB, HENRY WOOTTON. POSTSCRIPT. In I have expressly sent this my foot-boy to prevent your departure without som acknowledgement from me of the receipt of your obliging letter,having myself through som business, I know not how, neglected the ordinary conveyance. any part where I shall understand you fixed, I shall be glad, and diligent, to entertain you with home-novelties; even for some fomentation of our friendship, too soon interrupted in the cradle. COMUS. LUDLOW CAStle. BY MR. TODD. SOME idea of this venerable and magnificent pile, in which Comus was played with great splendour, at a period when masks were the most fashionable entertainment of our nobility, will probably gratify those, who read Milton with that curiosity which results from taste and imagination. Mr. Warton, the learned author of this elegant remark, declines entering into the 9 Lord S.] The son of lord viscount Scudamore, then the English ambassador at Paris, by whose notice Milton was honoured, and by whom he was introduced to Grotius, then residing at Paris, also as the minister of Sweden. TODD. gain the possession of his fortress some writers assert that he succeeded, others that he failed. The most generally received opinion is, that the governor, repenting of his baseness, and wishing pitulation advantageous to the garrison, to which to obtain the king's forgiveness, proposed a caStephen, despairing of winning the castle by to whom succeeded Joccas de Dinan; between arms, readily acceded. Henry II. presented whom and Hugh de Mortimer lord of Wigmore it to his favourite, Fulk Fitz-Warine,or de Dinan, such dissensions arose, as at length occasioned the seizure of Mortimer, and his confinement in is called Mortimer's Tower; from which he one of the towers of the castle, which to this day was not liberated, till he had paid an immense ransom. This tower is now inhabited, and used as a fives-court. It was again belonging to the crown in the 8th In the thirteenth year of Henry VI. it was in |