drops of dew are sparkling. Yet the sound of a horn reaches us through the foliage; how sweetly yet cheerfully it falls on the ear, amidst this vast silence! It resounds more loudly; the clatter of a hunt draws near; "eft through the thicke they heard one rudely rush;" a nymph approaches, the most chaste and beautiful in the world. Spenser sees her; nay more, he kneels before her: "Her face so faire, as flesh it seemed not, But hevenly pourtraict of bright angels hew, In her faire eyes two living lamps did flame, For, with dredd maiestie and awfull yre, She broke his wanton darts, and quenched bace desyre. Her yvorie forhead, full of bountie brave, All good and honour might therein be red; For there their dwelling was. And, when she spake, And 'twixt the perles and rubins softly brake A silver sound, that heavenly musicke seemd to make. Upon her eyelids many Graces sate, And everie one with meekenesse to her bowes: So glorious mirrhour of celestiall grace, And soveraine moniment of mortall vowes, How shall frayle pen descrive her heavenly face, For feare, through want of skill, her beauty to disgrace ! So faire, and thousand thousand times more faire, She seemd, when she presented was to sight; And was yclad, for heat of scorching aire, All in a silken Camus lilly whight, Purfled upon with many a folded plight, Below her ham her weed did somewhat trayne, In a rich iewell, and therein entrayld The ends of all the knots, that none might see How they within their fouldings close enwrapped bee. Like two faire marble pillours they were seene, Which doe the temple of the gods support, Those same with stately grace and princely port And in her hand a sharpe bore-speare she held, Her daintie paps; which, like young fruit in May, Her yellow lockes, crisped like golden wyre, As through the flouring forrest rash she fled, In her rude heares sweet flowres themselves did lap, And flourishing fresh leaves and blossomes did enwrap."1 "The daintie rose, the daughter of her morne, More deare than life she tendered, whose flowre The girlond of her honour did adorne; Ne suffered she the middayes scorching powre. 1 The Faërie Queene, ii. c. 3, st. 22-80. 2 Ibid. iii. c. 5, st. 51. He is on his knees before her, I repeat, as a child on Corpus Christi day, among flowers and perfumes, transported with admiration, so that he sees a heavenly light in her eyes, and angel's tints on her cheeks, even impressing into her service Christian angels and pagan graces to adorn and wait upon her; it is love which brings such visions before him; "Sweet love, that doth his golden wings embay In blessed nectar and pure pleasures well." Whence this perfect beauty, this modest and charming dawn, in which he assembles all the brightness, all the sweetness, all the virgin graces of the full morning? What mother begat her, what marvellous birth brought to light such a wonder of grace and purity? One day, in a sparkling, solitary fountain, where the sunbeams shone, Chrysogone was bathing with roses and violets. "It was upon a sommers shinie day, When Titan faire his beamës did display, In a fresh fountaine, far from all mens vew, She bath'd with roses red and violets blew, And all the sweetest flowers that in the forrest grew. Till faint through yrkesome wearines adowne Upon the grassy ground herselfe she layd To sleepe, the whiles a gentle slom bring swowne The beams played upon her body, and "fructified" her. The months rolled on. Troubled and ashamed, she went into the "wildernesse," and sat down, "every sence with sorrow sore opprest." Meanwhile Venus, 1 The Faerie Queene, iii. c. 6, st. 6 and 7. searching for her boy Cupid, who had mutinied and fled from her, "wandered in the world." She had sought him in courts, cities, cottages, promising "kisses sweet, and sweeter things, unto the man that of him tydings to her brings." Shortly unto the wastefull woods she came, Whereas she found the goddesse (Diana) with her crew, Sitting beside a fountaine in a rew; Some of them washing with the liquid dew And her lanck loynes ungirt, and brests unbraste, And were with sweet Ambrosia all besprinckled light."1 Diana, surprised thus, repulses Venus, " and gan to smile, in scorne of her vaine playnt," swearing that if she should catch Cupid, she would clip his wanton wings. Then she took pity on the afflicted goddess, and set herself with her to look for the fugitive. They came to the "shady covert" where Chrysogone, in her sleep, had given birth" unawares" to two lovely girls, "as faire as springing day." Diana took one, and made her the Venus carried off the other to the purest of all virgins. 1 The Faerie Queene, iii. c. 6, st. 17 and 18. |