COMUS, A MASK: Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634, before the Earl of Bridgewater, then President of Wales. THE PERSONS. The attendant Spirit, Comus with his crew. The Lady. First Brother. Second Brother. Sabrina, the Nymph. The chief persons who presented were, The Lord Brackley. Mr. Thomes Egerton, his brother. The first Scene discovers a wild wood. The attendant Spirit descends or enters. BEFORE the starry threshold of Jove's court 5 Which men call Earth, and with low-thoughted care 10 1. This exquisite little drama is, next to Paradise Lost, te mos splendid offspring of Milton's genius. Never were the loveliest graces of natural description more felicitously employed, or the union of what is beautiful in the moral and imaginative of poetry 100PE complete. To lay their just hands on that golden key To such my errand is: and but for such, 15 20 Which he to grace his tributary gods By course commits to several government, 25 And gives them leave to wear their sapphire crowns, 30 35 Lies through the perplex'd paths of this drear wood, The nodding horror of whose shady brows 40 I was dispatch'd for their defence and guard; 45 50 48. The Tuscan Mariners; they were transformed by Bacchus, whom they had angered, into ships and delphins.-See Ovid, Met. iii. 8. The story of Circe and her transformations is well knowu.-Homer, Odyss. x. Whoever tasted, lost his upright shape, And downward fell into a grovelling swine:) This nymph, that gazed upon his clust'ving locks, Whom therefore she brought up, and Comus named; Who ripe, and frolic of his full grown age, 60 At last betakes him to this ominous wood, Offering to every weary traveller 64 [taste 70 To quench the drought of Phoebus, which as they But boast themselves more comely than before, 75 80 I shoot from heav'n, to give him safe convoy, As now I do but first I must put off 85 Who, with his soft pipe, and smooth-dittied song, 90 Of this occasion. But I hear the tread Of hateful steps. I must be viewless now. 60. Celtic and Iberian field; France and Spain. Comus enters with a charming rod in one hand, his glass in the other; with him a rout of monsters, headed like sundry sorts of wild beasts, but otherwise like men and women, their apparel glittering ; they come in making a riotous and unruly noise, with torches in their hands. Com. The star that bids the shepherd fold, Now the top of Heav'n doth hold, Meanwhile welcome Joy and Feast, Lead in swift round the months and years. The sounds and seas, with all their finny drove, 115 And on the tawny sands and shelves Trip the pert faeries and the dapper elves. 120 93. It would be impossible, perhaps, to find a more exquisite plece of musical versification than the following. The beauty and variety of the imagery are equally unsurpassed. 10s. It would be useless to point out the many trifling alterations which appear in the manuscript and first editions of this poem; a few, however, are worth observing, and among them, that of this line, which originally stood And quick law with her scrupulous head. 117. Tawny; originally, yellow. י. |