Classic Poem

Two pretty rills do meet, and meeting make
Within one valley a large silver lake:
About whose banks the fertile mountains stood
In ages passed bravely crowned with wood,
Which lending cold-sweet shadows gave it grace
To be accounted Cynthia's bathing-place;
And from her father Neptune's brackish court,
Fair Thetis thither often would resort,
Attended by the fishes of the sea,
Which in those sweeter waters came to plea.
There would the daughter of the Sea God dive,
And thither came the Land Nymphs every eve
To wait upon her: bringing for her brows
Rich garlands of sweet flowers and beechy boughs.
For pleasant was that pool, and near it then
Was neither rotten marsh nor boggy fen,
It was nor overgrown with boisterous sedge,
Nor grew there rudely then along the edge
A bending willow, nor a prickly bush,
Nor broad-leaved flag, nor reed, nor knotty rush.
But here well-ordered was a grove with bowers,
There grassy plots set round about with flowers.
Here you might through the water see the land
Appear, strowed o'er with white or yellow sand;
Yon deeper was it, and the wind by whiffs
Would make it rise and wash the little cliffs
On which, oft pluming, sat unfrighted than
The gaggling wild-goose and the snow-white swan,
With all those flocks of fowls which to this day,
Upon those quiet waters breed and play.
For though those excellences wanting be
Which once it had, it is the same that we
By transposition name the Ford of Arle,
And out of which, along a chalky marle,
That river trills whose waters wash the fort
In which brave Arthur kept his royal court.
North-east, not far from this great pool, there lies
A tract of beechy mountains, that arise,
With leisurely ascending, to such height
As from their tops the warlike Isle of Wight
You in the ocean's bosom may espy,
Though near two furlongs thence it lie.
The pleasant way, as up those hills you climb,
Is strewed o'er with marjoram and thyme,
Which grows unset. The hedgerows do not want
The cowslip, violet, primrose, nor a plant
That freshly scents: as birch, both green and tall;
Low sallows, on whose blooming bees do fall:
Fair woodbines, which about the hedges twine;
Smooth privet, and the sharp-sweet eglantine,
With many moe whose leaves and blossoms fair
The earth adorn and oft perfume the air.

When you unto the highest do attain,
An intermixture both of wood and plain
You shall behold, which, though aloft it lie,
Hath downs for sheep and fields for husbandry,
So much, at least, as little needeth more,
If not enough to merchandise their store.

In every row hath nature planted there
Some banquet for the hungry passenger.
For here the hazel-nut and filbert grows,
There bullice, and, a little farther, sloes.
On this hand standeth a fair weilding-tree,
On that large thickets of blackberries be.

The shrubby fields are raspice orchards there,
The new felled woods like strawberry gardens are,
And had the King of Rivers blessed those hills
With some small number of such pretty rills
As flow elsewhere, Arcadia had not seen
A sweeter plot of earth than this had been.

For what offence this place was scanted so
Of springing waters, no record doth show.
Nor have they old tradition lett that tells;
But till this day at fifty fathom wells
The shepherds drink. And strange it was to hear
Of any swain that ever lived there,
Who either in a pastoral ode had skill,
Or knew to set his fingers to a quill,
For rude they were who there inhabited,
And to a dull contentment being bred
They no such art esteemed, nor took much heed
Of anything the world without them did.

Even there, and in the best frequented place
Of all these mountains, is a little space
Of pleasant ground hemmed in with dropping trees,
And those so thick that Phaebus scarcely sees
The earth they grow on once in all the year.
Nor what is done among the shadows there.

Along those lowly paths, where never came
Report of Pan, or of Apollo's name,
Nor rumour of the Muses till of late,
Some nymphs were wandering, and by chance or fate
Upon a laund arrived, where they met
The little flock of pastor Philaret.
They were a troop of beauties known well nigh
Through all the plains of happy Brittany.
A shepherd's lad was he, obscure and young,
Who, being first that ever there had sung,
In homely verse expressed country loves,
And only told them to the beechy groves;
As if to sound his name he never meant
Beyond the compass that his sheep-walk went.

They saw not him; nor them perceived he:
For in the branches of a maple-tree
He shrouded sat, and taught the hollow hill
To echo forth the music of his quill,
Whose tattling voice redoubled so the sound
That where he was concealed they quickly found.
And there they heard him sing a madrigal
That soon betrayed his cunning to them all.

Full rude it was, no doubt, but such a song
Those rustic and obscured shades among
Was never heard, they say, by any ear
Until his Muses had inspired him there.
Though mean and plain his country habit seemed,
Yet by his song the ladies rightly deemed
That either he had travelled abroad
Where swains of better knowledge make abode,
Or else that some brave nymph who used that grove
Had deigned to enrich him with her love.

Approaching nearer, therefore, to this swain,
They him saluted, and he them again,
In such good fashion as well seemed to be
According to their state and his degree.
Which greetings being passed, and much chat
Concerning him, the place, and this and that,
He to an arbour doth those beauties bring,
Where he them prays to sit, they him to sing,
And to express that untaught country art
In setting forth the mistress of his heart,
Which they o'erheard him practice, when, unseen,
He thought no ear had witness of it been.

At first, as much unable, he refused,
And seemed willing to have been excused
From such a task. For, " Trust me, nymphs, " quoth he,
" I would not purposely uncivil be,
Nor churlish in denying what you crave,
But, as I hope great Pan my flock will save,
I rather wish that I might, heard of none,
Enjoy my music by myself alone,
Or that the murmurs of some little flood,
Joined with the friendly echoes of the wood,
Might be the impartial umpires of my wit,
Than vent it where the world might hear of it.
And doubtless I had sung less loud while-ere
Had I but thought of any such so near.
Not that I either wish obscurified
Her matchless beauty, or desire to hide
Her sweet perfections; for, by Love, I swear
The utmost happiness I aim at here
Is but to compass worth enough to raise
A high-built trophy equal to her praise,
Which, fairest ladies, I shall hope in vain.
For I was meanly bred on yonder plain,
And though I can well prove my blood to be
Derived from no ignoble stems to me,
Yet Fate and Time them so obscured and crost,
That with their fortunes their esteem is lost.
And whatsoe'er repute I strive to win,
Now from myself alone it must begin;
For I have nor estate, nor friends, nor fame,
To purchase either credit to my name
Or gain a good opinion, though I do
Ascend the height I shall aspire unto.
If any of those virtues left I have
Which honour to my predecessors gave,
There's all that's left me. And though some contemn
Such needy jewels, yet it was for them
My Fair One did my humble suit affect,
And deigned my adventurous love respect.
And by their help I passage hope to make
Through such poor things as I dare undertake.

" But, you may say, what goodly thing, alas,
Can my despised meanness bring to pass?
Or what great Monument of honour raise
To Virtue in these Vice-abounding days,
In which a thousand times more honour finds
Ignoble gotten means than noble minds?
Indeed, the world affordeth small reward
For honest minds, and therefore her regard
I seek not after; neither do I care,
If I have bliss, how others think I fare.
For, so my thoughts have rest, it irks not me
Though none but I do know how blest they be.

" Here, therefore, in these groves and hidden plains,
I pleased sit alone, and many strains
I carol to myself these hills among,
Where no man comes to interrupt my song.
Whereas if my rude lays make known I should
Beyond their home, perhaps some carpers would,
Because they have not heard from whence we be,
Traduce, abuse, and scoff both them and me.
For if our great and learned shepherds, who
Are graced with wit, and fame, and favours too,
With much ado escape uncensured may,
What hopes have I to pass unscoffed, I pray,
Who yet unto the Muses am unknown,
And live unhonoured here among mine own?

" A gadding humour seldom taketh me
To range out further than yon mountains be,
Nor hath applausive Rumour borne my name
Upon the speeding wings of sounding Fame.
Nor can I think, fair nymphs, that you resort
For other purpose than to make a sport
At that simplicity which shall appear
Among the rude untutored shepherds here.
I know that you my noble Mistress ween
At best a homely milk-maid on the green,
Or some such country lass as tasked stays
At servile labour, until holy days:
For poor men's virtues so neglected grow,
And are now prized at a rate so low,
As 'tis impossible you should be brought
To let it with belief possess your thought
That any nymph whose love mighTworthy be,
Would deign to cast respective eyes on me.

You see I live possessing none of those
Gay things with which the world enamoured grows.
To woo a courtly beauty I have neither
Rings, bracelets, jewels, nor a scarf, nor feather.
I use no double dyed cloth to wear;
No scrip, embroidered richly, do I bear;
No silken belt, nor sheep-hook laid with pearls,
To win me favour from the shepherds' girls.
No place of office or command I keep,
But this my little flock of homely sheep;
And in a word, the sum of all my pelf
Is this, I am the master of myself.

" No doubt in courts of princes you have been,
And all the pleasures of the palace seen.
There you beheld brave courtly passages
Between herois and their mistresses.
You there, perhaps in presence of the King,
Have heard his learned bards and poets sing.
And what contentment then can wood or field
To please your curious understandings yield?
I know you walked hither but to prove
What silly shepherds do conceive of love,
Or to make trial how our simpleness
Compassion's force, or Beauty's power express,
And when you are departed, you will joy
To laugh or descant on the shepherd's boy.

" But yet, I vow, if all the art I had
Could any more esteem or glory add
To her unmatched worth, I would not weigh
What you intended. " — " Prithee, lad, " quoth they,
" Distrustful of our courtesy do not seem.
Her nobleness can never want esteem,
Nor thy concealed measures be disgraced,
Though in a meaner person they were placed,
If thy too modestly reserved quill
But reach that height which we suppose it will.

Thy meanness or obscureness cannot wrong
The nymph thou shalt eternise in thy song,
For as it higher rears thy glory that
A noble Mistress thou hast aimed at,
So more unto her honour it will prove
That whilst deceiving shadows others move,
Her constant eyes could pass unmoved by
The subtle times' bewitching bravery,
And those obscured virtues love in thee
That with despised meanness clouded be.
Now then for her sweet sake whose beauteous eye
Hath filled thy soul with heavenly Poesie,
Sing in her praise some new inspired strain:
And if within our power there shall remain
A favour to be done may pleasure thee,
Ask, and obtain it, whatsoe'er it be. "

" Fair ladies, " quoth the lad, " such words as these
Compel me can. " And therewithal he rose,
Returned them thanks, obeisance made, and than
Down sat again, and thus to sing began.