Classic Poem

Once (yet that once too often) heretofore
The silver Ladon on his sandy shore
Heard my complaints, and those cool groves that be
Shading the breast of lovely Arcady
Witnesse[d] the tears which I for Syrinx spent:
Syrinx the fair, from whom the instrument
That fills your feasts with joy (which when I blow
Draws to the sagging dug milk white as snow),
Had his beginning. This enough had been
To show the Fates, my deemed sisters, teen.
Here had they stay'd, this adage had been none:
“That our disasters never come alone.”
What boot is it though I am said to be
The worthy son of winged Mercury?
That I with gentle nymphs in forests high
Kiss'd out the sweet time of my infancy?
And when more years had made me able grown,
Was through the mountains for their leader known?
That high-brow'd Mænalus where I was bred,
And stony hills not few have honoured
Me as protector by the hands of swains,
Whose sheep retire there from the open plains?
That I in shepherds' cups (rejecting gold)
Of milk and honey measures eight times told
Have offer'd to me, and the ruddy wine
Fresh and new pressed from the bleeding vine?
That gleesome hunters, pleased with their sport,
With sacrifices due have thank'd me for't?
That patient anglers standing all the day
Near to some shallow stickle or deep bay,
And fishermen whose nets have drawn to land
A shoal so great it well-nigh hides the sand,
For such success some promontory's head
Thrust at by waves, hath known me worshipped?
But to increase my grief, what profits this,
“Since still the loss is as the loser is?”
“The many-kernel-bearing pine of late
From all trees else to me was consecrate,
But now behold a root more worth my love,
Equal to that which in an obscure grove
Infernal Juno proper takes to her:
Whose golden slip the Trojan wanderer,
By sage Cumæan Sybil taught, did bring,
By Fates decreed, to be the warranting
Of his free passage, and a safe repair
Through dark Avernus to the upper air.
This must I succour, this must I defend,
And from the wild boars' rooting ever shend.
Here shall the woodpecker no entrance find,
Nor Tavy's beavers gnaw the clothing rind,
Lambeder's herds, nor Radnor's goodly deer
Shall never once be seen a-browsing here.
And now, ye British swains, whose harmless sheep
Than all the world's besides I joy to keep,
Which spread on every plain and hilly wold
Fleeces no less esteem'd than that of gold,
For whose exchange one Indy gems of price,
The other gives you of her choicest spice,
And well she may; but we unwise the while
Lessen the glory of our fruitful Isle,
Making those nations think we foolish are
For baser drugs to vent our richer ware,
Which, save the bringer, never profit man
Except the sexton and physician;
And whether change of climes or what it be
That proves our mariners' mortality,
Such expert men are spent for such bad fares
As might have made us lords of what is theirs—
Stay, stay at home, ye nobler spirits, and prize
Your lives more high than such base trumperies:
Forbear to fetch, and they'll go near to sue,
And at your own doors offer them to you;
Or have their woods and plains so overgrown
With pois'nous weeds, roots, gums and seeds unknown,
That they would hire such weeders as you be
To free their land from such fertility?
Their spices hot their nature best endures,
But 'twill impair and much distemper yours.
What our own soil affords befits us best,
And long, and long, for ever, may we rest
Needless of help! and may this Isle alone
Furnish all other lands, and this land none!
Excuse me, Thetis, quoth the aged man,
If passion drew me from the words of Pan,
Which thus I follow: you whose flocks, quoth he,
By my protection quit your industry,
For all the good I have and yet may give
To such as on the plains hereafter live,
I do entreat what is not hard to grant,
That not a hand rend from this holy plant
The smallest branch; and whoso cutteth this
Die for th' offence; to me so heinous 'tis.
And by the floods infernal here I swear,
(An oath whose breach the greatest gods forbear,)
Ere Phœbe thrice twelve times shall fill her horns;
No furzy tuft, thick wood, nor brake of thorns
Shall harbour wolf, nor in this Isle shall breed,
Nor live one of that kind, if what's decreed
You keep inviolate. To this they swore:
And since those beasts have frighted us no more.
But swain, quoth Thetis, what is this you tell,
To what you fear shall fall on Philocel?
Fair queen, attend; but oh I fear, quoth he,
Ere I have ended my sad history,
Unstaying time may bring on his last hour,
And so defraud us of thy wished pow'r.
Yond goes a shepherd: give me leave to run
And know the time of execution.
Mine aged limbs I can a little strain,
And quickly come, to end the rest, again.