Classic Poem

Chastest Diana! in the deserts wild,
Have I so long thy truest handmaid been?
Upon the rough rock-ground thine arrows keen,
Have I (to make thee crowns) been gath'ring still
Fair-cheek'd Etesia's yellow camomile?
And sitting by thee on our flow'ry beds
Knit thy torn buckstalls with well-twisted threads,
To be forsaken? O now present be,
If not to save, yet help to ruin me!
If pure virginity have heretofore
By the Olympic powers been honour'd more
Than other states; and gods have been dispos'd
To make them known to us, and still disclos'd
To the chaste hearing of such nymphs as we
Many a secret and deep mystery;
If none can lead without celestial aid
Th' immaculate and pure life of a maid,
O let not then the Powers all-good, divine,
Permit vile lust to soil this breast of mine!
Thus cried she as she ran: and looking back
Whether her hot pursuer did ought slack
His former speed, she spies him not at all,
And somewhat thereby cheer'd 'gan to recall
Her nigh-fled hopes: yet fearing he might lie
Near some cross path to work his villainy,
And being weary, knowing it was vain
To hope for safety by her feet again,
She sought about where she herself might hide.
A hollow vaulted rock at last she spied,
About whose sides so many bushes were,
She thought securely she might rest her there.
Far under it a cave, whose entrance straight
Clos'd with a stone-wrought door of no mean weight;
Yet from itself the gemels beaten so
That little strength could thrust it to and fro.
Thither she came, and being gotten in
Barr'd fast the dark cave with an iron pin.
The satyr follow'd, for his cause of stay
Was not a mind to leave her, but the way
Sharp-ston'd and thorny, where he pass'd of late,
Had cut his cloven foot, and now his gait
Was not so speedy, yet by chance he sees
Through some small glade that ran between the trees
Where Walla went, and with a slower pace,
Fir'd with hot blood, at last attain'd the place.
When like a fearful hare within her form,
Hearing the hounds come like a threat'ning storm,
In full cry on the walk where last she trod,
Doubts to stay there, yet dreads to go abroad:
So Walla far'd. But since he was come nigh,
And by an able strength and industry
Sought to break in, with tears anew she fell
To urge the Powers that on Olympus dwell.
And then to Ina call'd: O if the rooms,
The walks and arbours in these fruitful coombes
Have famous been through all the Western plains
In being guiltless of the lasting stains
Pour'd-on by lust and murder: keep them free!
Turn me to stone, or to a barked tree,
Unto a bird, or flower, or ought forlorn;
So I may die as pure as I was born.
“Swift are the prayers and of speedy haste,
That take their wing from hearts so pure and chaste.
And what we ask of Heaven it still appears
More plain to it in mirrors of our tears.”
Approv'd in Walla. When the satyr rude
Had broke the door in two, and 'gan intrude
With steps profane into that sacred cell,
Where oft (as I have heard our shepherds tell)
Fair Ina us'd to rest from Phœbus ray:
She or some other having heard her pray,
Into a fountain turn'd her; and now rise
Such streams out of the cave, that they surprise
The satyr with such force and so great din,
That quenching his life's flame as well as sin,
They roll'd him through the dale with mighty roar
And made him fly that did pursue before.
Not far beneath i' the valley as she trends
Her silver stream, some wood-nymphs and her friends
That follow'd to her aid, beholding how
A brook came gliding, where they saw but now
Some herds were feeding, wond'ring whence it came:
Until a nymph that did attend the game
In that sweet valley, all the process told,
Which from a thick-leav'd tree she did behold:
See, quoth the nymph, where the rude satyr lies
Cast on the grass, as if she did despise
To have her pure waves soil'd with such as he:
Retaining still the love of purity.
To Tavy's crystal stream her waters go,
As if some secret power ordained so,
And as a maid she lov'd him, so a brook
To his embracements only her betook.
Where growing on with him, attain'd the state
Which none but Hymen's bonds can imitate.
On Walla's brook her sisters now bewail,
For whom the rocks spend tears when others fail,
And all the woods ring with their piteous moans:
Which Tavy hearing as he chid the stones,
That stopp'd his weedy course, raising his head
Inquir'd the cause, and thus was answered:
Walla is now no more. Nor from the hill
Will she more pluck for thee the daffodil,
Nor make sweet anadems to gird thy brow,
Yet in the groves she runs, a river now.
Look as the feeling plant (which learned swains
Relate to grow on the East Indian plains)
Shrinks up his dainty leaves, if any sand
You throw thereon, or touch it with your hand:
So with the chance the heavy wood-nymphs told,
The river (inly touch'd) began to fold
His arms across, and while the torrent raves,
Shrunk his grave head, beneath his silver waves.
Since when he never on his banks appears
But as one frantic: when the clouds spend tears
He thinks they of his woes compassion take,
(And not a spring but weeps for Walla's sake)
And then he often, to bemoan her lack,
Like to a mourner goes, his waters black,
And every brook attending in his way,
For that time meets him in the like array.
Here Willy that time ceas'd; and I a while:
For yonder's Roget coming o'er the stile;
'Tis two days since I saw him (and you wonder,
You'll say, that we have been so long asunder).
I think the lovely herdess of the dell
That to an oaten quill can sing so well,
Is she that's with him: I must needs go meet them,
And if some other of you rise to greet them
'Twere not amiss, the day is now so long
That I ere night may end another song.