Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham. Edmund Waller

Table of Contents

      While in this park I sing, the list'ning deer

       Attend my passion, and forget to fear;

       When to the beeches I report my flame,

       They bow their heads, as if they felt the same.

       To gods appealing, when I reach their bowers

       With loud complaints, they answer me in showers.

       To thee a wild and cruel soul is given,

       More deaf than trees, and prouder than the heaven!

       Love's foe profess'd! why dost thou falsely feign

       Thyself a Sidney? from which noble strain 10

       He sprung,[2] that could so far exalt the name

       Of love, and warm our nation with his flame;

       That all we can of love, or high desire,

       Seems but the smoke of am'rous Sidney's fire.

       Nor call her mother, who so well does prove

       One breast may hold both chastity and love.

       Never can she, that so exceeds the spring

       In joy and bounty, be supposed to bring

       One so destructive. To no human stock

       We owe this fierce unkindness, but the rock, 20

       That cloven rock produced thee, by whose side

       Nature, to recompense the fatal pride

       Of such stern beauty, placed those healing springs,[3]

       Which not more help, than that destruction, brings.

       Thy heart no ruder than the rugged stone,

       I might, like Orpheus, with my num'rous moan

       Melt to compassion; now, my trait'rous song

       With thee conspires to do the singer wrong;

       While thus I suffer not myself to lose 29

       The memory of what augments my woes;

       But with my own breath still foment the fire,

       Which flames as high as fancy can aspire!

      This last complaint th'indulgent ears did pierce

       Of just Apollo, president of verse;

       Highly concerned that the Muse should bring

       Damage to one whom he had taught to sing,

       Thus he advised me: 'On yon aged tree

       Hang up thy lute, and hie thee to the sea,

       That there with wonders thy diverted mind

       Some truce, at least, may with this passion find.' 40

       Ah, cruel nymph! from whom her humble swain

       Flies for relief unto the raging main,

       And from the winds and tempests does expect

       A milder fate than from her cold neglect!

       Yet there he'll pray that the unkind may prove

       Bless'd in her choice; and vows this endless love

       Springs from no hope of what she can confer,

       But from those gifts which Heaven has heap'd on her.

      [1] 'Penshurst': his farewell verses to Dorothy. [2] 'Sprung': Sir Philip Sidney. [3] 'Springs': Tunbridge Wells.

THE BATTLE OF THE SUMMER ISLANDS.[1]

       Table of Contents

      CANTO I.

      What fruits they have, and how Heaven smiles

       Upon these late-discovered isles.

      Aid me, Bellona! while the dreadful fight

       Betwixt a nation and two whales I write.

       Seas stain'd with gore I sing, advent'rous toil!

       And how these monsters did disarm an isle.

      Bermuda, wall'd with rocks, who does not know?

       That happy island where huge lemons grow,

       And orange-trees, which golden fruit do bear,

       Th' Hesperian garden boasts of none so fair;

       Where shining pearl, coral, and many a pound,

       On the rich shore, of ambergris is found. 10

       The lofty cedar, which to heaven aspires,

       The prince of trees! is fuel to their fires;

       The smoke by which their loaded spits do turn,

       For incense might on sacred altars burn;

       Their private roofs on od'rous timber borne,

       Such as might palaces for kings adorn.

       The sweet palmettos a new Bacchus yield,[2]

       With leaves as ample as the broadest shield,

       Under the shadow of whose friendly boughs

       They sit, carousing where their liquor grows. 20

       Figs there unplanted through the fields do grow,

       Such as fierce Cato did the Romans show,

       With the rare fruit inviting them to spoil

       Carthage, the mistress of so rich a soil.

       The naked rocks are not unfruitful there,

       But, at some constant seasons, every year,

       Their barren tops with luscious food abound,

       And with the eggs of various fowls are crown'd.

       Tobacco is the worst of things, which they

       To English landlords, as their tribute, pay. 30

       Such is the mould, that the bless'd tenant feeds

       On precious fruits, and pays his rent in weeds.

       With candied plantains, and the juicy pine,

       On choicest melons, and sweet grapes, they dine,

       And with potatoes fat their wanton swine.

       Nature these cates with such a lavish hand

       Pours out among them, that our coarser land

       Tastes of that bounty, and does cloth return,

       Which not for warmth, but ornament, is worn;

       For the kind spring, which but salutes us here, 40

       Inhabits there, and courts them all the year.

       Ripe fruits and blossoms on the same trees live;

       At once they promise what at once they give.

       So sweet the air, so moderate the clime,

       None sickly lives, or dies before his time.

       Heaven sure has kept this spot of earth uncursed,

       To show how all things were created first.

       The tardy plants in our cold orchards placed,

       Reserve their fruit for the next age's taste;

       There a small grain in some few months will be 50

       A firm, a lofty, and a spacious tree.

       The palma-christi, and the fair papà,

       Now but a seed (preventing nature's law),

       In half the circle of the hasty year

       Project a shade, and lovely fruits do wear.