* * * * *

XIX.

SONG.  FAREWELL, FAIR ARMIDA.

  Farewell, fair Armida, my joy and my grief,
  In vain I have loved you, and hope no relief;
  Undone by your virtue, too strict and severe,
  Your eyes gave me love, and you gave me despair;
  Now call’d by my honour, I seek with content
  The fate which in pity you would not prevent: 
  To languish in love, were to find by delay
  A death that’s more welcome the speediest way. 
  On seas and in battles, in bullets and fire,
  The danger is less than in hopeless desire; 10
  My death’s-wound you give, though far off I bear
  My fall from your sight—­not to cost you a tear: 
  But if the kind flood on a wave should convey,
  And under your window my body should lay,
  The wound on my breast when you happen to see,
  You’ll say with a sigh—­it was given by me.

* * * * *

XX.

ALEXANDER’S FEAST; OR, THE POWER OF MUSIC.

AN ODE, IN HONOUR OF ST CECILIA’S DAY.

1 ’Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won
By Philip’s warlike son: 
Aloft in awful state
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne: 
His valiant peers were placed around;
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound
(So should desert in arms be crown’d). 
The lovely Thais, by his side,
Sate like a blooming Eastern bride
In flower of youth and beauty’s pride. 
Happy, happy, happy pair! 
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.

    CHORUS.

Happy, happy, happy pair! 
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.

2 Timotheus, placed on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touch’d the lyre: 
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire. 
The song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above
(Such is the power of mighty love). 
A dragon’s fiery form belied the god: 
Sublime on radiant spires he rode,
When he to fair Olympia press’d: 
And while he sought her snowy breast: 
Then, round her slender waist he curl’d,
And stamp’d an image of himself, a sovereign of the world. 
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound,
A present deity, they shout around,
A present deity, the vaulted roofs rebound: 
With ravish’d ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.

CHORUS.

With ravish’d ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.