THE SELF BANISHED.

EDMUND WALLER.

It is not that I love you less
Than when before your feet I lay :

But, to prevent the sad increase
Of hopeless love, I keep away.

In vain (alas) for every thing,

Which I have known belong to you, Your form does to my fancy bring,

And makes my old wounds bleed anew.

Who in the spring, from the new sun,
Already has a fever got,

Too late begins those shafts to shun,

Which Phoebus through his veins has shot.

Too late he would the pain assuage,
And to thick shadows does retire;
About with him he bears the rage,
And in his tainted blood the fire.

But vow'd I have, and never must
Your banish'd servant trouble you;

For if I break, you may mistrust

The vow I made-to love you too.

TO ALTHEA, FROM PRISON.

RICHARD LOVELACE.

Born 1618-Died 1658.

When Love with unconfined wings

Hovers within my gates,
And my divine Althea brings

To whisper at my grates;
When I lie tangl'd in her hair,
And fetter'd to her eye,

The "birds" that wanton in the air,

Know no such liberty.

When flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,

Our careless heads with roses bound,
Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wines we steep;
When healths and draughts are free,-
Fishes that tipple in the deep.

Know no such liberty.

When like committed linnets, It
With shriller throat shall sing
The sweetness, mercy, majesty,
And glories of my king;

an old MS. copy of the Song since discovered by Dr. Bliss, it is also In the original it is "gods," Dr. Percy made the alteration; in written "birds." See Wood's Ath. Ox. by Bliss, Vol. III. col. 461.

+ Percy changed this line to "When linnet-like confined I," which

says Ellis, "is more intelligible."

When I shall voice aloud how good
He is, how great should be,—
Enlarged winds that curl the flood
Know no such liberty.

Stone walls, do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage:
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free,-
Angels, alone-that soar above
Enjoy such liberty.

[Lovelace wrote this Song we are informed by Anthony Wood, when confined in the Gate House at Westminster, for presenting a petition" from the whole body of the County of Kent to the House of Commons, for restoring the King (Charles I.) to his rights." For many years Lovelace was a very gay character, and through his wit and his handsomeness was in great favour with the ladies, going about glittering in gold and silver. He soon ran through his fortune, and died in poverty and want in a very mean lodging in Gunpowder Alley near Shoe Lane. He lies buried in St. Bride's Church. The general fault of his poetry is its want of simplicity. "The Song to Althea" says Mr. Southey "will live as long as the English language."]

TO LUCASTA, ON GOING TO THE WARS.

RICHARD LOVELACE.

Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde,

That from the nunnerie

Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde,
To warre and armes I flie.

True, a new mistresse now I chase,
The first foe in the field;

And with a stronger faith embrace
A sword, a horse, a shield.

Yet this inconstancy is such,
As you too shall adore;

I could not love thee, deare, so much,
Lov'd I not honour more.

["Lovelace," says Wood "made his amours to a gentlewoman of great beauty and fortune named Lucy Sacheverel, whom he usually called Lux casta; but she upon a strong report that he was dead of his wound received at Dunkirk, (where he had brought a regiment for the service of the French King,) soon after married." Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses by Bliss, Vol. III. col. 462.]

THE SCRUTINIE.

RICHARD LOVELACE.

Why should you swear I am forsworn,
Since thine I vow'd to be?

Lady it is already morn,

And 'twas last night I swore to thee

That fond impossibility.

Have I not lov'd thee much and long,
A tedious twelve hours space?
I must all other beauties wrong,
And rob thee of a new embrace;
Could I still dote upon thy Face.

Not, but all joy in thy browne haire,
By others may be found;

But I must search the black and faire
Like skillfull Minerallists that sound
For treasure in un-plowed-up ground.

Then if when I have lov'd my round,
Thou prov'st the pleasant she;
With spoyles of meaner Beauties crown'd,
I laden will return to thee,

Ev'n sated with Varietie.

[The following description of a beauty, from "Amyntor's Grove," a poem by the same author is full of true poetry.

Her breath like to the whispering wind
Was calm as thought, sweet as her mind;

Her lips like coral gates kept in
The perfume and the pearl within;
Her eyes a double flaming torch
That always shine and never scorch;
Herself the Heaven in which did meet
The All of bright, of fair and sweet.

As she walks" close by the lips of a clear stream,"
flowers bequeath

At once the incense of their breath.

The head of the Poet prefixed to this volume is taken from a very

fine painting preserved in Dulwich College.]