| |
| THROUGH 1 yon same bending plain | |
| That flings his arms down to the main; | |
| And through these thick woods have I run, | |
| Whose bottom never kissed the sun | |
| Since the lusty spring began. | 5 |
| All to please my Master Pan, | |
| Have I trotted without rest | |
| To get him fruit; for at a feast | |
| He entertains, this coming night, | |
| His paramour, the Syrinx bright. | 10 |
| But, behold a fairer sight! | |
| By that heavenly form of thine, | |
| Brightest fair, thou art divine, | |
| Sprung from great immortal race | |
| Of the gods; for in thy face | 15 |
| Shines more awful majesty, | |
| Than dull weak mortality | |
| Dare with misty eyes behold, | |
| And live: therefore on this mould | |
| Lowly do I bend my knee | 20 |
| In worship of thy deity. | |
| Deign it, goddess, from my hand, | |
| To receive whate’er this land | |
| From her fertile womb doth send | |
| Of her choice fruits; and but lend | 25 |
| Belief to that the Satyr tells: | |
| Fairer by the famous wells | |
| To this present day ne’er grew, | |
| Never better, nor more true. | |
| Here be grapes, whose lusty blood | 30 |
| Is the learned poet’s good, | |
| Sweeter yet did never crown | |
| The head of Bacchus; nuts more brown | |
| Than the squirrel’s teeth that crack them; | |
| Deign, oh fairest fair, to take them! | 35 |
| For these black-eyed Dryope | |
| Hath often-times commanded me | |
| With my claspèd knee to climb: | |
| See how well the lusty time | |
| Hath decked their rising cheeks in red, | 40 |
| Such as on your lips is spread! | |
| Here be berries for a queen, | |
| Some be red, some be green; | |
| These are of that luscious meat, | |
| The great god Pan himself doth eat: | 45 |
| All these, and what the woods can yield, | |
| The hanging mountain, or the field, | |
| I freely offer, and ere long | |
| Will bring you more, more sweet and strong; | |
| Till when, humbly leave I take, | 50 |
| Lest the great Pan do awake, | |
| That sleeping lies in a deep glade, | |
| Under a broad beech’s shade. | |
| I must go, I must run | |
| Swifter than the fiery sun. | 55 |
