TO CHLORIS

Aн, Chloris! that I now could sit
As unconcerned as when
Your infant beauty could beget
No pleasure, nor no pain!
When I the dawn used to admire,
And praised the coming day,
I little thought the growing fire
Must take my rest away.

Your charms in harmless childhood lay
Like metals in the mine;
Age from no face took more away

Than youth concealed in thine.

But as your charms insensibly
To their perfection pressed,
Fond love as unperceived did fly,
And in my bosom rest.

My passion with your beauty grew,
And Cupid at my heart,
Still as his mother favored you,

Threw a new flaming dart:

Each gloried in their wanton part;

To make a lover, he

Employed the utmost of his art

To make a beauty, she.

Charles Sedley [1639?-1701]

SONG

THE merchant, to secure his treasure,
Conveys it in a borrowed name:
Euphelia serves to grace my measure;
But Chloe is my real flame.

My softest verse, my darling lyre,

Upon Euphelia's toilet lay;

When Chloe noted her desire

That I should sing, that I should play.

Fair Hebe

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise;

But with my numbers mix my sighs:
And while I sing Euphelia's praise,

I fix my soul on Chloe's eyes.

Fair Chloe blushed: Euphelia frowned:

I sung, and gazed: I played, and trembled:
And Venus to the Loves around

Remarked, how ill we all dissembled.

695

Matthew Prior ]1664-1721]

PIOUS SELINDA

PIOUS Selinda goes to prayers,
If I but ask her favor;
And yet the silly fool's in tears
If she believes I'll leave her;
Would I were free from this restraint,

Or else had hopes to win her:
Would she could make of me a saint,

Or I of her a sinner.

William Congreve [1670-1729]

FAIR HEBE

FAIR Hebe I left, with a cautious design

To escape from her charms, and to drown them in wine,

I tried it; but found, when I came to depart,

The wine in my head, and still love in my heart.

I repaired to my Reason, entreated her aid;

Who paused on my case and each circumstance weighed,
Then gravely pronounced, in return to my prayer,
That "Hebe was fairest of all that was fair!"

"That's a truth," replied I, "I've no need to be taught; I came for your counsel to find out a fault."

"If that's all," quoth Reason, "return as you came; To find fault with Hebe, would forfeit my name."

What hopes then, alas! of relief from my pain,

While, like lightning, she darts through each throbbing vein? My Senses surprised, in her favor took arms;

And Reason confirms me a slave to her charms.

John West [1693-1766]

A MAIDEN'S IDEAL OF A HUSBAND

From The Contrivances "

GENTEEL in personage,
Conduct, and equipage,
Noble by heritage,

Generous and free:
Brave, not romantic;
Learned, not pedantic;
Frolic, not frantic;

This must he be.

Honor maintaining,
Meanness disdaining,
Still entertaining,

Engaging and new.
Neat, but not finical;
Sage, but not cynical;
Never tyrannical,

But ever true.

Henry Carey [? -1743]

"PHILLADA FLOUTS ME'

O WHAT a plague is love!
How shall I bear it?
She will inconstant prove,
I greatly fear it.
She so torments my mind

That my strength faileth,
And wavers with the wind

As a ship saileth.

And yet it grieves my heart
So soon from her to part:

Death strike me with his dart!

Phillada flouts me.

Thou shalt eat crudded cream

All the year lasting,

And drink the crystal stream

Pleasant in tasting;

Whig and whey whilst thou lust,

And bramble-berries, Pie-lid and pastry-crust,

Pears, plums, and cherries.

Thy raiment shall be thin,
Made of a weevil's skin-
Yet all's not worth a pin!
Phillada flouts me.

In the last month of May
I made her posies;
I heard her often say
That she loved roses.
Cowslips and gillyflowers
And the white lily
I brought to deck the bowers

For my sweet Philly.
But she did all disdain,

And threw them back again;
Therefore 'tis flat and plain
Phillada flouts me.

Fair maiden, have a care,
And in time take me;

I can have those as fair
If you forsake me:
For Doll the dairy-maid
Laughed at me lately,
And wanton Winifred

Favors me greatly.