The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia
manful wound, swearing by much, it was not well such beasts should be
suffered in a commonwealth. And then my governor, as full of joy, as
before of fear, came dancing and singing before, as even now you saw
him.” “Well, well,” said Basilius, “I have not chosen Dametas for his
fighting, nor for his discoursing but for his plainness and honesty,
and therein I know he will not deceive me.” But then he told Pamela
(not so much because she should know it, as because he would tell it)
the wonderful act Zelmane had performed, which Gynecia likewise spoke
of, both in such extremity of praising, as was easy to be seen, the
construction of their speech might best be made by the grammar rules
of affection. Basilius told with what a gallant grace she ran with the
lion’s head in her hand, like another Pallas with the spoils of
Gorgon. Gynecia swore she saw the very face of the young Hercules
killing the Nemean lion; and all with a grateful assent confirmed the
same praises; only poor Dorus (though of equal desert, yet not
proceeding of equal estate) should have been less forgotten, had not
Zelmane again with great admiration begun to speak of him; asking
whether it were the fashion or no in Arcadia that shepherds should
perform such valorous enterprises.
This Basilius, having the quick sense of a lover, took, as though his
mistress had given him a secret reprehension, that he had not showed
more gratefulness to Dorus; and therefore as nimbly as he could,
enquired of his estate, adding promise of great rewards, among the
rest, offering to him, if he would exercise his courage in soldiery,
he would commit some charge unto him under his lieutenant Philanax.
But Dorus, whose ambition climbed by another stair, having first
answered touching his estate that he was brother to the shepherd
Menalcas, who among other was wont to resort to the prince’s presence,
and excused his going to soldiery by the unaptness he found in himself
that way, he told Basilius that his brother in his last testament had
willed him to serve Dametas, and therefore, for due obedience
thereunto, he would think his service greatly rewarded if he might
obtain by that means to live in the sight of the prince and yet
practice his own chosen vocation. Basilius, liking well his goodly
shape and handsome manner, charged Dametas to receive him like a son
into his house, saying, that his valour, and Dametas’s truth would be
{97} good bulwarks against such mischiefs, as, he sticked not to say,
were threatened to his daughter Pamela.
Dametas, no whit out of countenance with all that had been said,
because he had no worse to fall into than his own, accepted Dorus; and
withal telling Basilius that some of the shepherds were come, demanded
in what place he would see their sports, who first was curious to know
whether it were not more requisite for Zelmane’s hurt to rest than sit
up at those pastimes: and she, that felt no wound but one, earnestly
desired to have the pastorals. Basilius commanded it should be at the
gate of the lodge, where the throne of the prince being, according to
the ancient manner, he made Zelmane sit between him and his wife
therein, who thought herself between drowning and burning, and the two
young ladies of either side the throne, and so prepared their eyes and
ears to be delighted by the shepherds.
But, before all of them were assembled to begin their sports, there
came a fellow who being out of breath, or seeming so to be for haste,
with humble hastiness told Basilius, that his mistress, the lady
Cecropia, had sent him to excuse the mischance of her beast ranging in
that dangerous sort, being happened by the folly of the keeper, who
thinking himself able to rule them, had carried them abroad, and so
was deceived: whom yet, if Basilius would punish for it, she was ready
to deliver. Basilius made no other answer, but that his mistress, if
she had any more such beasts, should cause them to be killed: and then
he told his wife and Zelmane of it, because they should not fear those
woods, as though they harboured such beasts where the like had never
been seen. But Gynecia took a further conceit of it, mistrusting
greatly Cecropia, because she had heard much of the devilish
wickedness of her heart, and that particularly she did her best to
bring up her son Amphialus, being brother’s son to Basilius, to aspire
to the crown as next heir male after Basilius, and therefore saw no
reason but that she might conjecture, it proceeded rather of some
mischievous practice, than of misfortune. Yet did she only utter her
doubt to her daughters, thinking, since the worst was past, she would
attend a further occasion, lest overmuch haste might seem to proceed
of the ordinary mislike between sisters-in-law only they marvelled
that Basilius looked no further into it, who, good man, thought so
much of his late conceived commonwealth, that all other matters were
but digressions unto him. But the shepherds were ready, and with well
handling themselves, called their senses to attend their pastimes.
Basilius, because Zelmane so would have it, used the artificial day of
torches, to lighten the sports their invention could minister: and
because many of the shepherds were but newly come, he did {98} in a
gentle manner chastise their negligence, with making them, for that
night the torch bearers; and the others he willed with all freedom of
speech and behaviour to keep their accustomed method, which while they
prepared to do, Dametas, who much disdained, since his late authority,
all his old companions, brought his servant Dorus in good acquaintance
and allowance of them, and himself stood like a director over them,
with nodding, gaping, winking, or stamping, showing how he did like or
mislike those things he did not understand. The first sports the
shepherds showed were full of such leaps and gambols as being
according to the pipe which they bore in their mouths, even as they
danced, made a right picture of their chief god Pan, and his
companions the Satyrs. Then would they cast away their pipes, and
holding hand in hand dance as it were in a brawl, by the only cadence
of their voices, which they would use in singing some short couplets,
whereto the one half beginning, the other half should answer as the
one half, saying:
We love, and have our loves rewarded.
The other would answer,
We love, and are no whit regarded.
The first again,
We find most sweet affection’s snare.
With like tune it should be as in a choir sent back again,
That sweet, but sour, despairful care.
A third time likewise thus:
Who can despair, whom hope doth bear?
The answer,
And who can hope that feels despair?
Then joining all their voices, and dancing a faster measure, they
would conclude with some such words:
As without breath no pipe doth move,
No music kindly without love.
Having thus varied both their song and dances into divers sorts of
inventions, their last sport was, one of them to provoke another to a
more large expressing of his passions: which Thyrsis (accounted one of
the best singers amongst them) having marked in Dorus’s dancing, no
less good grace and handsome behaviour than extreme tokens of a
troubled mind, began first with his pipe, and then with his voice,
thus to challenge Dorus, and was by him answered in the under-written
sort.
THE FIRST ECLOGUES
{99}
THYRSIS and DORUS
THYRSIS
Come Dorus, come, let songs thy sorrows signify,
And if for want of use thy mind ashamed is,
That very shame with love’s high title dignify.
No style is held for base where love well named is:
Each ear sucks up the words a true-love scattereth,
And plain speech oft, than quaint phrase better framed is.
DORUS
Nightingales seldom sing, the pie still chattereth,
The wood cries most, before it thoroughly kindled be,
Deadly wounds inward bleed, each slight sore mattereth.
Hardly they heard, which by good hunters singled be:
Shallow brooks murmur most, deep, silent slide away,
Nor true-love, his love with others mingled be.
THYRSIS
If thou wilt not be seen, thy face go hide away,
Be none of us, or else maintain our fashion:
Who frowns at others’ feasts, doth better bide away.
But if thou hast a love, in that love’s passion,
I challenge thee by show of her perfection,
Which of us two deserveth most compassion.
DORUS
Thy challenge great, but greater my protection:
Sing then, and see (for now thou hast inflamed me)
Thy health too mean a match for my infection.
No, though the heaven’s for high attempts have blamed me,
Yet high is my attempt. O Muse historify
Her praise, whose praise to learn your skill hath framed me.
THYRSIS
Muse hold your peace, but thou my god Pan glorify
My Kala’s gifts, who with all good gifts filled is.
Thy pipe, O Pan, shall help, though I sing sorrily.
A heap of sweets she is, where nothing spilled is;
Who though she be no Bee, yet full of honey is:
A Lily-field, with plough of Rose which tilled is:
Mild as a lamb, more dainty than a coney is:
Her eyes my eye-sight is, her conversation
More glad to me than to a miser money is.
What coy account she makes of estimation?
How nice to touch? how all her speeches poised be?
A nymph thus turned, but mended in translation.
DORUS
Such Kala is: but ah my fancies raised be
In one, whose name to name were high presumption,
Since virtue’s all, to make her title pleased be.
{100}
O happy gods, which by inward assumption
Enjoy her soul, in body’s fair possession,
And keep it join’d, fearing your seat’s consumption.
How oft with rain of tears skies make confession,
Their dwellers wrapt with sight of her perfection,
From heav’nly throne to her heav’n use digression?
Of best things then what world shall yield confection
To liken her? deck yours with your comparison:
She is herself of best things the collection.
THYRSIS
How oft my doleful sire cry’d to me, “Tarry son,”
When first he spied my love! how oft he said to me,
“Thou art no soldier fit for Cupid’s garrison?
My son keep this, that my long toil hath laid to me:
Love well thine own, methinks wool’s whiteness passeth all:
I never found long love such wealth hath paid to me.”
This wind he spent: but when my Kala glasseth all
My sight in her fair limbs, I then assure myself,
Not rotten sheep, but high crowns she surpasseth all.
Can I be poor, that her gold hair procure myself?
Want I white wool, whose eyes her white skin garnished?
’Till I get her, shall I to keep inure myself?
DORUS
How oft, when reason saw, love of her harnessed
With armour of my heart, he cried, “O vanity!
To set a pearl in steel so meanly varnished?
Look to thyself, reach not beyond humanity.
Her mind, beams, state, far from the weak wings banished;
And love which lover hurts is inhumanity.”
Thus reason said: but she came, reason vanished;
Her eyes so mastering me, that such objection
Seem’d but to spoil the food of thoughts long famished.
Her peerless height my mind to high erection
Draws up; and if hope-failing end life’s pleasure,
Of fairer death how can I make election?
THYRSIS
Once my well-waiting eyes espy’d my treasure,
With sleeves turn’d up, loose hair, and breasts enlarged,
Her father’s corn, moving her fair limbs, measure.
“O,” cried I, “if so mean work be discharged:
Measure my case how by thy beauty’s filling,
With seed of woes my heart brim-full is charg’d.
Thy father bids thee save, and chides for spilling;
Save then my soul, spill not my thoughts well heap’d,
No lovely praise was ever got by killing.”
Those bold words she did bear, this fruit I reaped,