THE GIRL DESCRIBES HER FAWN With sweetest milk and sugar first It wax'd more white and sweet than they — I blush'd to see its foot more soft I have a garden of my own, And all the spring-time of the year Have sought it oft, where it should lie; For in the flaxen lilies' shade Had it lived long, it would have been Andrew Marvell FAIRY SONGS I Where the bee sucks, there suck I: There I couch, when owls do cry: On the bat's back I do fly After summer merrily. Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, Under the blossom that hangs on the bough! 2 Come unto these yellow sands, And then take hands: The wild waves whist, Foot it featly here and there; And, sweet Sprites, the burthen bear. Bow-wow. The watch-dogs bark: Bow-wow. Hark, hark! I hear The strain of strutting chanticleer William Shakespeare John Milton, Died 1674 Robert Bulwer Lytton, Born 1831 November the Eighth A BRIDAL SONG Roses, their sharp spines being gone, Primrose, first-born child of Ver, Oxlips in their cradles growing, All, dear Nature's children sweet, Not an angel of the air, Be absent hence! The crow, the slanderous cuckoo, nor May on our bride-house perch or sing, But from it fly. Beaumont and Fletcher COME, THOU MONARCH OF THE VINE Come, thou monarch of the vine, William Shakespeare PERFECT BEAUTY It was a beauty that I saw So pure, so perfect, as the frame A skein of silk without a knot, A printed book without a blot, Ben Jonson Oliver Goldsmith, Born 1728 November the Tenth MEMORY When to the sessions of sweet silent thought Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow, Then can I grieve at grievances foregone, But if the while I think on thee, dear Friend, All losses are restored, and sorrows end. William Shakespeare SLEEP Come, Sleep: O Sleep! the certain knot of peace, With shield of proof shield me from out the prease I will good tribute pay, if thou do so. Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed, And if these things, as being thine in right, Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me, Sir Philip Sidney |