Page:Shakespeare Collection of Poems.djvu/49

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
VENUS and ADONIS.
37
Whereat amaz'd, as one that unaware
Hath dropt a precious Jewel in the flood,
Or 'stonisht as night-wanderers often are,
Their light blown out in some mistrustful wood:
Even so confounded in the dark she lay,
Having lost the fair discovery of her way.

And now she beats her heart, whereat it groans,
That all the neighbour-caves as seeming troubled,
Make verbal repetition of her moans:
Passion on passion, deeply is redoubled:
Ay me, she cryes, and twenty times, woe, woe,
And twenty ecchoes twenty times cry so.

She marking them, begins a wailing note,
And sings extemp'rally a woful ditty,
How love makes young men thrall, and old men dote,
How love is wise in folly, foolish witty:
Her heavy anthem stili concludes in woe,
And still the Quire of Ecchoes answers so.

Her song was tedious, and outwore the night,
For lovers hours are long, though seeming short:
It pleas'd themselves, others they think delight
In such like circumstance, with such like sport.
Their copious Stories, oftentimes begun,
End without audience, and are never done.

For who hath she to spend the night withal
But idle sounds, resembling Parasites,

Like