The FABLE of DRYOPE.
299
My sire, my sister, and my spouse farewell!
If in your breasts or love or pity dwell,
Protect: your plant, nor let my branches feel
The browzing cattel, or the piercing steel.
Farewell! and since I cannot bend to join
My lips to yours, advance at least to mine.
My son, thy mother's parting kiss receive,
While yet thy mother has a kiss to give.
I can no more; the creeping rind invades
My closing lips, and hides my head in shades:
Remove your hands, the bark shall soon suffice
Without their aid, to seal these dying eyes.
She ceas'd at once to speak, and ceas'd to be;
A4id all the nymph was lost within the tree:
Yet latent life thro' her new branches reign'd,
And long the plant a human heat retain'd.
If in your breasts or love or pity dwell,
Protect: your plant, nor let my branches feel
The browzing cattel, or the piercing steel.
Farewell! and since I cannot bend to join
My lips to yours, advance at least to mine.
My son, thy mother's parting kiss receive,
While yet thy mother has a kiss to give.
I can no more; the creeping rind invades
My closing lips, and hides my head in shades:
Remove your hands, the bark shall soon suffice
Without their aid, to seal these dying eyes.
She ceas'd at once to speak, and ceas'd to be;
A4id all the nymph was lost within the tree:
Yet latent life thro' her new branches reign'd,
And long the plant a human heat retain'd.
THE
