The wanton Troopers riding
Have shot my Faun and it will dye.
Ungentle men!
They cannot
To kill thee.
Thou neer didst
Them any harm: alas nor
Thy death yet do them any good.
I'me sure I never wisht them ill;
Nor do I for all this; nor will:
But, if my simple Pray'rs may
Prevail with Heaven to
Thy murder,
I will Joyn my
Rather then fail.
But,
O my fears!
It cannot dye so.
Heavens
Keeps register of every thing:
And nothing may we use in vain.
Ev'n Beasts must be with justice slain;
Else Men are made their Deodands.
Though they should wash their guilty
In this warm life blood, which doth
From thine, and wound me to the Heart,
Yet could they not be clean: their
Is dy'd in such a Purple Grain.
There is not such another
The World, to offer for their Sin,
Unconstant Sylvio, when yetI had not found him counterfeit,
One morning (I remember well)Ty'd in this silver Chain and Bell,
Gave it to me: nay and I
What he said then;
I'm sure I do.
Said He, look how your Huntsman
Hath taught a Faun to hunt his Dear.
But Sylvio soon had me beguil'd.
This waxed tame; while he grew wild,
And quite regardless of my Smart,
Left me his Faun, but took his Heart.
Thenceforth I set my self to
My solitary time away,
With this: and very well content,
Could so mine idle Life have spent.
For it was full of sport; and
Of foot, and heart; and did invite,
Me to its game: it seem'd to
Its self in me.
How could I
Than love it?
O I cannot
Unkind, t' a Beast that loveth me.
Had it liv'd long,
I do not
Whether it too might have done
As Sylvio did: his Gifts might
Perhaps as false or more than he.
But I am sure, for ought that
Could in so short a time espie,
Thy Love was far more better
The love of false and cruel men.
With sweetest milk, and sugar, firstI it at mine own fingers nurst.
And as it grew, so every
It wax'd more white and sweet than they.
It had so sweet a Breath!
And oftI blusht to see its foot more soft,
And white, (shall I say then my hand?)Nay any Ladies of the Land.
It is a wond'rous thing, how
Twas on those little silver feet.
With what a pretty skipping grace,
It oft would callenge me the Race:
And when 'thad left me far away,'T would stay, and run again, and stay.
For it was nimbler much than Hindes;
And trod, as on the four Winds.
I have a Garden of my own,
But so with Roses over grown,
And Lillies, that you would it
To be a little Wilderness.
And all the Spring time of the
It onely loved to be there.
Among the beds of Lillyes,
Have sought it oft, where it should lye;
Yet could not, till it self would rise,
Find it, although before mine Eyes.
For, in the flaxen Lillies shade,
It like a bank of Lillies laid.
Upon the Roses it would feed,
Until its lips ev'n seem'd to bleed:
And then to me 'twould boldly trip,
And print those Roses on my Lip.
But all its chief delight was
On Roses thus its self to fill:
And its pure virgin Limbs to
In whitest sheets of Lillies cold.
Had it liv'd long, it would have
Lillies without,
Roses within.
O help!
O help!
I see it faint:
And dye as calmely as a Saint.
See how it weeps.
The Tears do
Sad, slowly dropping like a Gumme.
So weeps the wounded Balsome:
The holy Frankincense doth flow.
The brotherless
Melt in such Amber Tears as these.
I in a golden Vial
Keep these two crystal Tears; and
It till it do o'reflow with mine;
Then place it in Diana's Shrine.
Now my sweet Faun is vanish'd
Whether the Swans and Turtles
In fair Elizium to endure,
With milk-white Lambs, and Ermins pure.
O do not run too fast: for
Will but bespeak thy Grave, and dye.
First my unhappy Statue
Be cut in Marble; and withal,
Let it be weeping too: but
Th' Engraver sure his Art may spare;
For I so truly thee bemoane,
That I shall weep though I be Stone:
Until my Tears, still dropping,
My breast, themselves engraving there.
There at my feet shalt thou be laid,
Of purest Alabaster made:
For I would have thine Image
White as I can, though not as Thee.
