History of English Literature Volume 1 (of 3)Taine, Hippolyte
History
History of English Literature Volume 1 (of 3)
Taine, Hippolyte
English literature -- History and criticism
"Shortly unto the wastefull woods she came,
Whereas she found the goddesse (Diana) with her crew,
After late chace of their embrewed game,
Sitting beside a fountaine in a rew;
Some of them washing with the liquid dew
From off their dainty limbs the dusty sweat
And soyle, which did deforme their lively hew;
Others lay shaded from the scorching heat,
The rest upon her person gave attendance great.
She, having hong upon a bough on high
Her bow and painted quiver, had unlaste
Her silver buskins from her nimble thigh,
And her lanck loynes ungirt, and brests unbraste,
After her heat the breathing cold to taste;
Her golden lockes, that late in tresses bright
Embreaded were for hindring of her haste,
Now loose about her shoulders hong undight,
And were with sweet Ambrosia all besprinckled light."[364]
Diana, surprised thus, repulses Venus, "and gan to smile, in scorne of
her vaine playnt," swearing that if she should catch Cupid, she would
clip his wanton wings. Then she took pity on the afflicted goddess, and
set herself with her to look for the fugitive. They came to the "shady
covert" where Chrysogone, in her sleep, had given birth "unawares" to
two lovely girls, "as faire as springing day." Diana took one, and made
her the purest of all virgins. Venus carried off the other to the Garden
of Adonis, "the first seminary of all things, that are borne to live and
dye"; where Psyche, the bride of Love, disports herself; where Pleasure,
their daughter, wantons with the Graces; where Adonis, "lapped in
flowres and pretious spycery, liveth in eternal bliss," and came back
to life through the breath of immortal Love. She brought her up as her
daughter, selected her to be the most faithful of loves, and after long
trials, gave her hand to the good knight Sir Scudamore.
That is the kind of thing we meet with in the wondrous forest. Are you
ill at ease there, and do you wish to leave it because it is wondrous?
At every bend in the alley, at every change of the light, a stanza, a
word, reveals a landscape or an apparition. It is morning, the white
dawn gleams faintly through the trees; bluish vapors veil the horizon,
and vanish in the smiling air; the springs tremble and murmur faintly
amongst the mosses, and on high the poplar leaves begin to stir and
flutter like the wings of butterflies. A knight alights from his horse,
a valiant knight, who has unhorsed many a Saracen, and experienced many
an adventure. He unlaces his helmet, and on a sudden you perceive the
cheeks of a young girl:
"Which doft, her golden lockes, that were upbound
Still in a knot, unto her heeles downe traced,
And like a silken veile in compasse round
About her backe and all her bodie wound;
Like as the shining skie in summers night,
What time the dayes with scorching heat abound,
Is creasted all with lines of firie light,
That it prodigious seemes in common peoples sight."[365]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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