A Song, 177 Rondelay, 178 A Song, 180 A Song to a fair young Lady, 181 Alexander's Feast, or the power of Music, an Ode, 183 Veni Creator Spiritus, paraphrased, 190 FABLES.--TALES FROM CHAUCER. Dedication to the Duke of Ormond, 195 Preface prefixed to the Fables, 205 Palamon and Arcite; or the Knight's Tale, 241 Dedication to the Duchess of Ormond, 245 The Cock and the Fox; or the Tale of the Nun's Priest, 327 The Flower and the Leaf; or the Lady in the Arbour, 356 The Wife of Bath, her Tale, 377 The Character of a good Parson, 395 FABLES.--TRANSLATIONS FROM BOCCACE. Sigismonda and Guiscardo, 403 Theodore and Honoria, 433 Cymon and Iphigenia, 452 EPISTLES. EPISTLE THE FIRST, TO HIS FRIEND JOHN HODDESDON, ON HIS DIVINE EPIGRAMS. These verses were rescued from oblivion by Mr Malone, having escaped the notice of Dryden's former editors. I have disposed them among the Epistles, that being the title which the author seems usually to have given to those copies of verses, which he sent to his friends upon their publications, and which, according to the custom of the time, were prefixed to the works to which they related. They form the second of our author's attempts at poetry hitherto discovered, the "Elegy upon Lord Hastings" being the first. The lines are distinguished by the hard and rugged versification, and strained conceit, which characterised English poetry before the Restoration. The title of Hoddesdon's book is a sufficiently odd one: "Sion and Parnassus, or Epigrams on several Texts of the Old and New Testaments," 8vo, 1650. Dryden was then a student in Trinity College, Cambridge, and about eighteen years old. The nature of the volume which called forth his poetical approbation, may lead us to suppose, that, at this time, he retained the puritanical principles in which he was doubtless educated. The verses are subscribed, _J. Dryden of Trin. C._ EPISTLE THE FIRST.