Εικόνες σελίδας
PDF
Ηλεκτρ. έκδοση

If now their finking state and low affairs
Can move your pity, and provoke your cares,
Fresh burning thyme before their cells convey,
And cut their dry and husky wax away;

For often lizards seize the luscious spoils,

Or drones that riot on another's toils:

Oft broods of moths infeft the hungry fwarms,
And oft the furious wafp their hive alarms
With louder hums, and with unequal arms;
Or else the spider at the entrance sets

Her fnares, and spins her bowels into nets.
When fickness reigns (for they as well as we
Feel all th' effects of frail mortality)

By certain marks the new disease is seen,

Their colour changes, and their looks are thin,
Their funeral rites are form'd, and ev'ry bee
With grief attends the fad folemnity;
The few difeas'd furvivors hang before

Their fickly cells, and droop about the door,
Or flowly in their hives their limbs unfold,
Shrunk пр with hunger, and benumb'd with cold;
In drawling hums the feeble infects grieve,

And doleful buzzes echo thro' the hive,

Like winds that foftly murmur thro' the trees,

Like flames pent up, or like retiring seas.

}

Now

Now lay fresh honey near their empty rooms,
In troughs of hollow reeds, whilft frying gums
Caft round a fragrant mist of spicy fumes.
Thus kindly tempt the famish'd swarm to eat,
And gently reconcile 'em to their meat.

Mix juice of galls, and wine, that grow in time
Condens'd by fire, and thicken to a flime;
To thefe dry'd rofes, thyme and centry join,
And raifins ripen'd on the Pythian vine.

Befides there grows a flow'r in marihy ground
Its name Amellus, eafy to be found;

A mighty fpring works in its root, and cleaves
The fprouting ftalk, and fhews itself in leaves;
The flow'r itself is of a golden hue,

The leaves inclining to a darker blue ;

The leaves fhoot thick about the flow'r, and grow
Into a bush, and shade the turf below:
The plant in holy garlands often twines
The altars' pofts, and beautifies the fhrines
Its tafte is fharp, in vales new-fhorn it grows,
Where Mella's ftream in watry mazes flows.
Take plenty of its roots, and boil 'em well
In wine, and heap 'em up before the cell.

But if the whole stock fail, and none furvive;

To raife new people, and recruit the hive,

I'll here the great experiment declare,

That fpread th' Arcadian fhepherd's name fo far.

[blocks in formation]

}

How

How bees from blood of flaughter'd bulls have fled,
And swarm amidft the red corruption bred.

For where th' Egyptians yearly see their bounds
Refresh'd with floods, and fail about their grounds,
Where Perfia borders, and the rolling Nile
Drives swiftly down the fwarthy Indians foil,
"Till into feven it multiplies its ftream,
And fattens Egypt with a fruitful slime:
In this last practice all their hope remains,
And long experience juftifies their pains.

First then a clofe contracted space of ground,

With ftraiten'd walls and low built roof they found;

A narrow fhelving light is next affign'd

To all the quarters, one to every

wind

Through thefe the glancing rays obliquely pierce:
Hither they lead a bull that's young and fierce,
When two-years growth of horn he proudly shows,
And shakes the comely terrors of his brows:
His nofe and mouth, the avenues of breath,
They muzzle up, and beat his limbs to death.
With violence to life and ftifling pain

He flings and fpurns, and tries to fnort in vain;
Loud heavy mows fall thick on every fide,
'Till his bruis'd bowels burft within the hide.
When dead, they leave him rotting on the ground,
With branches, thyme, and caflia, ftrow'd around.

All

All this is done when firft the western breeze

Becalms the year, and smooths the troubled feas;
Before the chattering fwallow builds her nest,
Or fields in fpring's embroidery are drest.
Mean while the tainted juice ferments within,
And quickens as it works: And now are seen
A wondrous fwarm, that o'er the carcafe crawls,
Of fhapeless, rude, unfinish'd animals,

No legs at firft the infect's weight sustain,

At length it moves its new-made limbs with pain;
Now ftrikes the air with quiv'ring wings, and tries
To lift its body up, and learns to rise;

Now bending thighs and gilded wings it wears
Full grown, and all the bee at length appears;
From every fide the fruitful carcafs pours
Its fwarming brood, as thick as fummer fhow'rs,
Or flights of arrows from the Parthian bows,
When twanging strings first shoot 'em on the foes.
Thus have I fung the nature of the bee ;

While Cæfar, tow'ring to divinity,

The frighted Indians with his thunder aw'd,

And claim'd their homage, and commenc'd a God;
I flourish'd all the while in arts of peace,
Retir'd and shelter'd in inglorious ease:
I who before the fongs of fhepherds made,
When gay and young my rural lays I play'd,
And fet my Tityrus beneath his fhade.

Ꭰ .

}

A SONG

A SONG. For St. CECILIA's Day at Oxford.

I.

CECILIA, whofe exalted hymns
With joy and wonder fill the bleft,
In choirs of warbling feraphims

Known and diftinguith'd from the reft,

Attend, harmonious faint, and see

Thy vocal fons of harmony;

Attend, harmonious faint, and hear our pray'rs;
Enliven all our earthly airs,

And, as thou fing'ft thy God, teach us to fing of thee:
Tune ev'ry string and ev'ry tongue,
Be thou the Mufe and fubject of our fong.

II.

Let all Cecilia's praise proclaim,

Employ the echo in her name.

Hark how the flutes and trumpets raife,
At bright Cecilia's name, their lays;

The organ labours in her praife.

Cecilia's name does all our numbers grace,
From ev'ry voice the tuneful accents fly,
In foaring trebles now it rifes high,

And now it finks, and dwells upon the bafe.

Cecilia's

« ΠροηγούμενηΣυνέχεια »