brains so sure locked up, That they remembered nothing.

Queen Mab and her light maids, the while, Amongst themselves do closely smile, To see the King caught with this wile, With one another jesting: And to the Fairy Court they went, With mickle joy and merriment, Which thing was done with good intent, And thus I left them feasting.

p. 117POPE’S Rape of the Lock.

p. 117

AN HEROI-COMICAL POEM.

AN HEROI-COMICAL POEM.

CONTENTS

Nolueram, Belinda, tuos violare capillos; Sed juvat, hoc precibus me tribuisse tuis.

—Mart., Epigr. xii. 84.

Mart

CANTO I.

What dire offence from amorous causes springs, What mighty contests rise from trivial things, I sing—This verse to Caryl, Muse! is due: This, even Belinda may vouchsafe to view: Slight is the subject, but not so the praise, If she inspire, and he approve my lays.

What

Say what strange motive, Goddess! could compel A well-bred lord to assault a gentle belle? O say what stranger cause, yet unexplored, Could make a gentle belle reject a lord? In tasks so bold, can little men engage, And in soft bosoms dwells such mighty rage?

Sol through white curtains shot a timorous ray, And oped those eyes that must eclipse the day: Now lap-dogs give themselves the rousing shake, And sleepless lovers, just at twelve, awake: Thrice rung the bell, the slipper knocked the ground, And the pressed watch returned a silver sound. Belinda still her downy pillow pressed, Her guardian Sylph prolonged the balmy rest; ’Twas he had summoned to her silent bed The morning-dream that hovered o’er her head; A youth more glittering than a birth-night beau, (That even in slumber caused her cheek to glow) Seemed to her ear his winning lips to lay, And thus in whispers said, or seemed to say:

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