Oh! blest without alloy,
And now enrich'd with all that faith can claim, 290
Look down entreated by whatever name,
If Damon please thee most (that rural sound)
Shall oft with ecchoes fill the groves around)
Or if Diodatus, by which alone
In those ethereal mansions thou art known.
Thy blush was maiden, and thy youth the taste
Of wedded bliss knew never, pure and chaste,
The honours, therefore, by divine decree
The lot of virgin worth are giv'n to thee;
Thy brows encircled with a radiant band, 300
And the green palm-branch waving in thy hand
Thou immortal Nuptials shalt rejoice
And join with seraphs thy according voice,
Where rapture reigns, and the ecstatic lyre
Guides the blest orgies of the blazing quire.
1 A river in Sicily.
2 Subject of Theocritus's Lament for Daphnis (Idyl i) in which
Thyrsis is the mourning shepherd. Hylas was taken away by nymphs
who admired his beauty and Bion is the subject of Moschus's
Epitaph of Bion (Idyl iii).
3 Goddess who was protector of the flocks. Faunus is god of the
plains and hills around Rome.
4 Characters in Ovid's Metamorphoses.
5 A river near St. Albans. Cassivellaunus was a British chieftan
who opposed Caesar. See Gallic War (v, xi.
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