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      O it has ruffled every spirit there,

       Saving love’s self, who stands superb to share

       The general gladness: awfully he stands;

       A sovereign quell is in his waving hands;

       No sight can bear the lightning of his bow;

       His quiver is mysterious, none can know What themselves think of it; from forth his eyes

       There darts strange light of varied hues and dyes:

       A scowl is sometimes on his brow, but who

       Look full upon it feel anon the blue

       Of his fair eyes run liquid through their souls.

       Endymion feels it, and no more controls

       The burning prayer within him; so, bent low,

       He had begun a plaining of his woe.

       But Venus, bending forward, said: “My child,

       Favour this gentle youth; his days are wild With love–he–but alas! too well I see

       Thou know’st the deepness of his misery.

       Ah, smile not so, my son: I tell thee true,

       That when through heavy hours I used to rue

       The endless sleep of this new-born Adon’,

       This stranger ay I pitied. For upon

       A dreary morning once I fled away

       Into the breezy clouds, to weep and pray

       For this my love: for vexing Mars had teaz’d

       Me even to tears: thence, when a little eas’d, Down-looking, vacant, through a hazy wood,

       I saw this youth as he despairing stood:

       Those same dark curls blown vagrant in the wind;

       Those same full fringed lids a constant blind

       Over his sullen eyes: I saw him throw

       Himself on wither’d leaves, even as though

       Death had come sudden; for no jot he mov’d,

       Yet mutter’d wildly. I could hear he lov’d

       Some fair immortal, and that his embrace

       Had zoned her through the night. There is no trace Of this in heaven: I have mark’d each cheek,

       And find it is the vainest thing to seek;

       And that of all things ’tis kept secretest.

       Endymion! one day thou wilt be blest:

       So still obey the guiding hand that fends

       Thee safely through these wonders for sweet ends.

       ’Tis a concealment needful in extreme;

       And if I guess’d not so, the sunny beam

       Thou shouldst mount up to with me. Now adieu!

       Here must we leave thee.”–At these words up flew The impatient doves, up rose the floating car,

       Up went the hum celestial. High afar

       The Latmian saw them minish into nought;

       And, when all were clear vanish’d, still he caught

       A vivid lightning from that dreadful bow.

       When all was darkened, with Etnean throe

       The earth clos’d–gave a solitary moan–

       And left him once again in twilight lone.

      He did not rave, he did not stare aghast,

       For all those visions were o’ergone, and past, And he in loneliness: he felt assur’d

       Of happy times, when all he had endur’d

       Would seem a feather to the mighty prize.

       So, with unusual gladness, on he hies

       Through caves, and palaces of mottled ore,

       Gold dome, and crystal wall, and turquois floor,

       Black polish’d porticos of awful shade,

       And, at the last, a diamond balustrade,

       Leading afar past wild magnificence,

       Spiral through ruggedest loopholes, and thence Stretching across a void, then guiding o’er

       Enormous chasms, where, all foam and roar,

       Streams subterranean tease their granite beds;

       Then heighten’d just above the silvery heads

       Of a thousand fountains, so that he could dash

       The waters with his spear; but at the splash,

       Done heedlessly, those spouting columns rose

       Sudden a poplar’s height, and ‘gan to enclose

       His diamond path with fretwork, streaming round

       Alive, and dazzling cool, and with a sound, Haply, like dolphin tumults, when sweet shells

       Welcome the float of Thetis. Long he dwells

       On this delight; for, every minute’s space,

       The streams with changed magic interlace:

       Sometimes like delicatest lattices,

       Cover’d with crystal vines; then weeping trees,

       Moving about as in a gentle wind,

       Which, in a wink, to watery gauze refin’d,

       Pour’d into shapes of curtain’d canopies,

       Spangled, and rich with liquid broideries Of flowers, peacocks, swans, and naiads fair.

       Swifter than lightning went these wonders rare;

       And then the water, into stubborn streams

       Collecting, mimick’d the wrought oaken beams,

       Pillars, and frieze, and high fantastic roof,

       Of those dusk places in times far aloof

       Cathedrals call’d. He bade a loth farewel

       To these founts Protean, passing gulph, and dell,

       And torrent, and ten thousand jutting shapes,

       Half seen through deepest gloom, and griesly gapes, Blackening on every side, and overhead

       A vaulted dome like Heaven’s, far bespread

       With starlight gems: aye, all so huge and strange,

       The solitary felt a hurried change

       Working within him into something dreary,–

       Vex’d like a morning eagle, lost, and weary,

       And purblind amid foggy, midnight wolds.

       But he revives at once: for who beholds

       New sudden things, nor casts his mental slough?

       Forth from a rugged arch, in the dusk below, Came mother Cybele! alone–alone–

       In sombre chariot; dark foldings thrown

       About her majesty, and front death-pale,

       With turrets crown’d. Four maned lions hale

       The sluggish wheels; solemn their toothed maws,

       Their surly eyes brow-hidden, heavy paws

       Uplifted drowsily, and nervy tails

       Cowering their tawny brushes. Silent sails

       This shadowy queen athwart, and faints away

      In another gloomy arch.

      Wherefore delay,

      Young traveller, in such a mournful place?

       Art thou wayworn, or canst not further trace

       The diamond path? And does it indeed

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