THE PHOENIX AND THE

TURTLE

LET the bird of loudest lay,
On the sole Arabian tree,
Herald sad and trumpet be,
To whose sound chaste wings obey.

But thou shrieking harbinger,
Foul precurrer of the fiend,

Augur of the fever's end,

To this troop come thou not near!

From this session interdict
Every fowl of tyrant wing,
Save the eagle, feather'd king:
Keep the obsequy so strict.

Let the priest in surplice white,
That defunctive music can,
Be the death-divining swan,
Lest the requiem lack his right.

And thou treble-dated crow,
That thy sable gender makest

With the breath thou givest and takest,
'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.

14. can, is accomplished in.
17. treble-dated, thrice as long-

lived as man.

18. gender, race.

ΤΟ

20

Here the anthem doth commence :
Love and constancy is dead;
Phoenix and the turtle fled
In a mutual flame from hence.

The Phoenix and the Turtle

Whereupon it made this threne
To the phoenix and the dove,
Co-supremes and stars of love,
As chorus to their tragic scene.

THRENOS.

Beauty, truth, and rarity,
Grace in all simplicity,

Here enclosed in cinders lie.

Death is now the phoenix' nest;
And the turtle's loyal breast
To eternity doth rest,

Leaving no posterity:
'Twas not their infirmity,
It was married chastity.

Truth may seem, but cannot be ;
Beauty brag, but 'tis not she ;

Truth and beauty buried be.

To this urn let those repair

That are either true or fair;
For these dead birds sigh a prayer.

49. threne, threnody, lamentation.

THE END

50

бо