dawn, and wanders into a garden of pleasance and delight. Aurora, with her countenance sweet yet pale, and her mantle bordered with sable, had not yet unclosed the curtains of the couch within which lay Flora, the goddess of flowers, but a delicious fragrance was breathed from its flowery carpet, and a rich melodious song burst from the groves around it:

"The fragrant flouris blomand in their seis,1
Ourspreid the levis of Nature's tapestries;
Abone the quhilk, with heavenly harmonies,
The birdes sat on twistes and on greis,2
Melodiously makand their kindlie gleis,
Quhais schill3 notis fordinned all the skyis;
Of repercussit air the echo cryis,
Amang the branches of the blomeid treis,
And on the laurers silver droppis lyis.
"Quhile that I roumed in that paradyce,
Replenished and full of all delice,6
Out of the sea Eous lift his heid,7
I meneR the hors quhilk drawis at device
The assiltrie and golden chair of price

Of Tytan, quhilk at morrow semis reid;
The new colour that all the nicht lay deid
Is restorit, baith foulis, flouris, and rice9

Recomfort was, throw Phoebus gudlyheid.
"The daisy and the mariguld unlappit,
Quhilks10 all the nycht lay with their levis happit,
Thame to preserve fra reumes11 pungitive,
The umbrate treis, that Titan about wappit,
War portrait and out fra eirth yschappit,
Be golden bemis vivificative,

Quhair amené heit is maist restorative;

The gresshopperis amangst the vergeris12 gnappit,
And beis wrocht material for their hive.

"Richt hailsum1 was the sessoun2 of the yeir,
Phoebus furth yet depured bemis cleir,

Maist nutritive till all things vegetant;
God Eolus of wind durst nocht appeir;
Nor auld Saturne, with his mortal speir
And bad aspect-contrair till every plant,
Neptunus n'old3 within that palice hant;
The bereall stremis1 rynnand men mich heir;
By bonkes grene with glancis variant."

It will be instantly perceived by the reader, that the language in these verses is more obscure and latinized, and the rhythm less melodious, than in the earlier poetry of Dunbar; yet, if we attend to the rules given by Mr. Tyrwhitt for the proper reading of Chaucer, and make allowance for a little learned affectation in the idiom, the description will be found both harmonious and poetical. To cast it into a modern dress is not so easy, however, as in the case of Dunbar. Let us attempt it:

"In broider'd beds unnumber'd flowers were seen,
Of Nature's couch the living tapestry;
And, hid within their leafy curtains green,
The little birds pour'd forth such harmony,
As fill'd my very heart with joy and glee;
A flood of music follow'd, wave on wave,
Which Echo answered from her airy cave;
And, sprinkled o'er the laurels blooming near,

The silver dew-drops shone, like diamonds bright and

clear.

"Whilst in this paradise my senses fed,

And fill'd my heart with every rich delight,

Up from the sea Eous raised his head,

I mean the horse to whose ætherial might

Is given to draw the golden chariot bright

Of Titan-which by night looks dark and dead,
But changeth in the morn to ruby red;

Whilst birds, and fields, and flowers, on holm and hight,
New life assume in glittering vests bedight.

"The daisy sweet, the marigold and rose,
That all the night their silken buds did close,
Lest icy rimes their tender twigs should sear,
Expanded fragrant; and, as Titan rose,
Each ancient tree his greeny glories shows.
Emerging joyous from the darkness drear,
All living things the kindly warmth did cheer;
The idle grasshoppers both chirpt and play'd,
The sweet laborious bees melodious music made.
"Delightful was the season, May's first hour,
The glorious sun uprising in his power,

Bathed with a kindly heat all growing things,
Nor boisterous Eolus, with blast and shower,
Nor Saturn, with his aspect sad and sour,

Dar'd in that place unfurl his icy wings,
But sweet Favonius thither fragrance brings,
And little streams, half-hid in moss, do run,
Making a pleasant chime, and glancing in the sun."

Encircled with these varied delights, the poet desires anxiously to pour forth a strain worthy of the occasion, to

"Nature queen, and eke to lusty May;"

when, for what reason he fails to inform us, his faculties become weak, and he is seized with a trembling which incapacitates him

"With spreit arraisit, and every wit away,

Quaking for fear both pulse and vein and nervis." Upon this he very sensibly determines to go home, but is suddenly arrested on his road by an extraordinary incident, which he thus describes:"Out of the air cam ane impressioun, Throu quhais licht in extacie or soun

Amid the virgultis, all intill a fary,1

As feminine so feblet fell I down;

And with that gleme sa desyit was my micht,
Quhell thair remanet nouther voice nor sicht,
Breith, motion, nor heiring naturall;

Saw never man so faint a levand2 wicht;

3

And na ferly, for ouer excelland licht

Corruptes the wit, aud garris1 the blude availl,
Until the hart thocht it na danger aill.
Quhen it is smorit, memberis wirkis nocht richt,
The dreidful terrour swa did me assaill.

"Yet at the last, I n't how long a space,

A lytte heit? appeirit in my face,

Quhilks had tofoir bene paill and voide of blude:
Tho in my sueven9 I met a ferly1o cace ;-
I thocht me set within a desert place,

Amidst a forest by a hideous flude,

With grysly fische; and schortly till conclude,
I sall descryve as God will give me grace,

My visioun in rural termis rude."

.

The language here is so antique and remote from English, that a translation must be attempted:

"Forth from the skies a sudden light did glance, That threw me into ecstasy or swoon;

Instant I fell in an enchanted trance,

And feeble as a woman sunk I down:
With that strange gleam, all faded was my might,
Silent my voice, and dizzied grew my sight;

Sans motion, breath, or hearing, tranced I stood

Was never seen so weak a living wight.

Nor was it strange, for such celestial light

Confounds the brain, and chases back the blood
Unto the sinking heart in ruby flood:
And the faint members of the body, all
Refuse to work-when terror doth appal.

3 no wonder.

1 a faëry—an enchanted trance. 2 living.
4 makes. 5 although. 6 work not right. 7 heat.
8 which. 9 swoon.
10 wonderful.

""Twere hard to tell how long the fit did last;
At length my colour came, though sore aghast,
And a wild wondrous vision met mine ee:1
Thro' a huge forest I did seem to roam,
In lonely gloom far far from mortal home,
Fast by the margin of a sullen sea,

In whose dead waters grisly fishes be:
'Twas hideous all-yet here I shall essay,

To tell mine aventure, though rude may be the lay." Finding himself in this doleful region-(I follow Dr. Irving's analysis of the Palace of Honour) he begins to complain of the iniquity of Fortune; but his attention is soon attracted by the arrival of a magnificent cavalcade "of ladies fair and guidlie men," who pass before him in bright and glorious procession. Having gone by, two caitiffs approach, one mounted on an ass, the other on a hideous horse, who are discovered to be the arch-traitors Sinon and Achitophel. From Sinon the poet learns that the brilliant assembly whom he has just beheld is the court of Minerva, who are journeying through this wild solitude to the palace of Honor. He not unnaturally asks how such villains were permitted to attend upon the goddess, and receives for answer, that they appear there on the same principle that we sometimes find thunder and tornadoes intruding themselves into the lovely and placid month of May. The merry horns of hunters are now heard in the wood, and a lovely goddess is seen surrounded by buskined nymphs, mounted upon an elephant, cheering on her hounds after an unhappy stag, who proves to be Actæon, pursued by Diana and his own dogs. Melodious music succeeds to this stirring scene,

1 eye.