Page:Ovid's Metamorphoses (Vol. 2) - tr Garth, Dryden, et. al. (1727).djvu/132

There, as the bubling Tide pours forth amain,
To plunge his Body in, and wash away the Stain.
The King instructed to the Fount retires,
But with the golden Charm the Stream inspires:
For while this Quality the Man forsakes,
An equal Pow'r the limpid Water takes;
Informs with Veins of Gold the neighb'ring Land,
And glides along a Bed of golden Sand.
Now loathing Wealth, th' Occasion of his Woes,
Far in the Woods he sought a calm Repose;
In Caves and Grottos, where the Nymphs resort,
And keep with Mountain Pan their Silvan Court.
Ah! had he left his stupid Soul behind!
But his Condition alter'd not his Mind.
For where high Tmolus rears his shady Brow,
And from his Cliffs surveys the Seas below,
In his Descent, by Sardis bounded here,
By the small Confines of Hypæpa there,
Pan to the Nymphs his frolick Ditties play'd,
Tuning his Reeds beneath the chequer'd Shade.
The Nymphs are pleas'd, the boasting Sylvan plays,
And speaks with Slight of great Apollo's Lays.
Tmolus was Arbiter; the Boaster still
Accepts the Tryal with unequal Skill.
The venerable Judge was seated high
On his own Hill, that seem'd to touch the Sky.
Above the whisp'ring Trees his Head he rears,
From their encumbring Boughs to free his Ears;
A Wreath of Oak alone his Temples bound,
The pendant Acorns loosely dangled round.
In me your Judge, says he, there's no Delay:
Then bids the Goatherd God begin, and play.
Pan tun'd the Pipe, and with his rural Song
Pleas'd the low Taste of all the vulgar Throng;
Such Songs a vulgar Judgment mostly please,
Midas was there, and Midas judg'd with these.

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