A MEDLEY.
45
Among the columns, pacing staid and still
By twos and threes, till all from end to end
With beauties every shade of brown and fair,
In colours gayer than the morning mist,
The long hall glitter'd like a bed of flowers.
How might a man not wander from his wits
Pierced thro' with eyes, but that I kept mine own
Intent upon the Princess, where she sat
Among her grave Professors, scattering gems
Of Art and Science; only Lady Blanche,
A double-rouged and treble-wrinkled Dame,
With all her faded Autumns falsely brown,
Shot sidelong daggers at us, a tiger-cat
In act to spring. At last a solemn grace
Concluded, and we sought the gardens: there
One walk'd reciting by herself, and one
In this hand held a volume as to read,
And smoothed a petted peacock down with that:
Some to a low song oar'd a shallop by,
Or under arches of the marble bridge
By twos and threes, till all from end to end
With beauties every shade of brown and fair,
In colours gayer than the morning mist,
The long hall glitter'd like a bed of flowers.
How might a man not wander from his wits
Pierced thro' with eyes, but that I kept mine own
Intent upon the Princess, where she sat
Among her grave Professors, scattering gems
Of Art and Science; only Lady Blanche,
A double-rouged and treble-wrinkled Dame,
With all her faded Autumns falsely brown,
Shot sidelong daggers at us, a tiger-cat
In act to spring. At last a solemn grace
Concluded, and we sought the gardens: there
One walk'd reciting by herself, and one
In this hand held a volume as to read,
And smoothed a petted peacock down with that:
Some to a low song oar'd a shallop by,
Or under arches of the marble bridge
