ff, and everywhere
Throughout that brave mosaic yard,
Those picks or diamonds in the card
With peeps of hearts, of club, and spade
Are here most neatly inter-laid
Many a counter, many a die,
Half-rotten and without an eye
Lies hereabouts; and, for to pave
The excellency of this cave,
Squirrels' and children's teeth late shed
Are neatly here enchequered
With brownest toadstones, and the gum
That shines upon the bluer plum.
The nails fallen off by whitflaws: art's
Wise hand enchasing here those warts
Which we to others, from ourselves,
Sell, and brought hither by the elves.
The tempting mole, stolen from the neck
Of the shy virgin, seems to deck
The holy entrance, where within
The room is hung with the blue skin
Of shifted snake: enfriez'd throughout
With eyes of peacocks' trains and trout-
Flies' curious wings; and these among
Those silver pence that cut the tongue
Of the red infant, neatly hung.
The glow-worm's eyes; the shining scales
Of silv'ry fish; wheat straws, the snail's
Soft candle light; the kitling's eyne;
Corrupted wood; serve here for shine.
No glaring light of bold-fac'd day,
Or other over-radiant ray,
Ransacks this room; but what weak beams
Can make reflected from these gems
And multiply; such is the light,
But ever doubtful day or night.
By this quaint taper light he winds
His errors up; and now he finds
His moon-tann'd Mab, as somewhat sick,
And (love knows) tender as a chick.
Upon six plump dandillions, high-
Rear'd, lies her elvish majesty:
Whose woolly bubbles seem'd to drown
Her Mabship in obedient down.
For either sheet was spread the caul
That doth the infant's face enthral,
When it is born (by some enstyl'd
The lucky omen of the child),
And next to these two blankets o'er-
Cast of the finest gossamore.
And then a rug of carded wool,
Which, sponge-like drinking in the dull
Light of the moon, seemed to comply,
Cloud-like, the dainty deity.
Thus soft she lies: and overhead
A spinner's circle is bespread
With cob-web curtains, from the roof
So neatly sunk as that no proof
Of any tackling can declare
What gives it hanging in the air.
The fringe about this are those threads
Broke at the loss of maidenheads:
And, all behung with these,