u, resolv'd to die, your friend despise,
Was I unworthy deem'd to share your end?
One pang our souls should free, one fate attend.
I call'd our gods--my hands these rites prepar'd;
You go without me, and our fate unshar'd?
835 Oh, sister! this sad deed has ruin'd all;
With you, your state, your friends, your sister fall.
--But pour the stream--I'll wash the blood away,
And if some ling'ring breath of life delay,
These lips shall catch it.--On the pyre she prest
840 Her sister, just expiring, to her breast;
She wip'd the blood--and Dido heard her cries,
And strove to raise in rain her languid eyes,
They clos'd again,--and babbling in the wound
The frothy blood hiss'd forth a horrid sound.
845 Thrice on her hand she lean'd to raise her head,
And thrice sank down unable on her bed;
Her eyes half fix'd, she open'd to the day,
And groan'd that stil they felt the vivid ray.
Till Juno who beheld her ling'ring death,
850 The painful agony of parting breath,
Sent Iris down in pity from the sky,
To free her soul, and loose the stubborn tye.
For since unclaim'd by Fate, before her day,
She fell to love forlorn a guiltless prey,
855 } To cut the tress, the queen of night delay'd,
} The flaxen hair that on her forehead stray'd,
} Nor yet consign'd her to the Stygian shade.

Then Iris, going from the sunbeam drew
A thousand colours, varying as she flew;
860 Her dewy wing in liquid azure spread,
Dropt down the sky, and hov'ring o'er her head
"Pluto, this fated lock I bear to thee,
And from this body set the spirit free",
She said--Her fingers cut the flaxen hair,
865 The heat dissolv'd--the soul exhal'd in air.

* * * * *

THE
HENRIAD.

CANTO IX.

ARGUMENT.

Description of the Palace of Love.--Discord implores his aid to bend the
unconquerable courage of Henry IV.--Description of Gabrielle d'Etree.
Henry, passionately enamoured with her; quits his army, and loses the
advantages of his victory at Ivry. Mornay seeks him in his retreat,
tears him from the arms of his mistress, and restores him to his army.

WHERE fam'd Idalia's happy plains extend,
As Europe's bounds begin and