n early dawn,
Her buskined virgins traced the dewy lawn. 170
Above the rest a rural nymph was famed,[75]
Thy offspring, Thames! the fair Lodona named;
(Lodona's fate, in long oblivion cast,
The muse shall sing, and what she sings shall last.)
Scarce could the goddess from her nymph be known, 175
But by the crescent and the golden zone.[76]
She scorned the praise of beauty, and the care;
A belt her waist, a fillet binds her hair;[77]
A painted quiver on her shoulder sounds,[78]
And with her dart the flying deer she wounds. 180
It chanced, as eager of the chace, the maid
Beyond the forest's verdant limits strayed,
Pan saw and loved, and burning with desire[79]
Pursued her flight, her flight increased his fire.
Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly, 185
When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky;
Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves,
When through the clouds he drives the trembling doves,[80]
As from the god she flew with furious pace,
Or as the god, more furious urged the chace.[81] 190
Now fainting, sinking, pale, the nymph appears;
Now close behind, his sounding steps she hears;
And now his shadow reached her as she run,[82]
His shadow lengthened by the setting sun;
And now his shorter breath, with sultry air, 195
Pants on her neck, and fans her parting hair.[83]
In vain on father Thames she calls for aid,
Nor could Diana help her injured maid.
Faint, breathless, thus she prayed, nor prayed in vain;
"Ah Cynthia! ah--though banished from thy train, 200
Let me, O let me, to the shades repair,
My natives shades--there weep, and murmur there."
She said, and melting as in tears she lay,
In a soft, silver stream dissolved away.
The silver stream her virgin coldness keeps, 205
For ever murmurs, and for ever weeps;
Still bears the name the hapless virgin bore,[84]
And bathes the forest where she ranged before.
In her chaste current oft the goddess laves,
And with celestial tears augments the waves.[85] 210
Oft in her glass the musing shepherd spies[86]
The headlong mountains and the downward skies,[87]
The wat'ry landscape of the pendant