55

He summons strait his denizens of air;
The lucid squadrons round the sails repair:
Soft o'er the shrouds aërial whispers breathe,
That seemed but zephyrs to the train beneath.
Some to the sun their insect-wings unfold,
Waft on the breeze, or sink in clouds of gold; 60
Transparent forms, too fine for mortal sight,
Their fluid bodies half dissolv'd in light,
Loose to the wind their airy garments flew,
Thin glitt'ring textures of the filmy dew,
Dipped in the richest tincture of the skies, 65
Where light disports in ever-mingling dyes;
While ev'ry beam new transient colours flings,
Colours that change whene'er they wave their
wings.

70

Amid the circle, on the gilded mast, Superior by the head, was Ariel plac'd; His purple pinions opening to the sun, He raised his azure wand, and thus begun: "Ye sylphs and sylphids, to your chief give ear!

Fays, fairies, genii, elves, and demons, hear! Ye know the spheres and various tasks assigned

75

By laws eternal to th' aërial kind.
Some in the fields of purest ether play,
And bask and whiten in the blaze of day.
Some guide the course of wandering orbs on
high,

Or roll the planets through the boundless sky; 80
Some less refined, beneath the moon's pale light
Pursue the stars that shoot athwart the night,
Or suck the mists in grosser air below,
Or dip their pinions in the painted bow,
Or brew fierce tempests on the wintry main, 85
Or o'er the glebe distil the kindly rain.
Others on earth o'er human race preside,
Watch all their ways, and all their actions guide:
Of these the chief the care of nations own,
And guard with arms divine the British throne.

"Our humbler province is to tend the fair, 91
Not a less pleasing, though less glorious care;
To save the powder from too rude a gale,
Nor let th' imprisoned essences exhale;

To draw fresh colours from the vernal flow'rs, 95
To steal from rainbows ere they drop in show'rs
A brighter wash to curl their waving hairs,
Assist their blushes, and inspire their airs;
Nay, oft, in dreams, invention we bestow,
To change a flounce, or add a furbelow.

100

"This day, black omens threat the brightest fair

That e'er deserved a watchful spirit's care;
Some dire disaster, or by force, or slight;
But what, or where, the fates have wrapped in
night.

106

Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,
Or some frail China jar receive a flaw;
Or stain her honour, or her new brocade;
Forget her pray'rs, or miss a masquerade;
Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball;
Or whether heav'n has doom'd that Shock
must fall.

110

Haste, then, ye spirits! to your charge repair:
The flutt'ring fan be Zephyretta's care;
The drops to thee, Brillante, we consign;

And, Momentilla, let the watch be thine;
Do thou, Crispissa, tend her fav'rite lock; 115
Ariel himself shall be the guard of Shock.

"To fifty chosen Sylphs, of special note, We trust th' important charge, the petticoat: Oft have we known that seven-fold fence to fail, Though stiff with hoops and armed with ribs of whale;

Form a strong line about the silver bound, 121 And guard the wide circumference around.

"Whatever spirit, careless of his charge, His post neglects, or leaves the fair at large, Shall feel sharp vengeance soon o'ertake his sins,

125

Be stopped in vials, or transfixed with pins;
Or plunged in lakes of bitter washes lie,
Or wedged, whole ages in a bodkin's eye;
Gums and pomatums shall his flight restrain,
While clogged he beats his silken wings in vain;
Or alum styptics with contracting pow'r, 131
Shrink his thin essence like a rivelled flower;
Or, as Ixion fixed, the wretch shall feel
The giddy motion of the whirling mill,
In fumes of burning chocolate shall glow,
And tremble at the sea that froths below!''
He spoke; the spirits from the sails descend:
Some, orb in orb, around the nymph extend;
Some thrid the mazy ringlets of her hair;
Some hang upon the pendants of her ear;
With beating hearts the dire event they wait,
Anxious, and trembling for the birth of fate.

CANTO III

135

140

At ombre singly to decide their doom;
And swells her breast with conquests yet to

come.

Straight the three bands prepare in arms to join,

Each band the number of the sacred nine. 30
Soon as she spreads her hand, th' aërial guard
Descend, and sit on each important card:
First Ariel perched upon a Matadore,
Then each according to the rank they bore;
For sylphs, yet mindful of their ancient race, 35
Are, as when women, wondrous fond of place.
Behold four kings in majesty revered,
With hoary whiskers and a forky beard;
And four fair queens whose hands sustain a
flow'r,

Th' expressive emblem of their softer pow'r; 40
Four knaves in garbs succinct, a trusty band;
Caps on their heads, and halberts in their hand;
And parti-coloured troops, a shining train,
Draw forth to combat on the velvet plain.
The skilful nymph reviews her force with care:
Let spades be trumps! she said, and trumps
they were.

Now move to war her sable Matadores, In show like leaders of the swarthy Moors. Spadillio first, unconquerable lord!

46

What boots the regal circle on his head,
His giant limbs, in state unwieldy spread;
That long behind he trails his pompous robe,
And of all monarchs only grasps the globe?

The baron now his diamonds pours apace! 75 Th' embroidered king who shows but half his face,

And his refulgent queen, with pow'rs combined,
Of broken troops, an easy conquest find.
Clubs, diamonds, hearts, in wild disorder seen,
With throngs promiscuous strew the level green.

A game of cards of Spanish origin played by three persons, the one naming the trump being opposed to the other two. The names of some of the cards are given in the passage following.

The highest card in the game of Loo.

Sent up in vapours to the baron's brain
New stratagems, the radiant lock to gain.
Ah cease, rash youth! desist ere 'tis too late,
Fear the just gods, and think of Scylla's fate!
Changed to a bird, and sent to flit in air,
She dearly pays for Nisus' injured hair!
But when to mischief mortals bend their
will,

126

How soon they find fit instrument of ill!
Just then, Clarissa drew with tempting grace
A two-edged weapon from her shining case:
So ladies in romance assist their knight,
Present the spear, and arm him for the fight. 130
He takes the gift with rev'rence, and extends
The little engine on his fingers' ends;
This just behind Belinda's neck he spread,
As o'er the fragrant steams she bends her head.
Swift to the lock a thousand sprites repair; 135
A thousand wings, by turns, blow back the
hair;

Failure to secure the requisite tricks.

And thrice they twitched the diamond in her ear;

Thrice she looked back, and thrice the foe drew near.

Just in that instant, anxious Ariel sought
The close recesses of the virgin's thought; 140
As on the nosegay in her breast reclined,
He watched th' ideas rising in her mind,
Sudden he viewed in spite of all her art,
An earthly lover lurking at her heart.
Amazed, confused, he found his pow'r expired,
Resigned to fate, and with a sigh retired.
The peer now spreads the glitt'ring forfex
wide

146

For, that sad moment, when the sylphs withdrew,

And Ariel weeping from Belinda flew,
Umbriel, a dusky, melancholy sprite,
As ever sullied the fair face of light,
Down to the central earth, his proper scene, 15
Repaired to search the gloomy cave of Spleen.

Swift on his sooty pinions flits the gnome,
And in a vapour reached the dismal dome.
No cheerful breeze this sullen region knows,
The dreaded east is all the wind that blows, 20
Here in a grotto, sheltered close from air,
And screened in shades from day's detested
glare,

She sighs for ever on her pensive bed,
Pain at her side, and Megrim at her head.
Two handmaids wait the throne; alike in
place,

25

But diff'ring far in figure and in face.
Here stood Ill-nature like an ancient maid,
Her wrinkled form in black and white arrayed;
With store of pray'rs, for mornings, nights, and
noons,

Her hand is filled; her bosom with lampoons. 30
There Affectation, with a sickly mien,
Shows in her cheek the roses of eighteen,
Practised to lisp and hang the head aside,
Faints into airs, and languishes with pride,
On the rich quilt sinks with becoming woe, 35
Wrapt in a gown, for sickness, and for show.
The fair ones feel such maladies as these,
When each new night-dress gives a new disease.
A constant vapour o'er the palace flies;
Strange phantoms rising as the mists arise; 40
Dreadful, as hermit's dreams in haunted shades,
Or bright, as visions of expiring maids.

Now glaring fiends, and snakes on rolling spires,

ward queen!

60

Who rule the sex to fifty from fifteen;
Parent of vapours and of female wit,
Who give th' hysteric, or poetic fit,
On various tempers act by various ways,
Make some take physic, others scribble plays;
Who cause the proud their visits to delay,
And send the godly in a pet to pray;

A nymph there is, that all thy pow'r disdains, 65
And thousands more in equal mirth maintains.
But, oh! if e'er thy gnome could spoil a grace,
Or raise a pimple on a beauteous face,

(While Hampton's echoes "Wretched maid!" replied,)

"Was it for this you took such constant care The bodkin, comb, and essence to prepare? For this your locks in paper durance bound? For this with tort'ring irons wreathed around? For this with fillets strained your tender head,

105

110

And bravely bore the double loads of lead? 102
Gods! shall the ravisher display your hair,
While the fops envy, and the ladies stare!
Honour forbid! at whose unrivalled shrine
Ease, pleasure, virtue, all our sex resign.
Methinks already I your tears survey,
Already hear the horrid things they say,
Already see you a degraded toast,
And all your honour in a whisper lost!
How shall I, then, your helpless fame defend?
"Twill then be infamy to seem your friend!
And shall this prize, th' inestimable prize,
Exposed through crystal to the gazing eyes,
And heightened by the diamond's circling rays,
On that rapacious hand for ever blaze?
Sooner shall grass in Hyde Park Circus grow,
And wits take lodgings in the sound of Bow;10
Sooner let earth, air, sea, to chaos fall,
Men, monkeys, lap-dogs, parrots, perish all!"
She said; then raging to Sir Plume repairs, 121
And bids her beau demand the precious hairs:
9 A drink composed of wine with the rind of lemons and
citrons in it.

116

10 i. e., within the sound of the bells of St. Mary le Bow, an old and famous church in the heart of London. In Pope's time the old part of London in the vicinity of this church was avoided by fashion and the "wits."

(Sir Plume,11 of amber snuff-box justly vain, And the nice conduct of a clouded cane) With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face, He first the snuff-box opened, then the case, 126 And thus broke out "My Lord, why, what the devil!

Zounds! damn the lock! 'fore Gad, you must be civil.

Plague on 't! 'tis past a jest-nay prithee, pox! Give her the hair"-he spoke, and rapped his box.

130

151

Happy! ah ten times happy had I been,
If Hampton-Court these eyes had never seen!
Yet am not I the first mistaken maid,
By love of courts to num'rous ills betrayed.
Oh had I rather unadmired remained
In some lone isle, or distant northern land,
Where the gilt chariot never marks the way, 155
Where none learn ombre, none e'er taste
bohea!12

There kept my charms concealed from mortal eye,

Like roses, that in deserts bloom and die. What moved my mind with youthful lords to roam?

Oh had I stayed, and said my pray'rs at home! 'Twas this, the morning omens seemed to tell, Thrice from my trembling hand the patch-box fell;

162

The tott'ring china shook without a wind,
Nay, Poll sat mute, and Shock was most un-

kind!

A sylph too warned me of the threats of fate, 165
In mystic visions, now believed too late!
See the poor remnants of these slighted hairs!
My hands shall rend what ev'n thy rapine

spares:

These in two sable ringlets taught to break,
Once gave new beauties to the snowy neck; 170
The sister-lock now sits uncouth, alone,
And in its fellows' fate foresees its own;

11 Sir George Brown.

12 The name given to the finest tea of that time. Pro nounced Bohay, as tea was pronounced tay.

Who would not scorn what housewife's cares produce,

25

Or who would learn one earthly thing of use?
To patch, nay ogle, might become a saint,
Nor could it sure be such a sin to paint.
But since, alas! frail beauty must decay,
Curled or uncurled, since locks will turn to gray;
Since painted, or not painted, all shall fade,
And she who scorns a man, must die a maid;
What then remains but well our pow'r to use,
And keep good-humour, still whate'er we lose?
And trust me, dear! good-humour can prevail,
When airs, and flights, and screams, and scold-
ing fail.

32

Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul."

So spoke the dame, but no applause ensued; Belinda frowned, Thalestris called her prude. 36 "To arms, to arms!" the fierce virago cries, And swift as lightning to the combat flies. All side in parties, and begin th' attack; Fans clap, silks rustle, and tough whalebones crack;

40

Heroes' and heroines' shouts confus'dly rise, And base and treble voices strike the skies. No common weapons in their hands are found, Like gods they fight, nor dread a mortal wound. So when bold Homer makes the gods en

Now Jove suspends his golden scales in air, Weighs the men's wits against the lady's hair; The doubtful beam long nods from side to side;

75

At length the wits mount up, the hairs subside.
See fierce Belinda on the baron flies,
With more than usual lightning in her eyes:
Nor fear'd the chief th' unequal fight to try,
Who sought no more than on his foe to die.
But this bold lord with manly strength endued,
She with one finger and a thumb subdued; 80
Just where the breath of life his nostrils drew,
A charge of snuff the wily virgin threw;
The gnomes direct, to ev'ry atom just,
The pungent grains of titillating dust.
Sudden, with starting tears each eye o'erflows,
And the high dome re-echoes to his nose.

86

89

"Now meet thy fate," incensed Belinda cried, And drew a deadly bodkin from her side. (The same, his ancient personage to deck, Her great-great-grandsire wore about his neck, In three seal-rings; which after, melted down, Formed a vast buckle for his widow's gown: Her infant grandame's whistle next it grew, The bells she jingled, and the whistle blew; Then in a bodkin1 graced her mother's hairs, 95 Which long she wore, and now Belinda wears.) "Boast not my fall," he cried, "insulting foe! Thou by some other shalt be laid as low: Nor think, to die dejects my lofty mind; All that I dread is leaving you behind! Rather than so, ah let me still survive, And burn in Cupid's flames-but burn alive." "Restore the lock!" she cries; and all around "Restore the lock!" the vaulted roofs rebound. 14 A large ornamental hairpin.

100