DISAPPOINTMENT.

YE shepherds! give ear to my lay,
And take no more heed of my sheep;
They have nothing to do but to stray,
I have nothing to do but to weep.
Yet do not my folly reprove:

She was fair and my passion begun ;
She smil'd-and I could not but love;
She is faithless-and I am undone.

Perhaps I was void of all thought;

Perhaps it was plain to foresee

That a nymph so complete would be sought

By a swain more engaging than me.

Ah! love every hope can inspire,

It banishes wisdom the while,

And the lip of the nymph we admire
Seems for ever adorn'd with a smile.

She is faithless and I am undone;

Ye that witness the woes I endure,

Let reason instruct you to shun

What it cannot instruct you to cure.

Beware how you loiter in vain

Amid nymphs of an higher degree;

It is not for me to explain

How fair and how fickle they be.

Alas! from the day that we met,

What hope of an end to my woes?
When I cannot endure to forget

The glance that undid my repose.
Yet time may diminish the pain :
The flower, and the shrub, and the tree,
Which I rear'd for her pleasure in vain,
In time may have comfort for me.

The sweets of a dew-sprinkled rose, The sound of a murmuring stream, The peace which from solitude flows, Henceforth shall be Corydon's theme.

High transports are shewn to the sight, But we are not to find them our own; Fate never bestow'd such delight

As I with my Phyllis had known.

O ye woods! spread your branches apace, To your deepest recesses I fly,

I would hide with the beasts of the chase,

I would vanish from every eye.

Yet my reed shall resound thro' the grove With the same sad complaint it begun;

How she smil'd, and I could not but love! Was faithless, and I am undone !

LAVINIA.

WHY steals from my bosom the sigh?

Why fix'd is my gaze on the ground ?

Come, give me my pipe, and I'll try

To banish my cares with the sound.

Erewhile were its notes of accord

With the smile of the flow'r-footed Muse,

Ah! why by its master implor'd

Should it now the gay carol refuse?