52 JOHN MILTON 
Another, with somewhat more poetic touch, refers to 
sunset :— 
“So did thy light, fair soul, itself withdraw 
To no dark tomb by nature’s common law, 
But set in waves.” 
After the rabble of versifiers let us now hear the poet. 
We may observe that the impersonation of Mr. King 
as the shepherd, Lycidas, while suggested by Greek 
conventional forms, is in fortunate harmony with the 
familiar Biblical comparison of the clergyman to the 
shepherd watching over his flock. How noble is 
the music of the well-known opening lines : — 
“Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more 
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere, 
I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude, 
And with forced fingers rude 
Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.” 
The sad occasion is the death of young Lycidas, the 
poet’s fellow-swain : — 
“ For we were nurst upon the selfsame hill, 
Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill. 
Together, both, ere the high lawns appeared, 
Under the opening eyelids of the morn, 
We drove afield,” 
and so proceeds the charming description until the 
first change of theme : — 
“But O the heavy change, now thou art gone, 
Now thou art gone and never must return ! 
Thee, shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves, 
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o’ergrown, 
And all the echoes mourn. 
