Thus drooping, or with linked Thunderbolts
Transfix us to the bottom of this Gulfe.
Awake, arise, or be for ever fall'n.
They heard, and were abasht, and up they sprung
Upon the wing, as when men wont to watch
On duty, sleeping found by whom they dread,
Rouse and bestir themselves ere well awake.
Nor did they not perceave the evil plight
In which they were, or the fierce pains not feel;
Yet to their Generals Voyce they soon obeyd
Innumerable. As when the potent Rod
Of AMRAMS Son in EGYPTS evill day
Wav'd round the Coast, up call'd a pitchy cloud
Of LOCUSTS, warping on the Eastern Wind,
That ore the Realm of impious PHAROAH hung
Like Night, and darken'd all the Land of NILE:
So numberless were those bad Angels seen
Hovering on wing under the Cope of Hell
'Twixt upper, nether, and surrounding Fires;
Till, as a signal giv'n, th' uplifted Spear
Of their great Sultan waving to direct
Thir course, in even ballance down they light
On the firm brimstone, and fill all the Plain;
A multitude, like which the populous North
Pour'd never from her frozen loyns, to pass
RHENE or the DANAW, when her barbarous Sons
Came like a Deluge on the South, and spread
Beneath GIBRALTAR to the LYBIAN sands.
Forthwith from every Squadron and each Band
The Heads and Leaders thither hast where stood