No chaperone was there, no door
Against a lover's sighs to stand.
Delicious age! May Heaven restore
Its customs to our land!

Nay, take me! In my lady's train
Some stubborn field I fain would plough
Lay on the lash and clamp the chain!
I bear them meekly now.




ELEGY THE FOURTH

ON HIS LADY'S AVARICE


A woman's slave am I, and know it well.
Farewell, my birthright! farewell, liberty!
In wretched slavery and chains I dwell,
For love's sad captives never are set free.

Whether I smile or curse, love just the same
Brands me and burns. O, cruel woman, spare!
O would I were a rock, to 'scape this flame
Far off upon the frosty mountains there!

Would I were flint, to front the tempest's power,
Wave-buffeted on some wild, wreckful shore!