To you, that are by excellence a queen!

The top of beauty! but of such an air,
As only by the mind's eye may be seen

Your interwoven lines of good and fair!
Vouchsafe to grace Love's triumph here to-night,
Through all the streets of your Callipolis;
Which by the splendour of your rays made bright,
The seat and region of all beauty is.
Love in perfection longeth to appear,

But prays of favour he be not called on,
Till all the suburbs and the skirts be clear
Of perturbations, and the infection gone.
Then will he flow forth, like a rich perfume

Into your nostrils! or some sweeter sound
Of melting music, that shall not consume

Within the ear, but run the mazes round.
Here the CHORUS walk about with their censers.
Cho. Meantime, we make lustration of the place,

And, with our solemn fires and waters prove
To have frighted hence the weak diseaséd race
Of those were tortured on the wheel of love.
The Glorious, Whining, the Adventurous fool
Fantastic, Bribing, and the Jealous ass.
The Sordid, Scornful, and the Angry mule,

The Melancholic, Dull, and Envious mass.

Grand Cho. With all the rest, that in the sensual school
Of lust, for their degree of brute may pass ;
All which are vapoured hence.

No loves, but slaves to sense;

Mere cattle, and not men.

Sound, sound, and treble all our joys again, Who had the power and virtue to remove Such monsters from the labyrinth of love.

The scene opens and discovers a prospect of the sea.

The TRIUMPH

is first seen afar off, and led in by AMPHITRITE, the wife of OCEANUS, with four sea gods attending her, NEREUS, PROTEUS, GLAUCUS, PALÆMON.

The TRIUMPH consisted of fifteen LOVERS, and as many CUPIDS, who rank themselves seven and seven on a side, with each a CUPID before him, with a lighted torch, and the middle person (which is His Majesty) placed in the centre.

Amph. Here stay a while: this, this,
The temple of all beauty is !
Here, perfect lovers, you must pay
First fruits; and on these altars lay
(The ladies' breasts) your ample vows,
Such as Love brings, and Beauty best allows!

Cho.

For Love without his object soon is gone:
Love must have answering Love to look upon.
Amph. To you, best judge then of perfection!
Euph. The queen of what is wonder in the place!
Amph. Pure object of heroic love, alone!
Euph. The centre of proportion,—

Amph. Deign to receive all lines of love in one.
Euph. And by reflecting of them fill this space,
Cho. Till it a circle of those glories prove,

Fit to be sought in Beauty, found by Love.
Semi-cho. Where love is mutual, still
All things in order move.

Semi-cho. The circle of the will

Cho.

Is the true sphere of love.

Advance, you gentler Cupids, then, advance,
And show your just perfections in your dance.

The CUPIDS dance their dance, and the MASQUERS their Entry.

Which done, EUCLIA, or a fair glory, appears in the heavens, singing an applausive SONG, or Paan of the whole; which she takes occasion to ingeminate in the Second Chorus, upon the sight of a work of Neptune's, being a hollow rock, filling part of the sea-prospect, whereon the MUSES sit.

HYMN.

Euc. So Love emergent out of Chaos brought
The world to light!

And gently moving on the waters, wrought
All form to sight!
Love's appetite

Did beauty first excite :
And left imprinted in the air

Those signatures of good and fair,

Cho. Which since have flowed, flowed forth upon the sense To wonder first, and then to excellence,

By virtue of divine intelligence !

The Ingemination.

And Neptune too,

Shows what his waves can do
To call the Muses all to play,

And sing the birth of Venus' day,

Cho. Which from the sea flowed forth upon the sense,

To wonder first, and next to excellence,

By virtue of divine intelligence!

Here follow the Revels.

Which ended, the scene changeth to a garden, and the heavens opening, there appear four new persons in form of a Constellation, sitting; or a new Asterism, expecting VENUS, whom they call upon with this

SONG.

JUPITER, JUNO, GENIUS, HYMEN.

Jup. Haste, daughter Venus, haste and come away,
Jun. All powers that govern marriage, pray

That you will lend your light,

Gen. Unto the constellation of this night.

Hym. Hymen.

Jun. And Juno.

Gen. And the Genius call.

Jup. Your father Jupiter.

Grand Cho. And all

That bless or honour holy nuptial.

VENUS here appears in a cloud, and passing through the Constellation, descendeth to the earth, when presently the cloud vanisheth, and she is seen sitting in a throne.

Ven. Here, here I present am

Both in my girdle, and my flame;
Wherein are woven all the powers
The Graces gave me, or the Hours,
My nurses once, with all the arts
Of gaining and of holding hearts :
And these with, I descend.

But to your influences first commend

The vow I go to take

On earth, for perfect Love and Beauty's sake.

Her song ended, and she rising up to go to the Queen, the throne disappears; in place of which, there shooteth up a palm-tree with an imperial crown on the top; from the root whereof, lilies and roses twining together and embracing the stem, flourish through the crown, which she in the SONG with the CHORUS describes.

Grand Cho. Beauty and Love, whose story is mysterial,
In yonder palm-tree, and the crown imperial,

Do from the Rose and Lily, so delicious,
Promise a shade shall ever be propitious

To both the kingdoms. But to Britain's Genius
The snaky rod and serpents of Cyllenius

Bring not more peace than these, who so united be
By Love, as with it earth and heaven delighted be.
And who this King and Queen would well historify,
Need only speak their names; these them will glorify:
MARY and CHARLES, Charles with his Mary named are,
And all the rest of loves or princes famed are.

After this, they DANCE their going out.

AND THUS IT ENDED.

CHLORIDIA.

RITES TO CHLORIS AND HER NYMPHS,

PERSONATED IN A MASQUE AT COURT,

BY THE QUEEN'S MAJESTY AND HER LADIES, AT
SHROVE-TIDE, 1630.

The inventors-Ben Jonson; Inigo Jones.

UNIUS TELLUS ANTE COLORIS ERAT.

THE King and Queen's Majesty having given their command for the invention of a new argument, with the whole change of the scene, wherein Her Majesty, with the like number of her ladies, purposed a presentation to the King; it was agreed, it should be the celebration of some rites done to the goddess Chloris, who, in a general Council of the Gods, was proclaimed Goddess of the Flowers, according to that of Ovid, in the Fasti,

-Arbitrium tu Dea floris habe.

And was to be stellified on earth, by an absolute decree from Jupiter, who would have the earth to be adorned with stars as well as the heaven.

Upon this hinge the whole invention moved.

The ornament which went about the scene was composed of foliage, or leaves heightened with gold, and interwoven with all sorts of flowers, and naked children playing and climbing among the branches; and in the midst a great garland of flowers, in which was written CHLORIDIA.

The curtain being drawn up, the scene is discovered, consisting of pleasant hills planted with young trees, and all the lower banks adorned with flowers. And from some hollow parts of those hills