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The nymphs and graces dancing...
Into this place whereas the elfin knight
Approached, him seemed that the merry sound
Of a shrill pipe he playing heard on height,
And many feet fast thumping the hollow ground;
That through the woods their echo did rebound;
He nigher drew, to weet what might it be;
There he a troop of ladies dancing found
Full merrily, and making gladful glee,
And in the midst a shepherd piping he did see.
He durst not enter into the open green,
For dread of them unwares to be descried,
For breaking off their dance, if he were seen;
But in the covert of the wood did bide,
Beheld of all, yet of them unespied:
There he did see (that pleased much his sight
That even he himself his eyes envied)
A hundred naked maidens lily white,
All rangèd in a ring, and dancing in delight.
All they without were rangèd in a ring
And dancèd round, but in the midst of them
Three other ladies did both dance and sing,
The whilst the rest them round about did hem,
And like a garland did in compass stem;
And in the midst of those same three were placed
Another damsel, as a precious gem
Amidst a ring most richly well enhansed,
That with her goodly presence all the rest much graced.
Those were the Graces, daughters of delight,
Handmaidens of Venus, which are wont to haunt
Upon this hill, and dance there day and night;
Those three to man all gifts of grace do graunt,
And all that Venus in herself doth vaunt
Is borrowèd of them; but that fair one
That in the midst was placèd paravaunt,
Was she to whom that shepherd piped alone,
That made him pipe so merrily as never none.
She was, to weet, that jolly shepherd’s lass
Which pipèd there unto that merry rout;
That jolly shepherd which there pipèd, was
Poor Colin Clout (who knows not Colin Clout?)
He piped apace, whilst they him danced about.
Pipe, jolly shepherd! pipe thou now apace
Unto thy Love, that made thee low to lout;
Thy Love is present there with thee in place,
Thy Love is there advaunst to be another Grace.
And there she remains, dancing in the midst of the Graces for ever, herself a Grace, made one by the ordinance of the poor but great poet who here addresses himself under his pastoral title, and justly prides himself on the power of conferring immortality on his Love.
Edmund Spenser