Page:Fairy tales, now first collected by Joseph Ritson.djvu/190

 On the clear crystals verdant bank he stood,And thrice look'd backward on the fatal wood,And thrice he groan'd, and thrice he beat his breast,And thus in tears his kindred gods address'd: "If true, ye watery powers, my lineage cameFrom Neptune mingling with a mortal dame;Down to his court, with coral garlands crown'd,Through all your grottos waft my plaintive sound,And urge the god, whose trident shakes the earth,To grace his offspring and assert my birth." He said. A gentle Naiad heard his prayer,And, touch'd with pity for a lovers care,Shoots to the sea, where low beneath the tidesOld Neptune in th' unfathom'd deep resides.Roused at the news the seas stern sultan sworeRevenge, and scarce from present arms forbore,But first the nymph his harbinger he sends,And to her care the fav'rite boy commends. As through the Thames her backward course she guides,Driven up his current by the refluent tides,Along his banks the pygmy legions spread,She spies, and haughty Oriel at their head.Soon with wrong'd Albions name the host she fires,And counts the oceans god among his sires;