THE FAERIE QUEENE by Edmund Spenser TO The ... - Planet.ee

www.TaleBooks.comAnd found no place wher safe he shroud him might:Lamenting Sorrow did in darknes lye,And shame his ugly face did hide from living eye.XXIII. And over them sad horror with grim hewDid alwaies sore, beating his yron wings;And after him Owles and Night-ravens flew,The hatefull messengers of heavy things,Of death and dolor telling sad tidings;Whiles sad Celeno, sitting on a clifte,A song of bale and bitter sorrow sings,That hart of flint asonder could have rifte;Which having ended after him she flyeth swifte.XXIV. All these before the gates of Pluto lay,By whom they passing spake unto them nought;But th' Elfin knight with wonder all the wayDid feed his eyes, and fild his inner thought,At last him to a litle dore he brought,That to the gate of Hell, which gaped wide,Was next adjoyning, ne them parted ought:Betwixt them both was but a litle stride,That did the house of Richesse from hell-mouth divide.XXV. Before the dore sat selfe-consuming Care,Day and night keeping wary watch and ward,For feare least Force or Fraud should unawareBreake in, and spoile the treasure there in gard:Ne would he suffer Sleepe once thither-wardApproch, albe his drowsy den were next;For next to death is Sleepe to be compard;Therefore his house is unto his annext:Here Sleep, ther Richesse, and Hel-gate them bothbetwext.XXVI. So soon as Mammon there arrivd, the doreTo him did open and affoorded way:Him followed eke Sir Guyon evermore,Ne darkenesse him, ne daunger might dismay.Soone as he entred was, the dore streight wayDid shutt, and from behind it forth there leptAn ugly feend, more fowle then dismall day,The which with monstrous stalke behind him stept,And ever as he went dew watch upon him kept.XXVII. Well hoped hee, ere long that hardy guest,If ever covetous hand, or lustfull eye,Or lips he layd on thing that likte him best,Or ever sleepe his eie-strings did untye,Should be his pray. And therefore still on hyeHe over him did hold his cruell clawes,Threatning with greedy gripe to doe him dye,And rend in peeces with his ravenous pawes,If ever he transgrest the fatall Stygian lawes.Page 189 , Faerie Queene, The - Edmund Spenser