Thus fade wethus our hopes and joys, rose-bright, Yield up their sweetness ere they reach their prime, And their poor fabrics lie within our sight, Stript of their radiance e'en in summer-time Their spirit hath gone from them, and they wither,

He has passed his prime and become effeminate.

When the fact is recalled that such contemporaries as Pomponius Laetus, Bartolommeo Sacchi, Molza, Alessandro Farnese (Paul III), Platina, Sabellicus at Rome; Pontanus, Sannazaro, and Porcello in Naples; and Pomponasso and Boiardo at Ferrara, were then at or nearing their prime, the position of Florence as the acknowledged centre of European culture was conceded by sense of right alone.

Before God, I must confess, your father is too cruel, To keep you thus sequester'd from the world, To spend your prime of youth thus in obscurity, And seek to wed you to an idiot fool, That knows not how to use himself: Could my deserts but answer my desires, I swear by Sol, fair Phoebus' silver eye, My heart would wish no higher to aspire, Than to be grac'd with Lelia's love.

The sense of grievous loss in the death of John Keats the youthful and aspiring poet, cut short as he was approaching his prime; and the instinctive impulse to mourning and desolation.

But now and then let fall a word or two Of hope, that Heaven some miracle might show, And for their sakes the sun should backward go; Against the laws of nature upward climb, 535 And, mounted on the Ram, renew the prime: For which two proofs in sacred story lay, Of Ahaz' dial, and of Joshua's day.

Brave, treacherous, restless, an able commander, a crafty politician, adroit in discerning and profiting by other men's bad qualities, wading to the throne through the blood of three kinsmen, he in some respects resembles Shakspeare's Richard III.,his 'prime of manhood daring, bold, and venturous,' his 'age confirmed, proud, subtle, sly, and bloody.'

Oh, how I hate this living death which has swallowed all my teens, which is greedily devouring my youth, which will sap my prime, and in which my old age, if I am cursed with any, will be worn away!

while each day blackens with fresh clouds, Complaints of ague, fever, crumbling huts, Of land thrown out to the forest, game and keepers, Bailiffs and barons, plundering all alike; Need, greed, stupidity: To clear such ruin Would task the rich prime of some noble hero But can I nothing do? Wal.

Now roaming in the yard, he spurn'd the ground, And gave to Partlet the first grain he found; Then often feather'd her with wanton play, And trod her twenty times ere prime of day; And took by turns, and gave, so much delight, Her sisters pined with envy at the sight.

In short, 'twas that sweet season's prime When Spring gives up the reins of time To Summer's glowing hand, And doubting mortals hardly know By whose command the breezes blow Which fan the smiling land. 'Twas then, beside a greenwood shade Which clothed a lawn's aspiring head, I urged my devious way, With loitering steps regardless where, So soft, so genial was the air, So wondrous bright the day.

That she must thus use her womanhood, her precious prime of strength.

" "Thou hast the philosophy of it, young man, and hast uttered a biting truth, for those who waste their prime in chasing a phantom.

CHAPTER XVIII THE PRIME OF THE MORNING

So parting Summer bids her flowery prime Attend the Sun to dress some foreign clime, While withering seasons in succession, here, Strip the gay gardens, and deform the Year.

At this age, had a private lot been his,that of a statesman, jurist, man of science, annalist, philosopher, troubadour, mathematician, historian, poet,he would but have entered his golden prime, rich in promise, fruitful in performance.

Thy generous fruits, though gather'd ere their prime, Still show'd a quickness; and maturing time 20 But mellows what we write, to the dull sweets of rhyme.

Deftly, silently the Trader sorted the furs, placing to one side or the other the "primes," "seconds," and "thirds" of each species.