XXXVII

Then choosing out few words most horrible, 325
  (Let none them read) thereof did verses frame,
  With which and other spelles like terrible,
  He bad awake blacke Plutoes griesly Dame,[*]
  And cursed heaven and spake reprochfull shame
  Of highest God, the Lord of life and light; 330
  A bold bad man, that dar’d to call by name
  Great Gorgon,[*] Prince of darknesse and dead night,
At which Cocytus[*] quakes, and Styx is put to flight.

XXXVIII

And forth he cald out of deepe darknesse dred
  Legions of Sprights,[*] the which like little flyes 335
  Fluttring about his ever damned hed,
  Awaite whereto their service he applyes,
  To aide his friends, or fray his enimies: 
  Of those he chose[*] out two, the falsest twoo,
  And fittest for to forge true-seeming lyes; 340
  The one of them he gave a message too,
The other by him selfe staide other worke to doo.

XXXIX

He making speedy way through spersed ayre,
  And through the world of waters wide and deepe,
  To Morpheus house doth hastily repaire. 345
  Amid the bowels of the earth full steepe,
  And low, where dawning day doth never peepe,
  His dwelling is; there Tethys[*] his wet bed
  Doth ever wash, and Cynthia[*] still doth steepe
  In silver deaw his ever-drouping hed, 350
Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth spred.

XL

Whose double gates[*] he findeth locked fast,
  The one faire fram’d of burnisht Yvory,
  The other all with silver overcast;
  And wakeful dogges before them farre do lye, 355
  Watching to banish Care their enimy,
  Who oft is wont to trouble gentle Sleepe. 
  By them the Sprite doth passe in quietly,
  And unto Morpheus comes, whom drowned deepe
In drowsie fit he findes:  of nothing he takes keepe. 360

XLI

And more, to lulle him in his slumber soft,[*]
  A trickling streame from high rock tumbling downe,
  And ever-drizling raine upon the loft,
  Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the sowne
  Of swarming Bees, did cast him in a swowne:  365
  No other noyse, nor peoples troublous cryes,
  As still are wont t’annoy the walled towne,
  Might there be heard:  but carelesse Quiet lyes,
Wrapt in eternall silence farre from enemyes.

XLII

The messenger approching to him spake, 370
  But his wast wordes returnd to him in vaine: 
  So sound he slept, that nought mought him awake. 
  Then rudely he him thrust, and pusht with paine
  Whereat he gan to stretch:  but he againe
  Shooke him so hard, that forced him to speake. 375
  As one then in a dreame, whose dryer braine[*]
  Is tost with troubled sights and fancies weake,
He mumbled soft, but would not all[*] his silence breake.