'lea' is a meadow.

966. This song is sung by Lawes while presenting the three young persons
to the Earl and Countess of Bridgewater.

967. ~ye~: see note, l. 216.

968. ~so goodly grown~, _i.e._ grown so goodly. _Goodly_ = handsome (A.S.
_godlic_ = goodlike).

970. ~timely~. Here an adverb: in l. 689 it is an adjective. Comp. the two
phrases in _Macbeth_: "To gain the _timely_ inn," iii. 3. 7; and "To
call _timely_ on him," ii. 3. 51.

972. ~assays~, trials, temptations. _Assay_ is used by Milton in the
sense of 'attempt' as well as of 'trial': see _Arc._ 80, "I will
_assay_, her worth to celebrate." The former meaning is now confined to
the form _essay_ (radically the same word); and the use of _assay_ has
been still further restricted from its being used chiefly of the testing
of metals. Comp. _Par. Lost_, iv. 932, "hard _assays_ and ill
successes"; _Par. Reg._ i. 264, iv. 478.

974, 5. ~To triumph~. The whole purpose of the poem is succinctly
expressed in these lines. _Stage Direction_: ~Spirit epiloguizes~, _i.e._
sings the epilogue or concluding stanzas. In one of Lawes' manuscripts
of the mask, the epilogue consists of twelve lines only, those numbered
1012-1023. From the same copy we find that line 976 had been altered by
Lawes in such a manner as to convert the first part of the epilogue into
a prologue which, in his character as Attendant Spirit, he sang whilst
descending upon the stage:--

_From the heavens_ now I fly,
And those happy climes that lie
Where day never shuts his eye,
Up in the broad _field_ of the sky.
There I suck the liquid air
All amidst the gardens fair
Of Hesperus, and his daughters three
That sing about the golden tree.
There eternal summer dwells,
And west winds, with musky wing,
About the cedarn alleys fling
Nard and cassia's balmy smells.
Iris there with humid bow
Waters the odorous banks, that blow
Flowers of more mingled hue
Than her purfled scarf can show,
_Yellow, watchet, green, and blue_,
And drenches oft with _Manna_ dew
Beds of hyacinth and roses,
Where _many a cherub soft_ reposes.

Doubtless this was the arrangement in the actual performance of the
mask.

976. ~To the ocean~, etc. The resemblance of this song, in rhythm and
rhyme, to the song of Ariel in the _Tempest_, v. 1. 88-94, has been
frequently pointed out: "Where the bee sucks, there suck I," etc.
Compare also the song