dipsa

Updated: May 17, 2025

Here the dire locusts' horrid swarms prevail; Here the blue asps with livid poison swell; Here the dry dipsa writhes his sinuous mail; Can we not here secure from envy dwell? When the grim lion urged his cruel chase, When the stern panther sought his midnight prey; What fate reserved me for this Christian race? O race more polished, more severe than they!

Thomas Clarkson - The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839)

Shall foreign plagues infest this teeming land, And more than sea-born monsters plough the main? "Here the dire locusts' horrid swarms prevail; Here the blue asps with livid poison swell; Here the dry dipsa writhes his sinuous mail; Can we not here secure from envy dwell?

Thomas Clarkson - The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), Volume I

Emulation, rather than imitation, was Cowley's attitude towards his predecessor, and his means are not always happy. Thus, though the humours of Truga may have been suggested by the character of Dipsa in the Jealous Lovers, she is probably introduced into Cowley's play as the counterpart of Dorylas in Amyntas.

Walter W. Greg - Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama: A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration: Stage in England