When sighes as frequent were as various sights, That any one, which lov'd him, hated me, Alas, my plaint, In such constraint, Breakes forth in rage, that thoughe my passions Nought being heard but what the minde affrights: swimme, When Autumn had disrob'd the Summer's pride, Yet are they drowned ere they landed be. Then England's honour, Europe's wonder dide. Imperfect lines : oh happy were I hurl'd O saddest straine that ere the Muses sung! And cut from life, as England from the world. A text of woe for griefe to comment on; O! happier had we beene, if we had beene Where hath the glorious eye of Heaven seene spring! Bequeathed be, Breake Nature's lawes! search the records of old ! To strew the place, wherein bis sacred urne If aught e're fell Might paralel Where stormes of woe so mainly have beset ber, The man whose masse of sorrowes have been such, She hath no place for worse, nor hope for better. Lying so ruefull and disconsolate? Hath not her watrie zone in murmuring, Fil'd every shoare with ecchoes of her crie? Yes, Thetis raves, And bids her waves See where they sadly sit on Isis' shore, And rend their haires as they would joy no more. Is Henrie dead, and doe the Muses sleepe? Alas! I see each one amazed stands, Shallow foords mutter, silent are the deepe: Faine would they tell their griefes, but know not THIRSIS'S PRAISE TO HIS MISTRES3. BY W. BROWNE. FROM A COLLECTION OF POEMS, CALLED ENGLAND'S To men so cloide they faine would heare no more, HELICON; OR, THE MUSES HARMONY. Though blaming those whose plaints they cannot heare? On a bill that grac'd the plaine Thirsis sate, a comely swaine, Whilst his flock, that wandred nie, Cropt the greene grasse busilie; Thus he tuu'd his oaten quill : Ver hath made the plesant field Many several odours yeeld, Odours aromatical: From faire Astra's cherrie lip, Sweeter smells for ever skip, They in pleasing passen al). Our former griefes would so exceed their last : Leavie groves now mainely rừng, Time cannot make our sorrowes aught com With each sweet bird's sonnetting, pleater, Notes that make the ecchoes long: Nor add one griefe to make our mourning greater. But when Astra tunes her voice, England stood ne're engirt with waves till now, All the mirthful birds rejoice, Till now it held part with the continent, And are list'ning to her song. Aye me! some one, in pittie show me how Fairely spreads the damaske rose, I might in dolefull numbers so lament, Whese rare mixture doth disclose Beauties, penrills cannot faine. the Bodleian library, and is inserted here on ac Yet, if Astra passe the bush, count of the variations from that printed in the first Roses have been seen to blush. book of Britannia's Pastorals. She doth all their beauties staine. a Phæbus shining bright in skie, Whereby you may consider well, Gilds the floods, beates mountaines hie That plain simplicity doth dwell With his beames' all quick’ning fire: At Lydford, without bravery. Astra's eyes (most sparkling ones) And in the town both young and grave, Strikcs a heat in hearts of stones, Do love the naked truth to have, And enflames them with desire. No cloak to hide their knavery. Fields are blest with flowrie wreath, The people all within this clime, Ayre is blest when she doth breath; Are frozen in the winter time, Birds make happy ev'ry grove, For sure I do not fain; She each bird when she doth sing; And when the summer is begun, They lye like silk-worms in the sun, And come to life again. One told me in king Cæsar's time, Those blessinges of the Earth we swaines do call, The town was built with stone and lime, But sure the walls were clay, The town is run away. Oh! Cæsar, if thou there didst reign, Come quickly while there is one. If thou stay but a little fit, I oft have heard of Lydford law, But five years more, they will comnit How, in the morn, they hang and draw, The whole town to a prison. And sit in judgment after. 'To see it thus much griev'd was I, At first I wonder'd at it much, The proverb saith, • Sorrows be dry," So was I at the matter. Now by good luck, I know not how, There thither came a strange stray cow, I took it for an old wind-mill, And we had milk and water. The ranes blown down by weather: To nine good stomachs, with our wigg. To lye therein one night, 'lis guess'd, At last we got a roasting pigg, 'Twere better to be ston'd and press'd, This dyet was our bounds, Or hang'd, now choose you whether. And this was just as if 'twere known, Ten men less room within this cave, a pound of butter had been thrown, Than five mice in a lanthorn have, Among a pack of hounds. The keepers they are sly ones; One glass of drink I got by chance, If any could devise by art, 'Twas claret when it was in France, To get it up into a cart, But now from it much wider; 'T'were fit to carry lyons. I think a man might make as good With green crabs boyld, and Brazil wood, When I beheld it, Lord! thought I, And half a pint of cyder. I kiss'd the mayor's hand of the town, Who, though he weare no scarlet gown, Honours the rose and thistle. A piece of coral to the mace, Which there I saw to serve in place, Would make a good child's whistle. At sick o'clock I came away, And pray'd for those that were to stay Within a place so arrant. Wide and ope the winds so roure, By God's grace I'll come there no more, Unless by some Tynn warrant. Two sureties for a noble. RICHARD THE THIRD, HIS CHARACTER, LEGEND, AND TRAGEDY, A POEM, 4to. Here is a bridge, there is a church ; 1614. [AMONGST OTHER VERSES BY CHASMAN, BEN Seven ashes, and one oak; JOHNSON, &c.] Three houses standing, and ten down. TO HIS WORTHY AND INGENIOUS FRIEND THE AUTHOR. They say the parson bath a gowne, So farre as can a swayne (who than a rounde But I saw ne'er a cloak. Un oaten-pipe no further boasts his skill) I dare to censure the shrill trumpets' sound, ! The steward. ? Attornies of the court. Or other music of the sacred hil: PREFIXED TO The popular applause hath not so fell (Like Nile's lowd cataract) possest mine ears But others' songs I can distinguish well And chant their praise, despised vertue rears: Nor shall thy buskin'd Muse be heard alone In stately pallaces; the shady woods By me shall learn't, and ecchoes one by one Teach it the hils, and they the silver floods. Our learned shepheards that have us'd to fore Their hasty gifts in notes that wooe the plaines, By rural ditties will be known no more; But reach at fame by such as are thy straines. And I would gladly (if the sisters spring Had me inabled) beare a part with thee, And for sweet groves, of brave' heroes sing, But since it fits not my weake melodie, It shall suffice that thou such means do'st give, That my harsh lines among the best may live. W. BROWNE, Int. Temp. MR. WILLIAM DRAYTON, TO HIS NOBLE FRIEND MR. WILLIAM BROWNE; OF THE EVIL TIME. DEAR friend, be silent and with patience see, And that which they have said of God, untrue, This isle is a mere Bedlam, and therein, This world of ours, thus runneth upon wheels, Set on the head, bolt upright with her heels; Which makes me think of what the Ethnics told Th' opinion, the Pythagorists uphold, That the immortal soul doth transmigrate; Then I suppose by the strong power of fate, That those which at confused Babel were, And since that time now many a lingering year, Through fools, and beasts, and lunatics have past, Are here imbodied in this age at last, And though so long we from that time be gone, For certainly there's scarce one found that now But to our proverb, all turn'd upside down; from reason, He's high'st that's low'st, he's surest in that's out, He hits the next way that goes farth'st about, Quere? braver! He getteth up unlike to rise at all, Who taught, that those all-framing powers above, To make them sport with, which the use to bring, As wherefore no man knows, God scarcely why; To any title empire can bestow; For this believe, that impudence is now Into the clouds the Devil lately got, He that by riot, of a mighty rent, Hath his late goodly patrimony spent, And into base and wilful begg`ry run, This man as he some glorious act had done, With some great pension, or rich gift reliev'd, When he that hath by industry achiev'd Some noble thing, contemned and disgrac'd, In the forlorn hope of times is plac'd. As though that God had carelessly left all That being hath on this terrestrial ball, To Fortune's guiding, nor would have to do With man, nor aught that doth belong him to, Or at the least God having given more Power to the Devil, than he did of yore, Over this world: the fiend as he doth hate The virtuous man; maligning his estate, All noble things, and would have by his will, To be damn'd with him, using all his skill, By his black hellish ministers to vex All worthy men, and strangly to perplex Their constancy, thereby them so to fright, That they should yeeld them wholly to his might. But of these things I vainly do but tell, Where Hell is Heaven, and Heav'n is now turn'd Hell; Where that which lately blasphemy hath been, | And a long while I greatly marvel'd why When I concluded by their odious crimes, As men oft laugh at little babes, when they That by their count'nance we no sooner learn With slavish baseness, that they silent sit Pointing like children in describing it. Then, noble friend, the next way to controul: And in this base world come whatever shall, A GLOSSARY OF OBSOLETE WORDS. } afraid. A. B. C. D. E F. G. I. K. L. Leefe, dear, beloved. M. 2 N. P. R. S. T. U. Unneth, scarcely. l'nwiste, unknown. W. * Y. |