NAY; let the prouder Pines of Ida feare
The sudden fires of heaven ; and decline
Their yeelding tops, that dar’d the skies whilere':
And shake your sturdy trunks, ye prouder Pines,

Whose swelling graines are like be galdalone,

With the deep furrowes of the thunder-stone.
Stand ye secure, ye safer shrubs below,
In humble dales, whom heav'ns do noc despight;
Nor angry clouds conspire your overthrow,
Envying at your too-disdainfull hight.

Let high attemps dread envy and ill tongues,

And cow'rdly shrink for fear of causelesse wrongs.
So wont big okes feare winding yvy weed :
So soaring egles feare the neighbour sonne :
So golden Mazor wont suspicion breed,
Of deadly Hemlock's poyson'd potion 3:

So adders shroud themselves in fayrest leaves :
So fouler fate the fayrer thing bereaves.

this sense

2

whilere—just now, a little while ago. Shakespeare uses orewhile in Else your memory is bad, going o'er it EREWHILE.

Love's LABOUR Lost. A. iv. Sc. d. Raleigh uses the word as Hall does.

are like be galdi. e, are like to be fretted, marked, or corn. So in Book IV. Sat. 5.

With some GAL'D trunk, ballac'd with straw and stone. And in the conclusion to Book III.

Hold out, ye guiltie and ye GALLED hides. So golden Mazor wont suspicion breed

Of deadly Hemlock's poison'd potion. Mazor, or mazer, is explained in the old dictionaries to be a standing-cup to drink in, commonly made of maeser, a Dutch word for maple. The contrast of he poet then is, between a cup usually made of maple, and the saine cup made of gold.

6

Nor the low bush feares climbing yvy-twine :
Nor lowly bustard dreads the distant rayes :
Nor earthen pot wont secret death to shrine:
Nor suttle snake doth lurke in pathed wayes.

Nor baser deed dreads envy and ill tongues,

Nor shrinks so soone for feare of causelesse wrongs.
Needs me then hope, or doth me need mis-dread:
Hope for that honor, dread that wrongfull spight:
Spight of the partie, honor of the deed,
Which wont alone on loftie objects light.
That
envy

should accost my muse and mee,
For this so rude and recklesse* poesie.
Would she but shade her tender brows with bay,
That now lye bare in carelesse wilfull rage;
And trance herselfe in that sweet extasey,
That rouzeth drouping thoughts of bashfull age.

(Tho now those bays and that aspired thought,

In carelesse rage she sets at worse than nought.)
Or would we loose her plumy pineon,
Manicled long with bonds of modest feare,
Soone might she have those kestrels' proud out gone,
Whose flightty wings are dew'd with weeter ayre;

And hopen now to shoulder from above

The eagle from the stayrs of friendly Jove.
Or list she rather in late tryumph reare
Eternall Trophees to some conqueror,
Whose dead deserts slept in his sepulcher,
And never saw, nor life, nor light before :

To lead sad Pluto captive with my song,

To grace the triumphs he obscur'd so long.
Or scoure the rusted swords of elvish knights,
Bathed in Pagan blood; or sheath them new
In misty morall types; or tell their fights,
Who mighty giants, or who monsters slew :

And by some strange inchanted speare and shield,

Vanquisht their foe, and wan’ the doubtfull field.
May be she might in stately Stanzaes frame
Stories of ladies, and advent'rous knights“,
To raise her silent and inglorious name
Unto a reach-lesse pitch of praises hight,

And somewhat say, as more unworthy done,

Worthy of brasse, and hoary marble-stone. • recklesse-careless, or severe.

5 kestrels—a species of hawk : from the French quercelle, cercelle : these froma the Latin circulus ; so called from the shape or disposition of its tail.

• weeter-wetter. ? wan-won.

• Stories of ladies, and advent'rous knights. A pointed allusion to the finished and descriptive poetry of Spenser. E.

Then might vaine envy waste her duller wing,
To trace the '

aery steps she spiting sees,
And vainly faint in hopelesse following
The clouded paths her native drosse denies.

But now such lowly Satyres here I sing,

Not worth our Muse, not worth their envying.
Too good, if ill, to be expos’d to blame:
Too good, if worse, to shadow shamelesse vice,
Ill, if too good, not answering their name:
So good and ill in fickle censure lies.

Since in our Satyre lyes both good and ill,

And they and it, in varying readers' will.
Witnesse, ye Muses, how I wilfull song'
These heddy rhymes, withouten second care;
And wish't them worse, my guiltie thoughts emong;
The ruder Satyre should go rag'd and bare,

And show his rougher and his hairy hide,

Tho mine be smooth, and deckt in cảrelesse pride.
Would we but breath within a wax-bound quill,
Pan's sevenfold pipe, some plaintive pastorall;
To teach each hollow grove, and shrubby hill,
Ech murm'ring brooke, each solitary vale

To sound our love, and to our song accord,

Wearying eccho with one changelesse word.
Or list us make two striving shepheards sing,
With costly wagers for the victorie,
Under Menalcas judge; whiles one doth bring
A carven bole well wrought of beechen tree,

Praising it by the story, or the frame,

Or want of use, or skilfull maker's name.
Another layeth a well-marked lambe,
Or spotted kid, or some more forward steere '',
And from the payle doth praise their fertile dam;
So do they strive in doubt, in hope, in feare,

Awayting for their trustie Umpire's doome,

Faulted" as false, by him that's overcome.
Whether so me list my lovely thought to sing,
Come daunce, ye nimble Dryads, by my side ;
Ye gentle wood-Nymphs, come; and with you bring
The willing faunes that mought your musick guide.

• Song for sung: thus spelt for the sake of the rhime. E. This conformity of the orthography io the rhime is very frequent. Indeed the orthography, in our author's days, was regulated by no fixed principles. There is no kind of confor. mity, in this respect, between the first edition of the Satires printed in 1597, and the subsequent editions of 1599, and 1602. I have followed, with very few exe cepcions, ihat of the first edition : from which edition I have also corrected several gross mistakes which had crept into all that followed.

to steerema young bullock. " faulted--blamed, found fault with.

Come, nimphs and faunes, that haunt those shady groves,

Whiles I report my fortunes or my loves.
Or whether list me sing so personate,
My striving selfe to conquer with my verse,
Speake, ye attentive swaynes that heard me late,
Needs me give grasse unto the conquerers.

At Colin's feet I throw my yeelding reed",

But let the rest win homage by their deed.
But now, ye Muses, sith your sacred hests
Profaned are by each presuming tongue;
In scornfull rage I vow this silent rest,
That never field nor

grove

shall heare my song.
Only these refuse rymes I here mispend,
To chide the world, that did my thoughts offend.

12 At Colin's feet I throw my yeelding reed. Expressive of his reluctance and inability to write Pastorals after Spenser.

DE SUIS SATIRIS.

Dum Satyræ dixi, videor dixisse Sat iræ

Corripio; aut istæc non satis est Satyra.
Ira facit Satyram, reliquum Sat temperat iram;

Pinge tuo Satyram sanguine, tum Satyra est.
Ecce novam Satyram : Satyrum sine cornibus ! Euge

Monstra novi monstri hæc; et Satyri et Satyræ.

VIRGIDEMIARUM.

LIB. I.