Fayre fieldes and pleasaunt layes there bene;
The fieldes ay fresh, the grasse ay greene.
O happy herse!
Make hast, ye shepheards, thether to revert:
O joyfull verse!
"Dido is gone afore; (whose turne shall be the next?) There lives shee with the blessed Gods in blisse,
There drincks she Nectar with Ambrosia mixt,
And joyes enjoyes that mortall men doe misse.
The honor now of highest gods she is,
That whilome was poore shepheards pryde,
While here on earth shee did abyde.
O happy herse!
Ceasse now, my song, my woe now wasted is;
O joyfull verse!
The. Ay, francke shepheard, how bene thy verses
With doleful pleasaunce, so as I ne wotte
Whether rejoyce or weepe for great constrainte.
Thyne be the cossette, well hast thow it gotte.
Up, Colin up! ynough thou morned hast;
Now gynres to mizzle, hye we homeward fast.
COLINS EMBLEME.
La mort ny mord.
THIS Æglogue (even as the first beganne) is ended with a complaynte of Colin to God Pan; wherein, as weary of his former wayes, hee proportioneth his life to the foure seasons of the yeare; comparing hys youthe to the spring time, when he was fresh and free from loves follye. His manhoode to the sommer, which, he sayth, was consumed with greate heate and excessive drouth, caused throughe a Comet or blazing starre, by which hee meaneth love; which passion is comenly compared to such flames and immoderate heate. His riper yeares he resembleth to an unseasonable harveste, wherein the fruites fall ere they be rype. His latter age to winters chyll and frostie season, now drawing neare to his last ende.
HE gentle shepheard satte beside a springe,
All in the shadowe of a bushye brere,
That Colin hight, which wel could pype
For hee of Tityrus his songs did lere :
There, as he satte in secreate shade alone,
Thus gan he make of love his piteous mone.
"O soveraigne Pan! thou god of shepheards all,
Which of our tender Lambkins takest keepe,
And, when our flocks into mischaunce mought fall
Doest save from mischiefe the unwary sheepe,
Als of their maisters hast no lesse regard
Then of the flocks, which thou doest watch and ward;
"I thee beseche (so be thou deigne to heare
Rude ditties, tund to shepheards Oaten reede,
Or if I ever sonet song so cleare,
As it with pleasaunce mought thy fancie feede)
Hearken a while, from thy greene cabinet,
The rurall song of carefull Colinet.
"Whilome in youth, when flowrd my joyfull spring,
Like Swallow swift I wandred here and there;
For heate of heedlesse lust me so did sting,
That I of doubted daunger had no feare:
I went the wastefull woodes and forest wide,
Withouten dreade of wolves to bene espyed.
"I wont to raunge amydde the mazie thickette,
And gather nuttes to make me Christmas game,
And joyed oft to chace the trembling Pricket,
Or hunt the hartlesse hare til shee were tame.
What wreaked I of wintrye ages waste?-
Tho deemed I my spring would ever laste.
"How often have I scaled the craggie Oke,
All to dislodge the Raven of her nest?
How have I wearied with many a stroke
The stately Walnut-tree, the while the rest
Under the tree fell all for nuts at strife?
For ylike to me was libertee and lyfe.
"And for I was in thilke same looser yeares, (Whether the Muse so wrought me from my byrth, Or I tomuch beleeved my shepherd peeres,) Somedele ybent to song and musicks mirth, A good olde shephearde, Wrenock was his name, Made me by arte more cunning in the same.
"Fro thence I durst in derring to compare
With shepheards swayne what ever fed in field;
And, if that Hobbinol right iudgement bare,
To Pan his own selfe pype I neede not yield:
For, if the flocking Nymphes did folow Pan,
The wiser Muses after Colin ranne.
"But, ah! such pryde at length was ill repayde:
The shepheards God (perdie God was he none)
My hurtlesse pleasaunce did me ill upbraide;
My freedome lorne, my life he lefte to mone.
Love they him called that gave me checkmate,
But better mought they have behote him Hate.
"Tho gan my lovely Spring bid me farewel,
And Sommer season sped him to display
(For love then in the Lyons house did dwell)
The raging fyre that kindled at his ray.
A comett stird up that unkindly heate,
That reigned (as men sayd) in Venus seate.
"Forth was I ledde, not as I wont afore,
When choise I had to choose my wandring waye,
But whether luck and loves unbridled lore
Would leade me forth on Fancies bitte to playe:
The bush my bedde, the bramble was my bowre,
The Woodes can witnesse many a wofull stowre.
"Where I was wont to seeke the honey Bee,
Working her formall rowmes in wexen frame,
The grieslie Todestoole growne there mought I se,
And loathed paddocks lording on the same :
And where the chaunting birds luld me a sleepe,
The ghastlie Owle her grievous ynne doth keeре.
"Then as the springe gives place to elder time,
And bringeth forth the fruite of sommers pryde;
Also my age, now passed younthly pryme,
To thinges of ryper season selfe applyed,
And learnd of lighter timber cotes to frame,
Such as might save my sheepe and me fro shame.
"To make fine cages for the Nightingale,
And Baskets of bulrushes, was my wont:
Who to entrappe the fish in winding sale
Was better seene, or hurtful beastes to hont?
I learned als the signes of heaven to ken,
How Phœbe fayles, where Venus sittes, and when.
"And tryed time yet taught me greater thinges;
The sodain rysing of the raging seas,
The soothe of byrdes by beating of their winges,
The power of herbs, both which can hurt and ease,
And which be wont t' enrage the restlesse sheepe,
And which be wont to worke eternall sleepe.
"But, ah! unwise and witlesse Colin cloute,
That kydst the hidden kinds of many a wede,
Yet kydst not ene to cure thy sore hart roote,
Whose ranckling wound as yet does rifelye bleede.
Why livest thou stil, and yet hast thy deathes wound?
Why dyest thou stil, and yet alive art founde?
"Thus is my sommer worne away and wasted,
Thus is my harvest hastened all to rathe;
The eare that budded fayre is burnt and blasted,
And all my hoped gaine is turn'd to scathe :
Of all the seede, that in my youth was sowne,
Was nought but brakes and brambles to be mowne.
"My boughes with bloosmes that crowned were at firste,
And promised of timely fruite such store,
Are left both bare and barrein now at erst;
The flattring fruite is fallen to grownd before,
And rotted ere they were halfe mellow ripe;
My harvest, wast, my hope away dyd wipe.
"The fragrant flowres, that in my garden grewe,
Bene withered, as they had bene gathered long; 110
Theyr rootes bene dryed up for lacke of dewe,
Yet dewed with teares they han be ever among.
Ah! who has wrought my Rosalind this spight,
To spil the flowres that should her girlond dight?
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