Being asked the Occasion of his White Head, he answered thus. [From the same.] I WHERE seething sighs, and sower sobs Hath slain the slips that Nature set; And scalding showers, with stony throbs, The kindly sap from them hath fet; What wonder then though you do see Upon my head white hairs to be? Where Thought hath thrill'd and thrown his spears, Where pinching Pain himself hath plac'd, There Peace with Pleasures were possess'd; And walls of wealth are fall'n to waste, And Poverty in them is prest; What wonder then though you do see Upon my head white hairs to be? 1 Ed. 1580," sorrow." Where wretched Woe doth weave her web, So low, that life may not long last; These hairs of Age are messengers, They be the lines that lead the length, The which I feel: and you may see They be the strings, of sober sound, Their tunes declare-a time from ground God grant to those that white hairs have, Their souls may joy, their lives well spent. I Upon your head such hairs to be. [In ed. 1577 and 1580, this piece is attributed, I believe falsely, to W. Hunnis.] So the sense seems to require. The original has “my.” UNCERTAIN AUTHORS. Among the uncertain authors, whose works are subjoined to Lord Surrey's Poems, are to be classed (says Mr Warton) SIR FRANCIS BRIAN, and LORD ROCHFORD. * THOMAS CHURCHYARD also may be added to the list of contributors. In the catalogue of his numerous productions prefixed to his "Challenge," he says, " Many things "in the book of songs and sonnets, in Queen Mary's "reign, were of my making." See an account of this author and his works in Ritson's Bibliographia. Sir Francis Brian (nephew to Bourchier lord Berners, the translator of Froissart), was the friend of Sir Thomas Wyatt, and knighted by Thomas, earl of Surrey, during the expedition to Brittany. His wit and accomplishments procured him the post of gentleman of the privy chamber to Henry VIII., and he was afterwards promoted to more important employments, and died chief-justiciary of Ireland, 1548. George Boleyn, viscount Rochfort, brother to Queen Anne Boleyn, with whom he was most unjustly accused of a criminal intimacy, was beheaded on this suspicion in May, 1536. He was the idol of the ladies at Henry's court, and wrote several songs and sonnets. The first of the following, which, by the editor of lord Surrey's Poems, is placed among the works of Sir Thomas Wyatt, is, in the Nuga Antique, ascribed to lord Rochford. * Sir F. Brian, indeed, is pointed out by Drayton as contributor to Tottel's miscellany. "Amongst our poets Bryan had a share "With the two + former, which accompted are + Surrey and Wyatt. The Lover complaineth the Unkindness of his Love. My lute awake, perform the last Labour that thou and I shall waste, And end that I have now begun! The rocks do not so cruelly Whereby my lute and I have done. Proud of the spoil that thou hast got Although my lute and I have done. "That time's best makers, and the authors were "On many dainty passages of wit." [Epist. to Hen. Reynolds, Esq.] And Richard Smith says, in a copy of verses before Gas coigne's Works, "Old Ruchført clamb the stately throne "Which Muses hold in Helicon." |