Carent

III.

Though seas and land betwixt us both,

Our faith and troth,

Like separated soules,

All time and space controules:
Above the highest sphere wee meet,

Unseene, unknowne, and greet as angels greet.

Can speake like spirits unconfin'd

In Heav'n, their earthy bodies left behind.

SONG.

SET BY MR. JOHN LANIERE.

TO LUCASTA. GOING TO THE WARRES.

I.

ELL me not, (sweet,) I am unkinde,
That from the nunnerie

Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde
To warre and armes I flie.

II.

True: a new Mistresse now I chase,
The first foe in the field;

And with a stronger faith imbrace

A sword, a horse, a shield.

III.

Yet this inconstancy is such,
As you too shall adore;

I could not love thee, dear, so much,

Lov'd I not Honour more.

A PARADOX.

ch

I.

IS true the beauteous Starre1

To which I first did bow
Burnt quicker, brighter far,

Than that which leads me now;
Which shines with more delight,
For gazing on that light
So long, neere lost my sight.

II.

Through foul we follow faire,

For had the world one face,
And earth been bright as ayre,
We had knowne neither place.
Indians smell not their neast;
A Swisse or Finne tastes best
The spices of the East.

1 i. e. Lucasta.

2 The East was celebrated by all our early poets as the land of spices and rich gums:

III.

So from the glorious Sunne
Who to his height hath got,
With what delight we runne
To some black cave or grot!
And, heav'nly Sydney you
Twice read, had rather view
Some odde romance so new.

IV.

The god, that constant keepes
Unto his deities,

Is poore in joyes, and sleepes
Imprison'd in the skies.

This knew the wisest, who
From Juno stole, below
To love a bear or cow.

"For now the fragrant East,

The spicery o' th' world,

Hath hurl'd

A rosie tincture o'er the Phoenix nest."

Otia Sacra, by Mildmay, Earl of Westmoreland,

1648, p. 37.

SONG.

SET BY MR. HENRY LAWES.

TO AMARANTHA; THAT SHE WOULD DISHEVELL

HER HAIRE.

I.

MARANTHA sweet and faire,

Ah brade no more that shining haire!
As my curious hand or eye,
Hovering round thee, let it flye.

II.

Let it flye as unconfin'd

As it's calme ravisher, the winde,
Who hath left his darling, th' East,
To wanton o're that spicie neast.

III.

Ev'ry tresse must be confest:
But neatly tangled at the best;

A portion of this song is printed, with a few orthographical variations, in the Ayres and Dialogues, part i. 1653; and it is also found in Cotgrave's Wits Interpreter, 1655, where it is called "Amarantha counselled." Cotgrave used the text of Lawes, and only gives that part of the production which he found in Ayres and Dialogues.

2 Forbear to brade-Lawes' Ayres and Dialogues, and Cot. grave.

3 This-Lawes' Ayres and Dialogues. Cotgrave reads his.

Like a clue of golden thread,
Most excellently ravelled.

IV.

Doe not then winde up

that light

In ribands, and o'er-cloud in night,
Like the sun in's early ray;

But shake your head, and scatter day.

V.

See, 'tis broke! within this grove,
The bower and the walkes of love,
Weary lye we downe and rest,
And fanne each other's panting breast.

VI.

Heere wee'll strippe and coole our fire,
In creame below, in milke-baths1 higher :
And when all wells are drawne dry,
I'll drink a teare out of thine eye.

VII.

Which our very joys shall leave,
That sorrowes thus we can deceive;
Or our very sorrowes weepe,
That joyes so ripe so little keepe.

'Milk-baths have been a favourite luxury in all ages. Peele had probably in his mind the custom of his own time and country when he wrote the following passage:

"Bright Bethsabe shall wash in David's bower,

In water mix'd with purest almond flower,
And bathe her beauty in the milk of kids."

King David and Fair Bethsabe, 1599.