Lyrics From The Song-books Of The Elizabethan Age, by A.H. Bullen.

	Page
PREFACE	v
INDEX OF FIRST LINES	xxiii
LYRICS FROM ELIZABETHAN SONG-BOOKS	xxxi
NOTES	177
LIST OF SONG-BOOKS	198

Note.—Two hundred and fifty copies of this large paper edition printed, each of which is numbered.

LYRICS

FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE

ELIZABETHAN AGE:

EDITED BY

A.H. BULLEN.

LONDON:
JOHN C. NIMMO,
14, King William Street, Strand, W.C.
1887.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT,
CHANCERY LANE.

PREFACE.

The present Anthology is intended to serve as a companion volume to the Poetical Miscellanies published in England at the close of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth centuries. A few of the lyrics here collected are, it is true, included in “England’s Helicon,” Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody,” and “The Phœnix’ Nest”; and some are to be found in the modern collections of Oliphant, Collier, Rimbault, Mr. W.J. Linton, Canon Hannah, and Professor Arber. But many of the poems in the present volume are, I have every reason to believe, unknown even to those who have made a special study of Elizabethan poetry. I have gone carefully through all the old song-books preserved in the library of the British Museum, and I have given extracts from two books of which there is no copy in our national library. A first attempt of this kind must necessarily be imperfect. Were I to go over the ground again I should enlarge the collection, and I should hope to gain tidings of some [Pg vi] song-books (mentioned by bibliographers) which I have hitherto been unable to trace.

In Elizabeth’s days composers were not content to regard the words of a song as a mere peg on which to hang the music, but sought the services of true-born lyrists. It is not too much to say that, for delicate perfection of form, some of the Elizabethan songs can compare with the choicest epigrams in the Greek Anthology. At least one composer, Thomas Campion, wrote both the words and the music of his songs; and there are no sweeter lyrics in English poetry than are to be found in Campion’s song-books. But it may be assumed that, as a rule, the composers are responsible only for the music.

It was in the year of the Spanish Armada, 1588, that William Byrd published “Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs of Sadness and Piety,” the first Elizabethan song-book of importance. Few biographical particulars concerning Byrd have come down. As he was senior chorister of St. Paul’s in 1554, he is conjectured to have been born about 1538. From 1563 to 1569 he was organist of Lincoln Cathedral. He and Tallis were granted a patent, which must have proved fairly lucrative, for the printing of music and the vending of music-paper. In later life he appears to have become a convert to Romanism. His last work was published in 1611, and [Pg vii] he died at a ripe old age on the 24th of July, 1623. The “Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs” are dedicated to Sir Christopher Hatton. In the dedicatory epistle he terms the collection “this first printed work of mine in English;” in 1575 he had published with Tallis “Cantiones Sacræ.” From the title one would gather that Byrd’s first English collection was mainly of a sacred character, but in an epistle to the reader he hastens to set us right on that point:—“Benign reader, here is offered unto thy courteous acceptance music of sundry sorts, and to content divers humours. If thou be disposed to pray, here are psalms; if to be merry, here are sonnets.” There is, indeed, fare for all comers; and a reader has only himself to blame if he goes away dissatisfied. In those days, as in these, it was not uncommon for a writer to attribute all faults, whether of omission or commission, to the luckless printer. Byrd, on the other hand, solemnly warns us that “in the expression of these songs either by voices or instruments, if there be any jar or dissonance,” we are not to blame the printer, who has been at the greatest pains to secure accuracy. Then the composer makes a modest appeal on behalf of himself, requesting those who find any fault in the composition “either with courtesy to let the same be concealed,” or “in friendly sort” point out the errors, which shall be [Pg viii]corrected in a future impression. This is the proper manner of dealing between gentlemen. His next publication was “Songs of Sundry Natures,” 1589, which was dedicated to Sir Henry Carey, who seems to have been as staunch a patron of Byrd as his son, Sir George Carey, was of Dowland. In 1611 appeared Byrd’s last work, “Psalms, Songs, and Sonnets.” The composer must have taken to heart the precepts set down by Sir Edward Dyer in “My mind to me a kingdom is,” (printed in “Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs”) for his dedicatory epistle and his address to the reader show him to have been a man who had laid up a large store of genial wisdom, upon which he could draw freely in the closing days of an honourable life. His earlier works had been well received, and in addressing “all true lovers of music” he knew that he could rely upon their cordial sympathy. “I am much encouraged,” he writes, “to commend to you these my last labours, for mine ultimum vale;” and then follows a piece of friendly counsel: “Only this I desire, that you will be as careful to hear them well expressed, as I have been both in the composing and correcting of them. Otherwise the best song that ever was made will seem harsh and unpleasant; for that the well expressing of them either by voices or instruments is the life of our labours, which is seldom or [Pg ix] never well performed at the first singing or playing.”

No musician of the Elizabethan age was more famous than John Dowland, whose “heavenly touch upon the lute” was commended in a well-known sonnet (long attributed to Shakespeare) by Richard Barnfield. Dowland was born at Westminster in 1562. At the age of twenty, or thereabouts, he started on his travels; and, after rambling through “the chiefest parts of France, a nation furnished with great variety of music,” he bent his course “towards the famous province of Germany,” where he found “both excellent masters and most honourable patrons of music.” In the course of his travels he visited Venice, Padua, Genoa, Ferrara, and Florence, gaining applause everywhere by his musical skill. On his return to England he took his degree at Oxford, as Bachelor of Music, in 1588. In 1597 he published “The First Book of Songs or Airs of four parts, with Tableture for the Lute.” Prefixed is a dedicatory epistle to Sir George Carey (second Lord Hunsdon), in which the composer alludes gracefully to the kindness he had received from Lady Elizabeth Carey, the patroness of Spenser. A “Second Book of Songs or Airs” was published in 1600, when the composer was at the Danish Court, serving as lutenist to King Christian the Fourth. The work was dedicated [Pg x]to the famous Countess of Bedford, whom Ben Jonson immortalized in a noble sonnet. From a curious address to the reader by George Eastland, the publisher, it would appear that in spite of Dowland’s high reputation the sale of his works was not very profitable. “If the consideration of mine own estate,” writes Eastland, “or the true worth of money, had prevailed with me above the desire of pleasing you and showing my love to my friends, these second labours of Master Dowland—whose very name is a large preface of commendation to the book—had for ever lain hid in darkness, or at the least frozen in a cold and foreign country.” The expenses of publication were heavy, but he consoled himself with the thought that his high-spirited enterprise would be appreciated by a select audience. In 1603 appeared “The Third and Last Book of Songs or Airs;” and, in 1612, when he was acting as lutenist to Lord Walden, Dowland issued his last work, “A Pilgrime’s Solace.” He is supposed to have died about 1615, leaving a son, Robert Dowland, who gained some fame as a composer. Modern critics have judged that Dowland’s music was somewhat overrated by his contemporaries, and that he is wanting in variety and originality. Whether these critics are right or wrong, it would be difficult to overrate the poetry. In attempting to select [Pg xi] representative lyrics one is embarrassed by the wealth of material. The rich clusters of golden verse hang so temptingly that it is difficult to cease plucking when once we have begun.

In his charming collection of “Rare Poems” Mr. Linton quotes freely from the song-books of Byrd and Dowland, but gives only one lyric of Dr. Thomas Campion. As Mr. Linton is an excellent judge of poetry, I can only suppose that he had no wide acquaintance with Campion’s writings, when he put together his dainty Anthology. There is clear evidence [1] that Campion wrote not only the music but the words for his songs—that he was at once an eminent composer and a lyric poet of the first rank. He published a volume of Latin verse, which displays ease and fluency (though the prosody is occasionally erratic); as a masque-writer he was inferior only to Ben Jonson; he was the author of treatises on the arts of music and poetry; and he practised as a physician. It would be interesting to ascertain[Pg xii] some facts about the life of this highly-gifted man; but hitherto little information has been collected. The Oxford historian, good old Anthony-à-Wood, went altogether wrong and confused our Thomas Campion with another person of the same name who took his degree in 1624—five years after the poet’s death. It is probable that our Thomas Campion was the second son of Thomas Campion of Witham, Essex, and that he was distantly related to Edmund Campion the famous Jesuit. His first work was his “Epigrammatum Libri duo,” published in 1595, and republished in 1619. The first edition is exceedingly rare; there is no copy in the British Museum. Francis Meres, in his very valuable (and very tedious) “Wit’s Treasury,” 1598, mentions Campion among the “English men, being Latin poets,” who had “attained good report and honorable advancement in the Latin empire.” In 1601 Campion and Philip Rosseter published jointly “A Book of Airs.” The music was partly written by Campion and partly by Rosseter; but the whole of the poetry may be safely assigned to Campion. From a dedicatory epistle, by Rosseter, to Sir Thomas Monson, we learn that Campion’s songs, “made at his vacant hours and privately imparted to his friends,” had been passed from hand to hand and had suffered from the carelessness of [Pg xiii] successive transcribers. Some impudent persons, we are told, had “unrespectively challenged” (i.e. claimed) the credit both of the music and the poetry. The address To the Reader, which follows the dedicatory epistle, is unsigned, but appears to have been written by Campion. “What epigrams are in poetry,” it begins, “the same are airs in music: then in their chief perfection when they are short and well seasoned. But to clog a light song with a long preludium is to corrupt the nature of it. Many rests in music were invented either for necessity of the fugue, or granted as an harmonical licence in songs of many parts; but in airs I find no use they have, unless it be to make a vulgar and trivial modulation seem to the ignorant strange, and to the judicial tedious.” It is among the curiosities of literature that this true poet, who had so exquisite a sense of form, and whose lyrics are frequently triumphs of metrical skill, should have published a work (entitled “Observations in the Art of English Poesy”) to prove that the use of rhyme ought to be discontinued, and that English metres should be fashioned after classical models. “Poesy,” he writes, “in all kind of speaking is the chief beginner and maintainer of eloquence, not only helping the ear with the acquaintance of sweet numbers, but also raising the mind to a more high and lofty [Pg xiv] conceit. For this end have I studied to induce a true form of versifying into our language; for the vulgar and artificial custom of rhyming hath, I know, deterr’d many excellent wits from the exercise of English poesy.” The work was published in 1602, the year after he had issued the first collection of his charming lyrics. It was in answer to Campion that Samuel Daniel wrote his “Defence of Rhyme” (1603), one of the ablest critical treatises in the English language. Daniel was puzzled, as well he might be, that an attack on rhyme should have been made by one “whose commendable rhymes, albeit now himself an enemy to rhyme, have given heretofore to the world the best notice of his worth.” It is pleasant to find Daniel testifying to the fact that Campion was “a man of fair parts and good reputation.” Ben Jonson, as we are informed by Drummond of Hawthornden, wrote “a Discourse of Poesy both against Campion and Daniel;” but the discourse was never published. In his “Observations” Campion gives us a few specimen-poems written in the unrhymed metres that he proposed to introduce. The following verses are the least objectionable that I can find:—

There is artful ease and the touch of a poet’s hand in those verses; but the Muses shield us from such innovations! Campion’s second collection, “Two Books of Airs”, is undated; but, from an allusion to the death of Prince Henry, we may conclude that it was published about the year 1613. The first book consists of “Divine and Moral Songs” and the second of “light conceits of lovers.” In dealing with sacred themes, particularly when they venture on paraphrases of the Psalms, our poets seldom do themselves justice; but I claim for Campion that he is neither stiff nor awkward. Henry Vaughan is the one English poet whose devotional fervour found the highest lyrical expression; and Campion’s impassioned poem “Awake, awake, thou heavy sprite!” (p. 6) is not unworthy of the great Silurist. Among[Pg xvi] the sacred verses are some lines (“Jack and Joan they think no ill,” p. 61) in praise of a contented countryman and his good wife. A sweeter example of an old pastoral lyric could nowhere be found, not even in the pages of Nicholas Breton. The “Third and Fourth Books of Airs” are also undated, but they were probably published in 1613. In this collection, where all is good, my favourite is “Now winter nights enlarge” (p. 90). Others may prefer the melodious serenade, worthy even of Shelley, “Shall I come, sweet love, to thee” (p. 100). But there is one poem of Campion (printed in the collection of 1601) which, for strange richness of romantic beauty, could hardly be matched outside the sonnets of Shakespeare:—

Campion was steeped in classical feeling: his rendering of Catullus’ “Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus” (p. 80) is, so far as it goes, delightful. It is time that Campion should again take his rightful place among the lyric poets of England. In his own day his fame stood high. Camden did not hesitate to couple his name with the names of Spenser and Sidney; but modern critics have persistently neglected him. The present anthology contains a large number of his best poems; and I venture to hope that my attempt to recall attention to the claims of this true poet will not be fruitless.

There is much excellent verse hidden away in the Song-books of Robert Jones, a famous performer on the lute. Between 1601 and 1611 Jones issued six musical works. Two of these—“The First Set of Madrigals,” 1607, and “The Muses’ Garden for Delight,” 1611,—I have unfortunately not been able to see, as I have not yet succeeded in discovering their present resting-place. Of “Ultimum Vale, or the Third Book of Airs” [1608], only one copy is known. It formerly belonged to Rimbault, and is now [Pg xviii] preserved in the library of the Royal College of Music. The other publications of Jones are of the highest rarity. By turns the songs are grave and gay. On one page is the warning to Love—

On another we read “Love winged my hopes and taught me how to fly,” (p. 73); but the vain hopes, seeking to woo the sun’s fair light, were scorched with fire and drown’d in woe,

I have drawn freely from the madrigals of Weelkes, Morley, Farmer, Wilbye and others. Thomas Ford’s “Music of Sundry Kinds,” 1607, has yielded some very choice verse; and Francis Pilkington’s collections have not been consulted in vain. From John Attye’s “First Book of Airs,” 1622, I have selected one song, (p. 94), only one,—warm and tender and delicious. Some pleasant verses have been drawn from the rare song-books of William Corkine; and Thomas Vautor’s “Songs [Pg xix] of Divers Airs and Natures,” 1619, have supplied some quaint snatches, notably the address to the owl, (p. 116) “Sweet Suffolk owl, so trimly dight.” I have purposely refrained from giving many humorous ditties. Had I been otherwise minded there was plenty of material to my hand in the rollicking rounds and catches of Ravenscroft’s admirable collections.

As I have no technical knowledge of the subject, it would be impertinent for me to attempt to estimate the merits of the music contained in these old song-books; but I venture with all confidence to commend the poetry to the reader’s attention. There is one poem which I have deliberately kept back. It occurs in “The First Part of Airs, French, Polish, and others together, some in tableture and some in prick-song,” 1605. The composer was a certain Captain Tobias Hume, but who the author of the poem was I know not. Here is the first stanza:—

[Pg xx] The other stanza shall occupy the place of honour in the front of my Anthology; for among all the Elizabethan song-books I have found no lines of more faultless beauty, of happier cadence or sweeter simplicity, no lines that more justly deserve to be treasured in the memory while memory lasts.

INDEX OF FIRST LINES

	PAGE
A little pretty bonny lass was walking (Farmer)	1
A shepherd in a shade his plaining made (John Dowland)	1
A sparrow-hawk proud did hold in wicked jail (Weelkes)	2
A woman’s looks (Jones)	3
About the maypole new, with glee and merriment (Morley)	4
Adieu! sweet Amaryllis (Wilbye)	5
April is in my mistress’ face (Morley)	5
Arise, my thoughts, and mount you with the sun (Jones)	5
Awake, awake! thou heavy sprite (Campion)	6
Awake, sweet Love! ’tis time to rise (Youll)	7
Ay me, can every rumour (Wilbye)	7
Ay me, my mistress scorns my love (Bateson)	8

Behold a wonder here (John Dowland)	8
Brown is my Love, but graceful (Musica Transalpina)	9
By a fountain where I lay (John Dowland)	9
By the moon we sport and play (Ravenscroft)	11

Canst thou love and lie alone (Melismata)	11
Change thy mind since she doth change (Robert Dowland)	12
Cold Winter’s ice is fled and gone (Weelkes)	13
Come away! come, sweet Love! (John Dowland)	14
Come, O come, my life’s delight (Campion)	15
Come, Phyllis, come into these bowers (Ford)	16
Come, shepherd swains, that wont to hear me sing (Wilbye)	16
Come, you pretty false-eyed wanton (Campion)	17
Could my heart more tongues employ (Campion)	18
Crownèd with flowers I saw fair Amaryllis (Byrd)	19

[Pg xxiv] Dare you haunt our hallow’d green (Ravenscroft)	19
Dear, if I with guilt would gild a true intent (Campion)	20
Dear, if you change I’ll never choose again (John Dowland)	20
Do you not know how Love lost first his seeing (Morley)	21
Draw on, sweet Night, best friend unto those cares (Wilbye)	21

Each day of thine, sweet month of May (Youll)	22
Every dame affects good fame, whate’er her doings be (Campion)	22

Fair Phyllis I saw sitting all alone (Farmer)	24
Farewell, false Love, the oracle of lies (Byrd)	24
Farewell, my joy! (Weelkes)	25
Fine knacks for ladies, cheap, choice, brave and new (John Dowland)	26
Fire that must flame is with apt fuel fed (Campion)	27
Flora gave me fairest flowers (Wilbye)	27
Follow your saint, follow with accents sweet (Campion and Rosseter)	28
Fond wanton youths make Love a God (Jones)	28
From Citheron the warlike boy is fled (Byrd)	30
From Fame’s desire, from Love’s delight retired (John Dowland)	31

Give Beauty all her right (Campion)	32
Go, crystal tears! like to the morning showers (John Dowland)	33
Go, turn away those cruel eyes (Egerton MS. 2013)	33
Good men, show! if you can tell (Campion)	34

Ha! ha! ha! this world doth pass (Weelkes)	36
Happy he (Jones)	36
Happy, O! happy he, who not affecting (Wilbye)	37
Have I found her? O rich finding (Pilkington)	38
Heigh ho! chill go to plough no more (Mundy)	38
How many things as yet (Maynard)	39
How shall I then describe my Love (Ford)	39

[Pg xxv] I always loved to call my lady Rose (Lichfild)	40
I have house and land in Kent (Melismata)	41
I joy not in no earthly bliss (Byrd)	43
I live and yet methinks I do not breathe (Wilbye)	44
I marriage would forswear (Maynard)	44
I only am the man (Maynard)	45
I saw my Lady weep (John Dowland)	46
I sung sometime my thoughts and fancy’s pleasure (Wilbye)	46
I weigh not Fortune’s frown nor smile (Gibbons)	47
I will no more come to thee (Morley)	48
If fathers knew but how to leave (Jones)	48
If I urge my kind desires (Campion and Rosseter)	49
If my complaints could passions move (John Dowland)	50
If thou long’st so much to learn, sweet boy, what ’tis to love (Campion)	51
If women could be fair and never fond (Byrd)	52
In crystal towers and turrets richly set (Byrd)	53
In darkness let me dwell, the ground shall sorrow be (Coprario)	53
In midst of woods or pleasant grove (Mundy)	54
In pride of May (Weelkes)	55
In Sherwood lived stout Robin Hood (Jones)	56
In the merry month of May (Este)	57
Inconstant Laura makes me death to crave (Greaves)	58
Injurious hours, whilst any joy doth bless me (Lichfild)	59
Is Love a boy,—what means he then to strike (Byrd)	59
It was the frog in the well (Melismata)	60

Jack and Joan they think no ill (Campion)	61

Kind are her answers (Campion)	62
Kind in unkindness, when will you relent (Campion and Rosseter)	63

Lady, the birds right fairly (Weelkes)	64
Lady, the melting crystal of your eye (Greaves)	64
Lady, when I behold the roses sprouting (Wilbye)	65
Let not Chloris think, because (Danyel)	66
Let not the sluggish sleep (Byrd)	67
[Pg xxvi] Let us in a lovers’ round (Mason and Earsden)	67
Like two proud armies marching in the field (Weelkes)	68
Lo! country sport that seldom fades (Weelkes)	68
Lo! when back mine eye (Campion)	68
Long have I lived in Court (Maynard)	69
Love is a bable (Jones)	70
Love not me for comely grace (Wilbye)	71
Love’s god is a boy (Jones)	72
Love winged my hopes and taught me how to fly (Jones)	73

“Maids are simple,” some men say (Campion)	74
Maids to bed and cover coal (Melismata)	74
More than most fair, full of all heavenly fire (Peerson)	75
Mother, I will have a husband (Vautor)	75
My hope a counsel with my heart (Este)	76
My love bound me with a kiss (Jones)	77
My love is neither young nor old (Jones)	78
My mind to me a kingdom is (Byrd)	78
My prime of youth is but a frost of cares (Mundy)	80
My sweetest Lesbia, let us live and love (Campion)	80
My Thoughts are winged with Hopes, my Hopes with Love (John Dowland)	81

Never love unless you can (Campion)	82
Now each creature joys the other (Farmer)	83
Now every tree renews his summer’s green (Weelkes)	83
Now God be with old Simeon (Pammelia)	83
Now have I learn’d with much ado at last (Jones)	84
Now I see thy looks were feignèd (Ford)	85
Now is my Chloris fresh as May (Weelkes)	86
Now is the month of maying (Morley)	87
Now let her change! and spare not (Campion)	87
Now let us make a merry greeting (Weelkes)	88
Now what is love, I pray thee tell (Jones)	89
Now winter nights enlarge (Campion)	90

O say, dear life, when shall these twin-born berries (Ward)	91
O stay, sweet love; see here the place of sporting (Farmer)	91
O sweet, alas, what say you (Morley)	92
[Pg xxvii] O sweet delight, O more than human bliss (Campion)	92
Oft have I mused the cause to find (Jones)	93
On a time the amorous Silvy (Attye)	94
Once did I love and yet I live (Jones)	95
Once I thought to die for love (Youll)	95
Our country swains in the morris dance (Weelkes)	96

Pierce did love fair Petronel (Farnaby)	96
Pour forth, mine eyes, the fountains of your tears (Pilkington)	97

Robin is a lovely lad (Mason and Earsden)	97
Round-a, round-a, keep your ring (Ravenscroft)	98

See, see, mine own sweet jewel (Morley)	98
Shall a frown or angry eye (Corkine)	99
Shall I abide this jesting (Alison)	99
Shall I come, sweet Love, to thee (Campion)	100
Shall I look to ease my grief (Jones)	100
She whose matchless beauty staineth (Jones)	101
Shoot, false Love! I care not (Morley)	103
Silly boy! ’tis full moon yet, thy night as day shines clearly (Campion)	104
Simkin said that Sis was fair (Farnaby)	105
Since first I saw your face I resolved to honour and renown ye (Ford)	105
Sing we and chant it (Morley)	106
Sister, awake! close not your eyes (Bateson)	107
Sleep, angry beauty, sleep and fear not me (Campion)	108
So light is love, in matchless beauty shining (Wilbye)	108
Some can flatter, some can feign (Corkine)	109
Sweet, come again (Campion and Rosseter)	110
Sweet Cupid, ripen her desire (Corkine)	111
Sweet heart, arise! why do you sleep (Weelkes)	112
Sweet Kate (Jones)	112
Sweet Love, if thou wilt gain a monarch’s glory (Wilbye)	113
Sweet Love, I will no more abuse thee (Weelkes)	114
Sweet Love, my only treasure (Jones)	114
Sweet, stay awhile; why will you rise (John Dowland)	115
[Pg xxviii] Sweet Suffolk owl so trimly dight (Vautor)	116
Take here my heart, I give it thee for ever (Weelkes)	116
Take time while time doth last (Farmer)	117
The fly she sat in shamble-row (Deuteromelia)	117
The Gods have heard my vows (Weelkes)	119
The lark, linnet and nightingale to sing some say are best (Pammelia)	120
The love of change hath changed the world throughout (Carlton)	120
The lowest trees have tops, the ant her gall (John Dowland)	121
The man of life upright (Campion and Rosseter)	121
The greedy hawk with sudden sight of lure (Byrd)	122
The match that’s made for just and true respects (Byrd)	123
The Nightingale so pleasant and so gay (Byrd)	124
The Nightingale so soon as April bringeth (Bateson)	124
The peaceful western wind (Campion)	125
There is a garden in her face (Campion)	126
There is a lady sweet and kind (Ford)	127
There were three Ravens sat on a tree (Melismata)	128
Think’st thou, Kate, to put me down (Jones)	129
Think’st thou to seduce me then with words that have no meaning (Campion)	130
Thou art but young, thou say’st (Wilbye)	131
Thou art not fair, for all thy red and white (Campion and Rosseter)	131
Thou pretty bird, how do I see (Danyel)	132
Though Amaryllis dance in green (Byrd)	132
Though my carriage be but careless (Weelkes)	133
Though your strangeness frets my heart (Jones)	134
Thrice blessèd be the giver (Farnaby)	135
Thrice toss these oaken ashes in the air (Campion)	136
Thus I resolve and Time hath taught me so (Campion)	136
Thus saith my Chloris bright (Wilbye)	137
Thus saith my Galatea (Morley)	137
To his sweet lute Apollo sang the motions of the spheres (Campion)	138
To plead my faith, where faith hath no reward (Robert Dowland)	139
[Pg xxix] To shorten winter’s sadness (Weelkes)	139
Toss not my soul, O Love, ’twixt hope and fear (John Dowland)	140
Turn all thy thoughts to eyes (Campion)	141

Unto the temple of thy beauty (Ford)	141
Upon a hill the bonny boy (Weelkes)	142
Upon a summer’s day Love went to swim (Byrd)	143

Vain men! whose follies make a god of love (Campion)	143

Wake, sleepy Thyrsis, wake (Pilkington)	144
We be soldiers three (Deuteromelia)	145
We be three poor mariners (Deuteromelia)	146
We must not part as others do (Egerton MS. 2013)	146
We shepherds sing, we pipe, we play (Weelkes)	147
Wedded to will is witless (Byrd)	147
Weep no more, thou sorry boy (Tomkins)	148
Weep you no more, sad fountains (John Dowland)	149
Welcome, sweet pleasure (Weelkes)	149
Were I a king I might command content (Mundy)	151
Were my heart as some men’s are, thy errors would not move me (Campion)	151
What hap had I to marry a shrow (Pammelia)	152
What is our life? a play of passion (Gibbons)	152
What needeth all this travail and turmoiling (Wilbye)	153
What pleasure have great Princes (Byrd)	153
What poor astronomers are they (John Dowland)	155
What then is love, sings Corydon (Ford)	156
When Flora fair the pleasant tidings bringeth (Carlton)	157
When I was otherwise than now I am (Byrd)	157
When thou must home to shades of underground (Campion and Rosseter)	158
When younglings first on Cupid fix their sight (Byrd)	159
Where most my thoughts, there least mine eye is striking (Wilbye)	159
Where shall a sorrow great enough be sought (Peerson)	160
Whether men do laugh or weep (Campion and Rosseter)	161
While that the sun with his beams hot (Byrd)	162
[Pg xxx] Whilst youthful sports are lasting (Weelkes)	163
White as lilies was her face (John Dowland)	164
Whither so fast? see how the kindly flowers (Pilkington)	166
Who likes to love, let him take heed (Byrd)	167
Who made thee, Hob, forsake the plough (Byrd)	168
Who prostrate lies at women’s feet (Bateson)	168
Who would have thought that face of thine (Farmer)	169
Why are you Ladies staying (Weelkes)	169
Wilt thou, Unkind! thus ’reave me (John Dowland)	170
Wise men patience never want (Campion)	171
Woeful heart with grief oppressèd (John Dowland)	172

Ye bubbling springs that gentle music makes (Greaves)	172
You blessèd bowers whose green leaves now are spreading (Farmer)	173
You that wont to my pipe’s sound (Morley)	173
Your shining eyes and golden hair (Bateson)	174

LYRICS FROM ELIZABETHAN SONG-BOOKS.

[Pg 43] From William Byrd’s Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs of Sadness and Piety, 1588.

From Michael Este’s Madrigals of three, four and five parts, 1604. (By Nicholas Breton. Originally published in 1591.)

From George Mason’s and John Earsden’s Airs that were sung and played at Brougham Castle in Westmoreland in the King’s Entertainment given by the Earl of Cumberland, 1618.

[Pg 83] From John Farmer’s First Set of English Madrigals, 1599. (Verses by Samuel Daniel.)

[Pg 89] From Robert Jones’s Second Book of Airs, 1601. (Attributed to Sir Walter Raleigh.)

[Pg 97] From Francis Pilkington’s First Set of Madrigals and Pastorals, 1613.

From Airs sung and played at Brougham Castle, 1618, by George Mason and John Earsden.

From John Dowland’s Pilgrim’s Solace, 1612. (The first stanza is found in a poem of Donne.)

From Thomas Bateson’s First Set of English Madrigals, 1604. (By Sir Philip Sidney.)

From Robert Jones’ Musical Dream, 1609. (This song is also printed in Thomas Campion’s Two Books of Airs, circ. 1613.)

[Pg 139] From Robert Dowland’s Musical Banquet, 1610. (The lines are assigned to Robert Deveureux, Earl of Essex.)

From Orlando Gibbons’ First Set Of Madrigals, 1612. (Ascribed to Sir Walter Raleigh.)

NOTES.

Page 3.

Thomas Weelkes was organist of Winchester College in 1600, and of Chichester Cathedral in 1608. His first collection, “Madrigals to three, four, five, or six voices,” was published in 1597. Here first appeared the verses (fraudulently ascribed, in “The Passionate Pilgrim,” 1599, to Shakespeare), “My flocks feed not.” In 1598 Weelkes published “Ballets and Madrigals to five voices,” which was followed in 1600 by “Madrigals of five and six parts.” Prefixed to the last-named work is the following dedicatory epistle:—

“To the truly noble, virtuous, and honorable, my very good Lord Henry, Lord Winsor, Baron of Bradenham.
My Lord, in the College at Winchester, where I live, I have heard learned men say that some philosophers have mistaken the soul of man for an harmony: let the precedent of their error be a privilege for mine. I see not, if souls do not partly consist of music, how it should come to pass that so noble a spirit as your’s, so perfectly tuned to so perpetual a tenor of excellence as it is, should descend to the notice of a quality lying single in so low a personage as myself. But in music the base part is no disgrace to the best ears’ attendancy. I confess my conscience is untoucht with any other arts, and I hope my confession is unsuspected; many of us musicians think it as much praise to be somewhat more than musicians as it is for gold to be somewhat more than gold, and if Jack Cade were alive, yet some of us might live, unless we should think, as the artisans in the Universities of Poland and Germany think, that the Latin tongue comes by reflection. I hope your Lordship will pardon this presumption of mine; the rather, because I know before Nobility I am to deal sincerely; and this small faculty of mine, because it is alone in me, and without the assistance of other more confident sciences, is the more to be favoured and the rather to be received into your honour’s protection; so shall I [Pg 178] observe you with as humble and as true an heart, as he whose knowledge is as large as the world’s creation, and as earnestly pray for you to the world’s Creator.

Your Honor’s in all humble service,
Thomas Weelkes.”

In 1608 appeared Weelkes’ last work, “Airs or Fantastic Spirits for three voices,” a collection of lively and humorous ditties. Oliphant writes:—“For originality of ideas, and ingenuity of construction in part writing, (I allude more especially to his ballets,) Weelkes in my opinion leaves all other composers of his time far behind.” The verses in Weelkes’ song-books are never heavy or laboured; they are always bright, cheerful, and arch.

Page 3. Robert Jones was a famous performer on the lute. He had a share in the management of the theatre in the Whitefriars (Collier’s “Annals of the Stage,” i. 395). His works are of the highest rarity. The delightful lyrics in Jones’ song-books have escaped the notice of all the editors of anthologies.

Page 4. Thomas Morley, who was a pupil of William Byrd, was the author of the first systematic treatise on music published in this country—“A plain and easy Introduction to practical Music,” 1597, quaintly set down in form of a dialogue. The verses in his collections are mere airy trifles, and hardly bear to be separated from the music.

“About the maypole new,” &c., is a translation of some Italian lines, beginning—

“Al suon d’una sampogn’ e d’una citera,
Sopra l’herbette floride
Dansava Tirsi con l’amata Cloride,” &c.

In Morley’s “Canzonets to three Voices,” 1593, we have the following pleasant description of the preparations for a country wedding:—

“Arise, get up, my dear, make haste, begone thee:
Lo! where the bride, fair Daphne, tarries on thee.
Hark! O hark! yon merry maidens squealing
Spice-cakes, sops-in-wine are a-dealing.
Run, then run apace
And get a bride-lace
And gilt rosemary branch the while there yet is catching
And then hold fast for fear of old snatching.
[Pg 179] Alas! my dear, why weep ye?
O fear not that, dear love, the next day keep we.
List, yon minstrels! hark how fine they firk it,
And how the maidens jerk it!
With Kate and Will,
Tom and Gill,
Now a skip,
Then a trip,
Finely fet aloft,
There again as oft;
Hey ho! blessed holiday!
All for Daphne’s wedding day!”

Page 9. John Wilbye is styled by Oliphant “the first of madrigal writers.” He published his “First Set of English Madrigals” in 1598, and his “Second Set” in 1609. The Second Set was dedicated to the unfortunate Lady Arabella Stuart. The composer concludes his dedicatory epistle with the prayer, “I beseech the Almighty to make you in all the passages of your life truly happy, as you are in the world’s true opinion, virtuous.” In the very year when the epistle was written the gifted patroness of art and learning was accused before the Privy Council and ordered to be kept in close confinement. She made her escape, but after a few hours was captured at sea in her flight to Dunkirk, brought back to London, and committed to the Tower, where she died of a broken heart in 1615. It is pleasant to think that the song-book dedicated to her honour may have cheered her in the long hours of solitude. The collection consists chiefly of love-lyrics; but such verses as “Happy, O happy he,” &c. (p. 37) and “Draw on, sweet Night” (p. 21), must have been carefully cherished by the poor captive.

Page 9. “April is in my mistress’ face.”—Compare Robert Greene’s verses in “Perimedes, the Blacksmith,” 1588:—

“Fair is my love, for April in her face,
Her lovely breasts September claims his part,
And lordly July in her eyes takes place:
But cold December dwelleth in her heart:
Blest be the months that set my thoughts on fire,
Accurs’d that month that hindereth my desire!”

[Pg 180] Page 11. “The Urchins’ Dance” is from the anonymous play “The Maid’s Metamorphosis,” 1600. In the same play are the following dainty verses;—

“1 Fairy.

I do come about the copse
Leaping upon flowers’ tops;
Then I get upon a fly,
She carries me above the sky,
And trip and go!

2 Fairy.

When a dew-drop falleth down
And doth light upon my crown,
Then I shake my head and skip
And about I trip.

3 Fairy.

When I feel a girl a-sleep,
Underneath her frock I peep,
There to sport, and there I play;
Then I bite her like a flea,
And about I skip.”

Thomas Ravenscroft, compiler of the “Brief Discourse,” won his spurs at a very early age. He took his degree of Bachelor of Music before he had reached his fifteenth year, as we learn from some commendatory verses prefixed to the “Brief Discourse;”—

“Non vidit tria lustra puer, quin arte probatus,
Vita laudatus, sumpsit in arte gradum.”

He was twenty-two when he published the “Brief Discourse” in 1614: but in 1611 be had published “Melismata, musical fancies fitting the court, city, and country humours,” and he edited two collections that appeared in 1609—“Pammelia” and “Deuteromelia.” “Pammelia” is the earliest English printed collection of Catches, Rounds, and Canons; both words and music were for the most part older than the date of publication. “Deuteromelia” was intended as a continuation of “Pammelia.”

Page 12. Robert Dowland, editor of “A Musical Banquet,” was a son of John Dowland; he succeeded his father as one of the Court musicians in 1626, and was alive in 1641.

Page 16. Thomas Ford, when he published his “Music of sundry kinds,” 1607, was a musician in the suite of Prince Henry. At the accession of Charles I. he was appointed one of [Pg 181] his musicians, and he died in 1648—the year before his royal patron was beheaded.

Page 23. “Little lawn then serve[d] the Pawn.”—The Pawn was a corridor, serving as a bazaar, in the Royal Exchange (Gresham’s).

Page 24. “Farewell, false Love, the oracle of lies.”—“J. C.” in “Alcilia,” 1595, writes:—

“Love is honey mixed with gall,
A thraldom free, a freedom thrall;
A bitter sweet, a pleasant sour,
Got in a year, lost in an hour;
A peaceful war, a warlike peace,
Whose wealth brings want, whose want increase;
Full long pursuit and little gain,
Uncertain pleasure, certain pain;
Regard of neither right nor wrong,
For short delights repentance long.

Love is the sickness of the thought,
Conceit of pleasure dearly bought;
A restless passion of the mind,
A labyrinth of arrows blind:
A sugared poison, fair deceit,
A bait for fools, a furious heat;
A chilling cold, a wondrous passion,
Exceeding man’s imagination;
Which none can tell in whole or part,
But only he that feels the smart.”

Robert Greene has a somewhat similar description of Love (“What thing is Love? it is a power divine,” &c.) in “Menaphon,” 1589.

Page 28. “Fond wanton youths.”—This piece is also printed in “The Golden Garland of Princely Delights,” 1620, where it is headed “Of the Inconveniences by Marriage,” and is directed to be sung to the tune of “When Troy town.”

Page 29, l. 22. “Their longings must not be beguiled.”—The original gives “Their laughings” (which is unintelligible).

Page 31. It was at Wanstead House, a seat of the Earl of Leicester, that Sidney wrote his masque the “Lady of the May” in honour of Queen Elizabeth’s visit in 1578. “Was Raleigh [Pg 182] retired there,” writes Mr. W. J. Linton (Rare Poems, p. 257), “during some season of her displeasure? There is a look of him about this song, not unlike the lines to Cynthia; and what mistress but Majesty should appoint his place of retirement?

‘Wanstead, my Mistress saith this is the doom.’”

The two lines that close each stanza are from a song in Sidney’s “Arcadia.”

Page 37. “Who, known to all, unknown to himself dies.” From Seneca’s “Thyestes:”—

“qui notus nimis omnibus
Ignotus moritur sibi.”

Page 39. “How many things.”—I have given four of John Maynard’s “Twelve Wonders of the World” (cf. pp. 44-5, 69); and, if I am not mistaken, the reader will like to see the remaining eight. There is much freshness and piquancy in these quaint old rhymes, which were written by no less a poet than Sir John Davies.

“The Divine.

My calling is Divine,
And I from God am sent;
I will no chop-church be,
Nor pay my patron rent,

Nor yield to sacrilege;
But like the kind true mother,
Rather will lose all the child
Than part it with another.

Much wealth I will not seek,
Nor worldly masters serve,
So to grow rich and fat
While my poor flock doth starve.

The Soldier.

My occupation is
The noble trade of kings
The trial that decides
The highest right of things.

[Pg 183] Though Mars my master be,
I do not Venus love,
Nor honour Bacchus oft,
Nor often swear by Jove.

Of speaking of myself
I all occasion shun,
And rather love to do,
Than boast what I have done.

The Lawyer.

The law my calling is;
My robe, my tongue, my pen
Wealth and opinion gain
And make me judge of men.

The known dishonest cause,
I never did defend
Nor spun out suits in length,
But wish’d and sought an end;

Nor counsel did bewray,
Nor of both parties take,
Nor ever took I fee
For which I never spake.

The Physician.

I study to uphold
The slippery state of man,
Who dies when we have done
The best and all we can.

From practice and from books
I draw my learned skill,
Not from the known receipt
Or ’pothecary’s bill.

The earth my faults doth hide,
The world my cures doth see,
What youth and time effects
Is oft ascribed to me.

[Pg 184] The Merchant.

My trade doth everything
To every land supply,
Discovers unknown coasts,
Strange countries doth ally.

I never did forestall,
I never did engross,
Nor custom did withdraw
Though I return’d with loss.

I thrive by fair exchange,
By selling and by buying,
And not by Jewish use,
Reprisal, fraud, or lying.

The Country Gentleman.

Though strange outlandish spirits
Praise towns and countries scorn,
The country is my home,
I dwell where I was born.

There profit and command
With pleasure I partake,
Yet do not hawks and dogs
My sole companions make.

I rule, but not oppress;
End quarrels, not maintain;
See towns, but dwell not there
To abridge my charge or train.

The Wife.

The first of all our sex
Came from the side of man,
I thither am return’d
From whence our sex began.

I do not visit oft,
Nor many when I do,
I tell my mind to few
And that in counsel too.

[Pg 185] I seem not sick in health,
Nor sullen but in sorrow;
I care for somewhat else
Than what to wear to-morrow.

The Widow.

My dying husband knew
How much his death would grieve me,
And therefore left me wealth
To comfort and relieve me.

Though I no more will have,
I must not love disdain;
Penelope her self
Did suitors entertain.

And yet to draw on such
As are of best esteem,
Nor younger than I am
Nor richer will I seem.”

Page 41. “I have house and land in Kent.”—This admirable song has been frequently reprinted. Miss De Vaynes, in her very valuable “Kentish Garland” (i., 142), observes:—“We have met with no other song in the Kentish dialect except Jan Ploughshare’s” (printed on p. 372, vol. i., of the “Garland”). Rimbault in his “Little Book of Songs and Ballads” (1851), gives the following lines from an old MS. (temp. Henry VIII.):—

“Joan, quoth John, when will this be?
Tell me when wilt thou marry me,
My corn and eke my calf and rents,
My lands and all my tenements?
Say, Joan, quoth John, what wilt thou do?
I cannot come every day to woo?”

David Herd printed a fragment of a Scotch song that was founded on the English song:—

“I hae layen three herring a’ sa’t,
Bonny lass, gin ze’ll take me, tell me now,
And I hae brew’n three pickles o’ ma’t
And I cannae cum ilka day to woo.
[Pg 186] To woo, to woo, to lilt and to woo,
And I cannae cum ilka day to woo.

I hae a wee ca’f that wad fain be a cow,
Bonny lassie, gin ye’ll take me, tell me now,
I hae a wee gryce that wad fain be a sow,
And I cannae cum ilka day to woo.
To woo, to woo, to lilt and to woo,
And I cannae cum ilka day to woo.”

Page 43. “I joy not in no earthly bliss.”—These stanzas are usually printed with “My mind to me a kingdom is” (p. 78), and the whole poem has been attributed to Sir Edward Dyer.

Page 47. “I weigh not Fortune’s frown nor smile.”—These lines (which seem to have been modelled on “I joy not in no earthly bliss”) are by Joshua Sylvester.

In the second stanza, “I sound not at the news of wreck,” sound is an old form of swoon.

Page 52. “If women could be fair.”—This poem is ascribed to Edward, Earl of Oxford, in Rawlinson, MS. 85, fol. 16.

Page 53. “In darkness let me dwell.”—These lines are also found in Robert Dowland’s “Musical Banquet,” 1610, set to music by John Dowland.

Page 57. “In the merry month of May.”—First printed in “The Honorable Entertainment given to the Queen’s Majesty in Progress at Elvetham in Hampshire, by the Right Honorable the Earl of Hertford,” 1591, under the title of “The Ploughman’s Song.”

Page 60. “It was the frog in the well.”—There are several versions of this old ditty: the following is from Kirkpatrick Sharpe’s “Ballad Book,” 1824:—

“There lived a puddy in a well,
And a merry mouse in a mill.

Puddy he’d a wooin ride,
Sword and pistol by his side.

Puddy came to the mouse’s wonne,
‘Mistress mouse, are you within?’

[Pg 187] ‘Yes, kind sir, I am within;
Saftly do I sit and spin.’

‘Madam, I am come to woo;
Marriage I must have of you.’

‘Marriage I will grant you nane,
Until uncle Rotten he comes hame.’

‘Uncle Rotten’s now come hame;
Fy! gar busk the bride alang.’

Lord Rotten sat at the head o’ the table,
Because he was baith stout and able.

Wha is’t that sits next the wa’,
But Lady Mouse, baith jimp and sma’?

What is’t that sits next the bride,
But the sola puddy wi’ his yellow side?

Syne came the deuk, but and the drake;
The deuk took puddy, and garred him squaik.

Then cam in the carl cat,
Wi’ a fiddle on his back.
‘Want ye ony music here?’

The puddy he swam doun the brook;
The drake he catched him in his fluke.

The cat he pu’d Lord Rotten doun;
The kittens they did claw his croun.

But Lady Mouse, baith jimp and sma’,
Crept into a hole beneath the wa’;
‘Squeak!’ quoth she, ‘I’m weel awa.’”

Doubtless Ravenscroft’s version is more ancient. A ballad entitled “A most strange weddinge of the frogge and the mouse” was licensed for printing in 1580.

[Pg 188] Page 65. “Lady, when I behold.”—Gracefully Paraphrased from an Italian original:—

“Quand’ io miro le rose,
Ch’in voi natura pose;
E quelle che v’ ha l’arte
Nel vago seno sparte;
Non so conoscer poi
Se voi le rose, o sian le rose in voi.”

Page 66. John Danyel is supposed to have been a brother of Samuel Daniel, the poet. He took his degree of Bachelor of Music in 1604. “At the commencement of the reign of Charles the First he was one of the Court Musicians, and his name occurs among the ‘Musicians for the Lutes and Voices’ in a privy seal, dated December 20th, 1625, exempting the musicians belonging to the Court from the payment of subsidies” (Rimbault).

Page 68. “Then all at once for our town cries.”—“I should imagine,” says Oliphant, “that there was occasionally a sort of friendly contention in the sports between neighbouring villages; which idea is rather corroborated by a passage from an old play called the ‘Vow-breaker’ by Samson, 1636: ‘Let the major play the hobby-horse an’ he will; I hope our Town lads cannot want a hobby-horse.’” In an old play. “The Country Girl,” (first printed in 1647), attributed to that shadowy personage Antony Brewer, we have an allusion to this pleasant form of rivalry:—

“Abraham. Sister Gillian,—I have the rarest news for you.
Gillian. For me? ’tis well. And what news have you got, sir?
Abr. Skipping news, lipping news, tripping news.
Gil. How! dancing, brother Abram, dancing?
Abr. Prancing, advancing, dancing. Nay, ’tis a match, a match upon a wager.
Gil. A match. Who be they?
Abr. Why all the wenches of our town Edmonton, and all the mad wenches of Waltham.
Gil. A match, and leave me out! When, when is’t, brother?
Abr. Marry, e’en this morning:—they are now going to’t helter-skelter. [A treble plays within.
Gil. And leave me out! where, brother, where?
[Pg 189] Abr. Why there, Sister Gillian; there, at our own door almost,—on the green there, close by the may-pole. Hark! you may hear them hither.” (Sig. D.)

The stage-direction at the entrance of the dancers runs thus:—“Enter six country wenches, all red petticoats, white stitch’d bodies, in their smock-sleeves, the fiddler before them, and Gillian with her tippet up in the midst of them dancing.”

Page 73. “It was the purest light of heaven” &c.—I am reminded of a fine passage in Drayton’s “Barons’ Wars,” canto VI.:—

“Looking upon proud Phaeton wrapped in fire,
The gentle queen did much bewail his fall;
But Mortimer commended his desire
To lose one poor life or to govern all.
‘What though,’ quoth he, ‘he madly did aspire
And his great mind made him proud Fortune’s thrall?
Yet, in despight when she her worst had done,
He perish’d in the chariot of the sun.’”

Page 74. “The Bellman’s Song.”—In “Robin Goodfellow; his mad pranks and merry jests,” 1628, we have another specimen of a Bellman’s Song:—

“Sometimes would he go like a bellman in the night, and with many pretty verses delight the ears of those that waked at his bell-ringing: his verses were these:—

Maids in your smocks,
Look well to your locks,
And your tinder-box,
Your wheels and your rocks,
Your hens and your cocks,
Your cows and your ox,
And beware of the fox.
When the bellman knocks
Put out your fire and candle-light,
So they shall not you affright.
May you dream of your delights,
In your sleeps see pleasing sights!
Good rest to all, both old and young:
The bellman now hath done his song.

Then would he go laughing Ho ho ho! as his use was.”

[Pg 190] Page 77. “That kisses were the seals of love.”—Every reader will recall

“But my kisses bring again, bring again.
Seals of love but sealed in vain, sealed in vain.”

(The first stanza is found among the poems of Sir Philip Sidney.)

Page 80. “My prime of youth.”—This song is also set to music in Richard Alison’s “Hour’s Recreation,” 1606, and Michael Este’s “Madrigals of three, four, and five parts,” 1604. It is printed in “Reliquiæ: Wottonianæ” as “By Chidick Tychborn, being young and then in the tower, the night before his execution.” Chidiock Tychbourne of Southampton was executed with Ballard and Babington in 1586.

Page 80. “My sweetest Lesbia.”—The first stanza is an elegant paraphrase from Catullus, though the last line fails to render the rhythmical sweetness long-drawn-out of “Nox est perpetua una dormienda.”

Page 81. “My Thoughts are winged with Hopes.”—This piece is also found in “England’s Helicon.” A MS. copy, in a commonplace book found at Hamburg, is signed “W. S.” I have frequently met with these initials in volumes of MS. poetry of the early part of the seventeenth century. The following pretty verses in Add. MS. 21, 433, fol. 158, are subscribed “W. S.”:—

“O when will Cupid show such art
To strike two lovers with one dart?
I’m ice to him or he to me;
Two hearts alike there seldom be.

If ten thousand meet together,
Scarce one face is like another:
If scarce two faces can agree,
Two hearts alike there seldom be.”

There is not the slightest ground for identifying “W. S.” with Shakespeare. Mr. Linton (“Rare Poems,” p. 255) conjectures that “My Thoughts are winged with Hopes”—which has the heading “To Cynthia” in “England’s Helicon”—may be by Raleigh.

Page 83. “Now each creature.”—The first stanza of “An Ode” by Samuel Daniel, originally printed in the 1592 edition of “Delia.”

[Pg 191] “Now God be with old Simeon.”—Here is another round from “Pammelia”:—

“Come drink to me,
And I to thee.
And then shall we
Full well agree.

I’ve loved the jolly tankard,
Full seven winters and more;
I loved it so long
That I went upon the score.

Who loveth not the tankard,
He is no honest man;
And he is no right soldier,
That loveth not the can.

Tap the cannikin, troll the cannikin,
Toss the cannikin, turn the cannikin!
Hold now, good son, and fill us a fresh can,
That we may quaff it round from man to man.”

Good honest verse, but ill-suited to these degenerate, tea-drinking days.

Page 85. “Now I see thy looks were feignèd.”—First printed in “The Phœnix Nest,” 1593, subscribed “T. L. Gent,” i.e. Thomas Lodge, one of the most brilliant of Elizabethan lyrists.

Page 87. “Shall we play barley-break.”—The fullest description of the rustic game of barley-break is to be found in the first book of Sidney’s “Arcadia.”

Page 87. “Now let her change.” This song is also set to Music in Robert Jones’ “Ultimum Vale” (1608).

Page 89. “Now what is love” &c.—This poem originally appeared in “The Phœnix Nest,” 1593; it is also printed (in form of a dialogue) in “England’s Helicon,” 1600, and Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody,” 1602. It is ascribed to Raleigh in a MS. list of Davison’s. See Canon Hannah’s edition of Raleigh’s poems.

Page 93. “Oft have I mused.”—This poem was printed in Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody,” 1602.

[Pg 192] Page 96. “Our country-swains in the morris-dance.”—In Morley’s “Madrigals to Four Voices,” 1594, there is a lively description of the morris-dance:—

“Ho! who comes here with bag-piping and drumming?
O, ’tis I see the morris-dance a coming.
Come, ladies, out, O come, come quickly,
And see about how trim they dance and trickly:
Hey! there again: hark! how the bells they shake it!
Now for our town! once there, now for our town and take it:
Soft awhile, not away so fast, they melt them!
Piper be hang’d, knave! look, the dancers swelt them.
Out, there, stand out!—you come too far (I say) in—
There give the hobby-horse more room to play in!”

“I woo with tears and ne’er the near.”—Ne’er the near (a proverbial expression) = Never the nigher.

Page 107. “When they came home Sis floted cream.”—I suppose the meaning is that Sis skimmed the cream from the milk. Halliwell (Arch. Dict.) gives “Flotten-milk. Same as Flet-mitte” and “flet-mitte” is a north-country term for skimmed milk.

“Since first I saw.”—This exquisite song is also found in “The Golden Garland of Princely Delights,” 1620.

Page 114. “Sweet Love, my only treasure.”—Printed in Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody,” 1602, where it is subscribed with the mysterious initials “A. W.”

Page 115. “Sweet, stay awhile.”—I suspect that this stanza does not really belong to Donne’s “Break of day;” it is not found in MS. copies of Donne’s poems, nor in any edition prior to that of 1669. Probably Donne’s verses were written as a companion-piece to the present poem.

Page 120. “Yet merrily sings little Robin.”—The loveliest of all verses in praise of Robin Redbreast are in Chapman’s “Tears of Peace,” 1609:—

“Whose face the bird hid that loves humans best,
That hath the bugle eyes and rosy breast,
And is the yellow autumn’s nightingale.”

Page 120. “The love of change.”—This is the first stanza of [Pg 193] a poem which is printed entire (in six stanzas) in Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody,” 1602.

Page 121. “The lowest trees have tops.”—Printed in Davison’s “Poetical Rhapsody” with the signature “Incerto.”

Page 121. “The man of life upright.”—In some old MS. copies this poem is ascribed to Francis Bacon: see Hannah’s “Poems of Raleigh and Wotton,” p. 119. Canon Hannah makes no mention of Campion’s claim. Campion distinctly tells us that he wrote both the verses and the music of his songs: and I have no doubt that he was the author of the present lyric, which has more merit than any of Bacon’s poems. In an epigram printed in his “Observations in the Art of English Poetry,” 1602, there is a striking image that reappears in the present poem:—

“A wise man wary lives yet most secure,
Sorrows move not him greatly, nor delights,
Fortune and death he scorning only makes
Th’ earth his sober inn, but still heaven his home.”
(Sig. C2).

Henceforward let nobody claim “The man of life upright” for Bacon.

Page 124. “The Nightingale so pleasant and so gay.”—“According to Peacham,” says Oliphant (“Musa Madrigalesca,” p. 45), “there was a virtuous contention between W. Byrd and Ferrabosco who of the two should best set these words; in which according to his (Peacham’s) opinion, Ferrabosco succeeded so well that ‘it could not be bettered for sweetness of ayre and depth of judgment.’”

Page 124. “The Nightingale so soon as April bringeth.”—From the first stanza of a poem printed in the third edition of Sidney’s “Arcadia,” 1598.

Page 126. “There is a garden in her face.”—This poem is also set to music in Alison’s “Hour’s Recreation,” 1606, and Robert Jones’ “Ultimum Vale” (1608). Herrick’s dainty verses “Cherry-Ripe” are well-known:—

“Cherry-ripe, ripe, ripe! I cry:
Full and fair ones, come and buy.
If so be you ask me where
They do grow, I answer,—There,
[Pg 194] Where my Julia’s lips do smile,
There’s the land or cherry-isle,
Whose plantations fully show
All the year where cherries grow.”

Page 127. “There is a lady sweet and kind.”—Printed also in “The Golden Garland of Princely Delights,” 1620.

Page 128. “There were three Ravens.”—The north-country version of this noble dirge contains some verses of appalling intensity:—

“His horse is to the huntin gane
His hounds to bring the wild deer hame;
His lady’s ta’en another mate,
So we may mak our dinner sweet.

“O we’ll sit on his bonny breast-bane,
And we’ll pyke out his bonny gray een;
Wi’ ae lock o’ his gowden hair,
We’ll theek our nest when it blaws bare.

“Mony a ane for him makes mane,
But none sall ken where he is gane:
Ower his banes when they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair.”

Page 130. “Think’st thou to seduce me,” &c.—In William Corkine’s “Airs,” 1610, this song is found with considerable variations. Corkine gives only three stanzas. The first stanza agrees closely with Campion’s text; the second and third stanzas run thus:—

“Learn to speak first, then to woo, to wooing much pertaineth;
He that hath not art to hide, soon falters when he feigneth,
And, as one that wants his wits, he smiles when he complaineth.

“If with wit we be deceived our faults may be excusèd,
Seeming good with flattery graced is but of few refusèd,
But of all accursed are they that are by fools abusèd.”

Page 131. “Thou art not fair for all thy red and white.”—These lines are printed in Dr. Grosart’s edition of Donne’s [Pg 195] poems, vol. ii. p. 259. They are ascribed to Donne in an early MS.; but I see no reason for depriving Campion of them. (The first stanza is also set to music in Thomas Vautor’s “Airs,” 1619.)

Page 132. “Though Amaryllis dance in green.”—Also printed in “England’s Helicon,” 1600.

Page 148. “We must not part as others do.”—These lines are very much in Donne’s manner. The MS. from which they are taken (Egerton MS. 2013) contains some undoubted poems of Donne.

Page 151. “Were I a king.”—Canon Hannah prints these verses (in his “Poems of Raleigh and Wotton,” p. 147) from a MS. copy, in which they are assigned to Edward Earl of Oxford. Appended in the MS. are the following answers:—

“Answered thus by Sir P. S.
Wert thou a king, yet not command content,
Sith empire none thy mind could yet suffice;
Wert thou obscure, still cares would thee torment;
But wert thou dead all care and sorrow dies.
An easy choice, of these three which to crave:
No kingdom, nor a cottage, but a grave.

“Another of another mind.
A king? oh, boon for my aspiring mind,
A cottage makes a country swad rejoice:
And as for death, I like him in his kind
But God forbid that he should be my choice!
A kingdom or a cottage or a grave,—
Nor last, nor next, but first and best I crave;
The rest I can, whenas I list, enjoy,
Till then salute me thus—Vive le roy!

“Another of another mind.
The greatest kings do least command content;
The greatest cares do still attend a crown;
A grave all happy fortunes doth prevent
Making the noble equal with the clown:
A quiet country life to lead I crave;
A cottage then; no kingdom nor a grave.”

[Pg 196] Page 152. “What is our life?”—A MS. copy of these verses is subscribed “S^r W. R.”, i.e., Sir Walter Raleigh. See Hannah’s “Poems of Raleigh and Wotton,” p. 27.

Compare the sombre verses, signed “Ignoto,” in “Reliquiæ Wottonianæ”:—

“Man’s life’s a tragedy; his mother’s womb,
From which he enters, is the tiring-room;
This spacious earth the theatre, and the stage
That country which he lives in: passions, rage,
Folly and vice are actors; the first cry
The prologue to the ensuing tragedy;
The former act consisteth of dumb shows;
The second, he to more perfection grows;
I’ the third he is a man and doth begin
To nurture vice and act the deeds of sin;
I’ the fourth declines; i’ the fifth diseases clog
And trouble him; then death’s his epilogue.”

Page 153. “What needeth all this travail and turmoiling?”—Suggested by Spenser’s fifteenth sonnet:—

“Ye tradefull Merchants that with weary toyle
Do seeke most pretious things to make your gain,
And both the Indias of their treasure spoile,
What needeth you to seeke so farre in vaine?
For loe! my Love doth in her selfe containe
All this worlds riches that may farre be found.
If Saphyres, loe! her eies be Saphyres plaine;
If Rubies, loe! hir lips be Rubies sound;
If Pearles, hir teeth be pearles, both pure and round;
If Yvorie, her forehead yvory weene;
If Gold, her locks are finest gold on ground;
If Silver, her faire hands are silver sheene:
But that which fairest is but few behold,
Her mind, adornd with vertues manifold.”

Page 154, l. 1. “And fortune’s fate not fearing.”—Oliphant boldly reads, for the sake of the rhyme, “And fickle fortune scorning.”—in “England’s Helicon” the text is the same as in the song-book.

Page 158, l. 5. “And when she saw that I was in her [Pg 197] danger.”—Within one’s danger = to be in a person’s power or control.

L. 16. “White Iope.”—Campion must have had in his mind a passage of Propertius (ii. 28);—

“Sunt apud infernos tot millia formosarum:
Pulchra sit in superis, si licet, una locis.
Vobiscum est Iope, vobiscum candida Tyro,
Vobiscum Europe, nec proba Pasiphae.”

See Hertzberg’s note on that passage.

Page 162. “While that the sun.”—Also printed in “England’s Helicon,” 1600.

[Pg 198]

LIST OF SONG-BOOKS.

Alison, Richard. An Hour’s Recreation in Music, 1606. Page 99.

Attye, John. First Book of Airs of Four Parts, 1622. 94.

Bateson, Thomas. First Set of English Madrigals, 1604. 8, 107, 124, 168, 174.

Byrd, William. Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs of Sadness and Piety, 1588. 24, 43, 52, 78, 123, 132, 153, 167.

Songs of Sundry Natures, 1589. 30, 59, 122, 124, 143, 157, 159, 162, 168.

Psalms, Songs, and Sonnets, 1611. 19, 53, 67, 147.

Campion, Thomas. See Rosseter, Philip.

Two Books of Airs [circ. 1613]. 6, 17, 32, 34, 61, 68, 125, 143, 171.

The Third and Fourth Book of Airs [circ. 1613]. 15, 18, 20, 22, 27, 51, 62, 74, 82, 87, 90, 92, 100, 104, 108, 126, 130, 136, 138, 141, 151.

Carlton, Richard. Madrigals to five voices, 1601. 120, 157.

Coprario, John. Funeral Tears for the death of the Right Honourable the Earl of Devonshire, 1606. 53.

Corkine, William. Airs to sing and play to the Lute and Bass-viol, 1610. 99, 109, 111.

The Second Book of Airs, 1612.

Danyel, John. Songs for the Lute, Viol, and Voice, 1606. 66, 132.

Dowland, John. The First Book of Songs or Airs of four parts, 1597. 14, 20, 33, 50, 81, 170.

The Second Book of Songs or Airs, of two, four, and five parts, 1600. 1, 26, 31, 46, 140, 164, 172.

The Third and Last Book of Songs or Airs, 1603. 8, 9, 121, 149, 155.

A Pilgrims Solace, 1612. 115.

[Pg 199]

Dowland, Robert. A Musical Banquet furnished with variety of delicious Airs, 1610. 12, 139.

Earsden, John, and Mason, George. The Airs that were sung and played at Brougham Castle in Westmoreland, 1618. 67, 97.

Egerton, MS. 2013. 33, 146.

Este, Michael. Madrigals to three four and five parts, 1604. 57, 76.

Farmer, John. The first set of English Madrigals to four voices, 1599. 1, 24, 83, 91, 117, 169, 173.

Farnaby, Giles. Canzonets to four voices, 1598. 96, 105, 135.

Ford, Thomas. Music of sundry kinds, 1607. 16, 39, 85, 105, 127, 141, 156.

Gibbons, Orlando. The first set of Madrigals and Mottets, 1612. 47, 152.

Greaves, Thomas. Songs of sundry kinds, 1604. 58, 64, 172.

Jones, Robert. The first took of Airs, 1601. 3, 28, 48, 95, 101.

The second book of Songs and Airs, 1601. 5, 70, 72, 73, 77, 78, 89.

Ultimum Vale, or the third book of Airs, 1608. 36, 84, 93, 100, 114, 129.

A Musical Dream, or the Fourth Book of Airs, 1609. 56, 112, 134.

Lichfild, Henry. The first set of Madrigals to five parts, 1614. 40, 59.

Maynard, John. The XII wonders of the world, 1611. 39, 44, 45, 69.

Morley, Thomas. Canzonets or little short songs to three voices, 1593. 21, 98.

Madrigals to four voices, 1594; 1600. 5, 48, 92.

The first book of Ballets to five voices, 1595. 4, 87, 103, 106, 137, 173.

Mundy, John. Songs and Psalms, 1594. 38, 54, 80, 151.

Peerson, Martin. Mottects, or grave chamber-music, 1630. 75, 160.

Pilkington, Francis. The first Book of Songs or Airs, 1605. 38, 166.

The First Set of Madrigals and Pastorals, 1613. 97.

[Pg 200]

The Second Set of Madrigals, 1624. 144.

Ravenscroft, Thomas. Pammelia; Music’s Miscellany or mixed variety of Pleasant Roundelays, 1609. 83, 120, 152.

Deuteromelia; or the second part of Music’s Melody, 1609. 117, 145, 146.

Melismata; Musical Fancies fitting the court, city, and country humours, 1611. 11, 41, 60, 74, 128.

Brief Discourse of the true use of Charact’ring the Degrees, &c., 1614. 11, 19, 98.

Rosseter, Philip, and Campion, Thomas.

A Book of Airs, 1601. 28, 49, 63, 80, 110, 121, 131, 158, 161.

Tomkins, Thomas. Songs of three, four, five, and six parts, 1622. 148.

Vautor, Thomas. The First Set: being songs of divers Airs and Natures, of five and six parts, 1619. 75, 116.

Ward, John. The First Set of English Madrigals to three, four, five and six parts, 1613. 91.

Weelkes, Thomas. Madrigals to three, four, five and six voices, 1597. 88, 96.

Ballets and Madrigals to five voices, 1598. 25, 55, 83, 86, 112, 114, 139, 147, 149, 163.

Madrigals of five and six parts, 1600. 13, 64, 88, 116, 169.

Madrigals of six parts, 1600. 2, 68.

Airs or Fantastic Spirits for three voices, 1608. 36, 119, 133, 142.

Wilbye, John. The First Set of English Madrigals to three, four, five and six voices, 1598. 5, 7, 27, 46, 65, 113, 131, 137, 153.

The Second Set of English Madrigals to three, four, five and six voices, 1609. 16, 21, 37, 44, 71, 108, 159.

Yonge, Nicholas. Musica Transalpina: the Second Book of Madrigals to five and six voices, 1597. 9.

Youll, Henry. Canzonets to three voices, 1608. 7, 22, 95.

Transcriber’s Notes:

CONTENTS

LYRICS
FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE
ELIZABETHAN AGE.

LYRICS

FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE

ELIZABETHAN AGE:

EDITED BY

A.H. BULLEN.

LONDON:
JOHN C. NIMMO,
14, King William Street, Strand, W.C.
1887.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT,
CHANCERY LANE.

PREFACE.

Footnotes

IN LAVDEM AMORIS.

INDEX OF FIRST LINES

LYRICS FROM ELIZABETHAN SONG-BOOKS.

NOTES.

LIST OF SONG-BOOKS.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO.
TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.

Transcriber’s Notes:

CONTENTS

LYRICS FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE ELIZABETHAN AGE.

LYRICS FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE ELIZABETHAN AGE:

EDITED BY

A.H. BULLEN.

LONDON: JOHN C. NIMMO, 14, King William Street, Strand, W.C. 1887.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.

PREFACE.

Footnotes

IN LAVDEM AMORIS.

INDEX OF FIRST LINES

LYRICS FROM ELIZABETHAN SONG-BOOKS.

NOTES.

LIST OF SONG-BOOKS.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO. TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.

LYRICS
FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE
ELIZABETHAN AGE.

LYRICS

FROM THE SONG-BOOKS OF THE

ELIZABETHAN AGE:

LONDON:
JOHN C. NIMMO,
14, King William Street, Strand, W.C.
1887.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT,
CHANCERY LANE.

CHISWICK PRESS:—C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO.
TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.