Full secretly, new comen her to pleyne,1 XXII. And though I stood abased tho a lite,3 XXIII. And in my head I drew right hastily; With no wight mo but only women twain. "Ah sweet, are ye a worldly creatúre, This seems to mean complain, but should it not rather be playen, to play or sport? Started back. • A little. XXIV. "Or are ye god Cupidis own princess? "That have depainted with your heavenly hand. "This garden full of flowers as they stand? "What shall I think, alas! what reverence "Shall I mestér unto your excellence ? XXV. "Giff ye a goddess be, and that ye like "To do me pain, I may it not astart; "Giff ye be worldly wight, that doth me sike, "Why list God make you so, my dearest heart, "To do a silly prisoner thus smart, "That loves you all, and wots of nought but wo: And, therefore, mercy sweet! sen it is so." The dress and figure of his mistress are minutely painted as follows: XXVII. Of her array the form if I shall write, 2 A sort of precious stones (says Urry) brought from With many an emerald and fair saphire, XXVIII. Full of quaking spangles bright as gold, XXIX. About her neck, white as the fair émail,3 That as a spark of lowe,5 so wantonly Balassia, in India. Tyrwhitt says, the balais, Fr. is a sort of bastard ruby. 1 2 Shining. Probably the fleur de genêt, (genista) broom. • The repetition of this word is apparently a mistake of the original transcriber. 3 Fr. Enamel. 4 Fr. Goldsmith's-work. Fire. (Ruddiman's Glossary.) Seemed burning upon her white throat: XXX. And for to walk, that freshe Maye's morrow, That, for rudeness, to speak thereof I dread. XXXI. In her was youth, beauty, with humble aport, It would, perhaps, be difficult to select, even from Chaucer's most finished works, a long specimen of descriptive poetry so uniformly elegant as this indeed some of the verses are so highly finished, that they would not disfigure the compo 1 Before. VOL. I. ⚫ A little. X • Half. sitions of Dryden, Pope, or Gray. Nor was King James's talent confined to serious and pathetic compositions. Two poems of a ludicrous cast, and which have been the constant favourites of the Scotish people to the present day, are now uni.versally attributed to this monarch. These are "Christ's Kirk on the Green," and "Peblis on the Play;" the first composed in the northern, and the second, in the southern dialect of Scotland. A third, called " Falkland on the Green," which Mr. Pinkerton supposes to have described the popular sports of the central district of the kingdom, and to have been written in the Fifeshire dialect, has hitherto eluded the researches of antiquaries. In Mr. Pinkerton's "Ancient Scotish Poems," (London, 1786), is found a "Song on Absence," which the editor suspects to be the same which is described by Major, as beginning with the words "y as 'sen," &c. Of the King's Quair only one MS. is known to exist: it is a small folio, in the Bodleian library, (Seld. Archiv. B. xxiv.) Mr. Tytler, having procured a transcript of this MS. published it at Edinburgh, 1783, together with "Christ's Kirk on the Green," under the title of "Poetical Remains of James I.:" the work is illustrated with copious notes, and with two dissertations; the first on the |