Christopher Marlowe: 1563-1593.

The Shepherd to his Love.
Come live with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That valleys, groves, or hills, or field,
Or woods, and steepy mountains yield.
Where we will sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed our flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses,
And then a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;
A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Slippers lined choicely for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;
A belt of straw and ivy-buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing,
For thy delight, each May morning :
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.

Michael Drayton: 1563-1631.
Summer's Eve.

Clear had the day been from the dawn,
All chequered was the sky,
Thin clouds, like scarfs of cobweb lawn,
Veiled heaven's most glorious eye.
The wind had no more strength than this,
That leisurely it blew,

To make one leaf the next to kiss,
That closely by it grew.

The rills that on the pebbles played
Might now be heard at will;

This world they only music made,
Else everything was still.

Sir Walter Raleigh: 1552-1618.
From The Pilgrimage.

Give me my scallop-shell of quiet,
My staff of faith to walk upon;
My scrip of joy, immortal diet;

My bottle of salvation;

My gown of glory, hope's true gauge,
And thus I'll take my pilgrimage!
Blood must be my body's 'balmer,
No other balm will there be given;
Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer,
Travelleth towards the land of Heaven;
Over the silver mountains

Where spring the nectar fountains.

Lines composed the Night before his
Execution.

When such is time, that takes on trust
Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with earth and dust;
Who in the dark and silent grave-
When we have wandered all our ways-
Shuts up the story of our days:
But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
My God shall raise me up, I trust !

Richard Barnfield: ? 1570-P
As it fell upon a day,

In the merry month of May,
Sitting in a pleasant shade,
Which a grove of myrtles made;
Beasts did leap, and birds did sing,
Trees did grow, and plants did spring;
Everything did banish moan,
She, poor bird, as all forlorn,
Save the nightingale alone.
Leaned her breast up-till a thorn;
And there sung the dolefull'st ditty,
That to hear it was great pity.
Fie, fie, fie, now would she cry;
Teru, teru, by and by;
That, to hear her so complain,
Scarce I could from tears refrain ;
For her griefs, so lively shown,
Made me think upon mine own.
Ah!-thought I-thou mourn'st in vain ;
None takes pity on thy pain:

The flowers, like brave embroidered girls, Senseless trees, they cannot hear thee;

Looked as they much desired

To see whose head with orient pearls

Most curiously was tyred.

And to itself the subtile air

Such sovereignty assumes,

That it received too large a share
From nature's rich perfumes.

dressed

Ruthless bears, they will not cheer thee:
King Pandion1 he is dead;

All thy friends are lapped in lead;
All thy fellow-birds do sing,
Careless of thy sorrowing!

1 Pandion, king of Attica, was the father of Philomela, who was changed into a nightingale.

William Shakspeare: 1564-1616.

Scene from Coriolanus.'-Rome. A Street.

Enter a company of mutinous Citizens, with staves, clubs, and other weapons.

1st Cit. Before we proceed any further, hear me speak.

All. Speak, speak.

1st Cit. You are all resolved rather to die than to famish?

All. Resolved, resolved.

1st Cit. First, you know, Caius Marcius is chief enemy to the people.

All. We know 't, we know 't.

1st Cit. Let us kill him, and we 'll have corn at our own price. Is 't a verdict?

All. No more talking on 't let it be done: away, away! 2d Cit. One word, good citizens.

1st Cit. We are accounted poor citizens; the patricians, good.1 What authority surfeits on would relieve us. If they would yield us but the superfluity, while it were wholesome, we might guess they relieved us humanely; but they think we are too dear: the leanness that afflicts us, the object of our misery, is as an inventory to particularise their abundance; our sufferance is a gain to them.-Let us revenge this with our pikes, ere we become rakes:2 for the gods know, I speak this in hunger for bread, not in thirst for revenge. 2d Cit. Would you proceed especially against Caius Marcius? All. Against him first: he's a very dog to the commonalty.

2d Cit. Consider you what services he has done for his country?

1st Cit. Very well; and could be content to give him good report for 't, but that he pays himself with being proud.

2d Cit. Nay, but speak not maliciously.

1st Cit. I say unto you, what he hath done famously he did it to that end; though soft-conscienced men can be content to say it was for his country, he did it to please his mother, and to be partly proud; which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue.

2d Cit. What he cannot help in his nature you account a vice in him. You must in no way say he is covetous.

1st Cit. If I must not, I need not be barren of accusations; he hath faults, with surplus, to tire in repetition. [Shouts within.] What shouts are these? The other side o' the city is risen: why stay we prating here? to the Capitol ! All. Come, come.

1st Cit. Soft! who comes here? 2d Cit. Worthy Menenius Agrippa; one that hath always loved the people. 1st Cit. He's one honest enough: would all the rest were so!

Enter MENENIUS AGRIPPA.

Men. What work 's, my countrymen, in hand? Where go you with bats and clubs? The matter? Speak, I pray you.

1st Cit. Our business is not unknown to the senate; they have had inkling, this fortnight, what we intend to do, which now we 'll shew'em in deeds. They say poor suitors have strong breaths; they shall know we have strong arms too. Men. Why, masters, my good friends, mine honest neighbours,

Will you undo yourselves?

1st Cit. We cannot, sir, we are undone already.

Men. I tell you, friends, most charitable care

1 Used here in a commercial sense.

2 An allusion to the old proverb, As lean as a rake.'

Have the patricians of you. For your wants,
Your suffering in this dearth, you may as well
Strike at the heaven with your staves as lift them
Against the Roman state; whose course will on
The way it takes, cracking ten thousand curbs
Of more strong link asunder than can ever
Appear in your impediment: for the dearth,
The gods, not the patricians, make it; and
Your knees to them, not arms, must help. Alack,
You are transported by calamity

Thither where more attends you; and you slander
The helms o' the state, who care for you like fathers,
When you curse them as enemies.

1st Cit. Care for us!-True, indeed!-They ne'er cared for us yet. Suffer us to famish, and their storehouses crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act established against the rich; and provide more piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and there's all the love they bear us. Men. Either you must

1st Cit. Well, I'll hear it, sir: yet you must not think to fob off

our disgrace with a tale: but, an 't please you, deliver.

Men. There was a time when all the body's members

Rebell'd against the belly; thus accus'd it :

That only like a gulf it did remain

I' the midst o' the body, idle and unactive,

Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing

Like labour with the rest; where the other instruments
Did see and hear, devise, instruct, walk, feel,
And mutually participate; did minister
Unto the appetite and affection common
Of the whole body. The belly answer'd-

1st Cit. Well, sir, what answer made the belly?
Men. Sir, I shall tell you.-With a kind of smile,
Which ne'er came from the lungs, but even thus
(For, look you, I may make the belly smile
As well as speak), it tauntingly replied

To the discontented members, the mutinous parts
That envied his receipt; even so most fitly
As you malign our senators, for that

They are not such as you.

Your belly's answer? What!

1st Cit.
The kingly-crowned head, the vigilant eye,
The counsellor heart, the arm our soldier,
Our steed the leg, the tongue our trumpeter,
With other muniments and petty helps

In this our fabric, if that they

Men.

What then?

'Fore me, this fellow speaks!-what then? what then? 1st Cit. Should by the cormorant belly be restrain'd, Who is the sink o' the body

put off

Men.

Well, what then?

1st Cit. The former agents, if they did complain, What could the belly answer?

Men.

I will tell you;

If you'll bestow a small (of what you have little)
Patience a while, you'll hear the belly's answer.
1st Cit. You are long about it.
Men.

Note me this, good friend;
Your most grave belly was deliberate,
Not rash like his accusers, and thus answer'd.
"True is it, my incorporate friends,' quoth he,
"That I receive the general food at first,
Which you do live upon; and fit it is,
Because I am the storehouse and the shop
Of the whole body: but if you do remember,

I send it through the rivers of your blood,

Even to the court, the heart, to the seat o' the brain;
And, through the cranks and offices of man,

The strongest nerves, and small inferior veins,
From me receive that natural competency

Whereby they live: and though that all at once,
You, my good friends,' this says the belly, mark me—
1st Cit. Ay, sir; well, well.

Men.

"Though all at once cannot

See what I do deliver out to each;

Yet I can make my audit up, that all

From me do back receive the flour of all,

And leave me but the bran.' What say you to 't?
1st Cit. It was an answer: how apply you this?
Men. The senators of Rome are this good belly,
And you the mutinous members: for examine
Their counsels and their cares; digest things rightly,
Touching the weal o' the common; you shall find,
No public benefit which you receive

But it proceeds, or comes, from them to you,

And no way from yourselves.-What do you think?

You, the great toe of this assembly?—

1st Cit. I the great toe? Why the great toe?

Men. For that, being one o' the lowest, basest, poorest, Of this most wise rebellion, thou go'st foremost :

Thou rascal, that art worst in blood to run,

Lead'st first, to win some vantage.

But make you ready your stiff bats and clubs;

Rome and her rats are at the point of battle,

The one side must have bale.-Hail, noble Marcius!

Enter CAIUS MARCIUS.

Mar. Thanks.-What's the matter, you dissentious rogues?
1st Cit. We have ever your good word.

Mar. He that will give good words to thee will flatter
Beneath abhorring.-What would you have, you curs,
That like nor peace nor war? the one affrights you,
The other makes you proud. He that trusts to you,
Where he should find you lions finds you hares;

ruin

Where foxes, geese: you are no surer, no,
Than is the coal of fire upon the ice,

Or hailstone in the sun. Your virtue is,

To make him worthy whose offence subdues him,

And curse that justice did it. Who deserves greatness
Deserves your hate: and your affections are

A sick man's appetite, who desires most that

Which would increase his evil. He that depends

Upon your favours swims with fins of lead,

And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye! Trust ye!
With every minute you do change a mind;

And call him noble that was now your hate,

Him vile that was your garland. What's the matter,
That in these several places of the city

You cry against the noble senate, who,

Under the gods, keep you in awe, which else

Would feed on one another?-What's their seeking?
Men. For corn at their own rates; whereof, they say,
The city is well stor❜d.

Mar.

Hang 'em! They say!

They'll sit by the fire, and presume to know

What's done i' the Capitol; who's like to rise,

Who thrives, and who declines; side factions, and give out
Conjectural marriages; making parties strong,

And feebling such as stand not in their liking

Below their cobbled shoes. They say there's grain enough!

Would the nobility lay aside their ruth,

And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry

With thousands of these quarter'd slaves, as high

As I could pick my lance.

Men. Nay, these are almost thoroughly persuaded;
For though abundantly they lack discretion,

Yet are they passing cowardly. But, I beseech you,
What says the other troop?

Mar.
They are dissolved: hang 'em!
They said they were an-hungry; sigh'd forth proverbs-
That hunger broke stone walls, that dogs must eat,
That meat was made for mouths, that the gods sent not
Corn for the rich men only :-with these shreds

They vented their complainings; which being answer'd,
And a petition granted them, a strange one

(To break the heart of generosity,

And make bold power look pale), they threw their caps
As they would hang them on the horns o' the moon,
Shouting their emulation.

Men.

What is granted them?

Mar. Five tribunes to defend their vulgar wisdoms,

Of their own choice: one's Junius Brutus,

Sicinius Velutus, and I know not-'Sdeath!

The rabble should have first unroof'd the city,
Ere so prevail'd with me; it will in time

Win upon power, and throw forth greater themes
For insurrection's arguing.

Men.

This is strange.

Mar. Go, get you home, you fragments!

pity

pitch

God's death!