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After this thy travel fore
Sweet reft feife thee evermore,
That to give the world increase,
Shortned haft thy own life's leafe,
Here, befides the forrowing
That thy noble house doth bring,
Here be tears of perfect moan
Wept for thee in Helicon,

And fome flowers, and fome bays,
For thy herfe, to ftrow the ways,

Sent thee from the banks of Came,

Devoted to thy virtuous name;

28. Atropes for Lucina came;] One

50

55

60

Whilft

49. After this thy travel fore] An

of the Fates inftead of the Goddefs fhe died in child-bed.

who brings the birth to light.

63. The

Whilft thou, bright Saint, high fitft in glory,
Next her much like to thee in ftory,
That fair Syrian shepherdess,

Who after years of barrenness,

The highly favor'd Jofeph bore

To him that ferv'd for her before,

And at her next birth much like thee,
Through pangs fled to felicity,

Far within the bofom bright

65

Of blazing Majesty and Light:

70

There with thee, new welcome Saint,

Like fortunes may her foul acquaint,
With thee there clad in radiant fheen,
No Marchionefs, but now a Queen.

* SONG.

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IX.

On MAY MORNING.

OW the bright morning ftar, day's harbinger,
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The

63. That fair Syrian Shepherdess, &c] Rachel, the daughter of Laban the Syrian, kept. her father's fheep. Gen. XXIX. 9. and after her firft fon, Jofeph, died in childbed of her fecond fon, Benjamin, XXXV. 18.

*This beautiful little Song has

within thefe few years been fet to mufic by Mr. Feftin, and performed at Ranelagh gardens.

3. who from her green lap

throws &c] This image feems to be borrow'd from Shakespear. Richard II. A&t 5. Sc. 4.

who are the violets now

That

The flow'ry May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowflip, and the pale primrose.
Hail bounteous May that doft inspire
Mirth and youth and warm defire;
Woods and groves are of thy dreffing,
Hill and dale doth boaft thy bleffing.
Thus we falute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and with thee long.

W

X.

+On SHAKESPEAR. 1630.

5

ΤΟ

Hat needs my Shakespear for his honor'd bones
The labor of an age in piled ftones,

Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid
Under a ftar-ypointing pyramid ? ·

Dear fon of memory, great heir of fame,

What need'ft thou fuch weak witness of thy name? Thou in our wonder and astonishment

Haft built thyself a live-long monument.

That ftrow the green lap of the new-come fpring?

+ This copy of verfes on Shakefpear being made in 1630, our poet was then in the 22d year of his age and it was printed with the poems of that author at London in $640.

5

For

5. Dear fon of memory,] He honors his favorite Shakespear with the fame relation as the Mufes themfelves. For the Mufes are called by the old poets the daughters of memory. See Hefiod Theog. ver. 53.

15. And

For whilft to th' fhame of flow-endevoring art
Thy eafy numbers flow, and that each heart
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep impreffion took,
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving,
Doft make us marble with too much conceiving;
And fo fepulcher'd in fuch pomp doft lie,
That kings for fuch a tomb would wish to die.

XI.

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ΙΟ

15

* On the University Carrier, who ficken'd in the time of his vacancy, being forbid to go to London, by reafon of the plague.

H'

ERE lies old Hobfon; Death hath broke his

girt,

And here alas, hath laid him in the dirt,

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Or elfe the ways being foul, twenty to one,
He's here ftuck in a flough, and overthrown.
"Twas fuch a shifter, that if truth were known, 5
Death was half glad when he had got him down;
For he had any time this ten years full,
Dodg'd with him, betwixt Cambridge and the Bull.
And furely Death could never have prevail'd,
Had not his weekly course of carriage fail'd;
But lately finding him so long at home,

And thinking now his journey's end was come,
And that he had ta'en up

his latest inn,

In the kind office of a chamberlin

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14

Show'd him his room where he muft lodge that night,

Pull'd off his boots, and took away

H

the light:

any afk for him, it shall be faid, Hobfon has fupt, and's newly gone to bed.

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