I bent my bolt against the bush,
Listening if any thing did rushe,
But then heard no more rustling:
Tho, peeping close into the thicke,
Might see the moving of some quicke,
Whose shape appeared not;
But were it faerie, feend, or snake,
My courage earnd1 it to awake,
And manfully thereat shotte.
With that sprong forth a naked swayne With spotted winges, like Peacocks trayne, And laughing lope to a tree;
His gylden quiver at his backe,
And silver bowe, which was but slacke,
Which lightly he bent at me:
That seeing, I levelde againe
And shott at him with might and maine, As thicke as it had hayled.
So long I shott, that al was spent ;
Tho pumie stones I hastly hent
And threwe; but nought availed:
He was so wimble and so wight,
From bough to bough he lepped light,
And oft the pumies latched '.
Therewith affrayd, I ranne away :
But he, that earst seemd but to playe,
A shaft in earnest snatched,
And hit me running in the heele :
For then I little smart did feele,
But soone it sore encreased;
And now it ranckleth more and more,
And inwardly it festreth sore,
Ne wote I how to cease it.
Wil. Thomalin, I pittie thy plight,
Perdie with Love thou diddest fight:
I know him by a token;
For once I heard my father say,
How he him caught upon a day,
(Whereof he will be wroken)
Entangled in a fowling net,
Which he for carrion Crowes had set
That in our Peere-tree haunted:
Tho sayd, he was a winged lad,
But bowe and shafts as then none had,
Els had he sore be daunted.
But see, the Welkin thicks apace,
And stouping Phebus steepes his face :
Yts time to hast us homeward.
Palinode. Is not thilke the mery moneth of May,
When love-lads masken in fresh aray?
How falles it, then, we no merrier bene,
Ylike as others, girt in gawdy greene?
Our bloncket liveryes' bene all to sadde
For thilke same season, when all is ycladd
With pleasaunce: the grownd with grasse, the Woods
With greene leaves, the bushes with bloosming buds.
Yougthes folke now flocken in every where,
To gather May bus-kets and smelling brere.
And home they hasten the postes to dight,
And all the Kirke pillours eare day light,
With Hawthorne buds, and swete Eglantine,
And girlonds of roses, and Sopps in wine.
Such merimake holy Saints doth queme3,
But we here sitten as drownd in a dreme.
Piers. For Younkers, Palinode, such follies fitte,
But we tway bene men of elder witt.
Pal. Sicker this morrowe, no lenger agoe,
I sawe a shole of shepeheardes outgoe
With singing, and shouting, and jolly chere:
Before them yode a lusty Tabrere,
That to the many a Horne-pype playd,
Whereto they dauncen, eche one with his mayd.
To see those folkes make such jovysaunce,
Made my heart after the pype to daunce:
Tho to the greene Wood they speeden hem all,
To fetchen home May with their musicall:
And home they bringen in a royall throne,
Crowned as king and his Queene attone
Was Lady Flora, on whom did attend
A fayre flocke of Faeries, and a fresh bend
Of lovely Nymphs. (O that I were there,
To helpen the Ladyes their Maybush beare!)
Ah! Piers, bene not thy teeth on edge, to thinke
How great sport they gaynen with little swinck?
Whilome in youth, when flowrd my joyfull spring,
Like Swallow swift I wandred here and there;
For heate of heedlesse lust me so did sting,
That I of doubted daunger had no feare:
I went the wastefull woodes and forest wide,
Withouten dreade of Wolves to bene espyed.
How often have I scaled the craggie Oke,
All to dislodge the Raven of her nest?
How have I wearied with many a stroke
The stately Walnut-tree, the while the rest
Under the tree fell all for nuts at strife?
For ylike to me was libertee and lyfe.
Tho gan my lovely Spring bid me farewel,
And Sommer season sped him to display
(For love then in the Lyons house did dwell)
The raging fyre that kindled at his ray.
A comett stird up that unkindly heate,
That reigned (as men say) in Venus seate.
Forth was I ledde, not as I wont afore,
When choise I had to choose my wandring waye,
But whether luck and loves unbridled lore
Woulde leade me forth on Fancies bitte to playe:
The bush my bedde, the bramble was my bowre,
The Woodes can witnesse many a wofull stowre1
Where I was wont to seeke the honey Bee,
Working her formall rowmes in wexen frame,
The grieslie Tode-stoole growne there mought I se,
And loathed Paddocks 2 lording on the same :
And where the chaunting birds luld me asleepe,
The ghastlie Owle her grievous ynne doth keepe.
Then as the springe gives place to elder time,
And bringeth forth the fruite of sommers pryde;
Also my age, now passed youngthly pryme,
To thinges of ryper season selfe applyed,
And learnd of lighter timber cotes to frame,
Such as might save my sheepe and me fro shame.
To make fine cages for the Nightingale,
And Baskets of bulrushes, was my wont:
Who to entrappe the fish in winding sale3
Was better seene, or hurtful beastes to hont?
I learned als the signes of heaven to ken,
How Phoebe fayles, where Venus sittes, and when.
And tryed time yet taught me greater thinges;
The sodain rysing of the raging seas,
The soothe of byrdes by beating of their winges,
The power of herbs, both which can hurt and ease,
And which be wont t' enrage the restlesse sheepe,
And which be wont to worke eternall sleepe.
But, ah! unwise and witlesse Colin Cloute,
That kydst the hidden kinds of many a wede,
Yet kydst not ene to cure thy sore hart-roote,
Whose ranckling wound as yet does rifelye bleede.
Why livest thou stil, and yet hast thy deathes wound? Why dyest thou stil, and yet alive art founde?
Thus is my sommer worne away and wasted,
Thus is my harvest hastened all to rathe1;
The eare that budded faire is burnt and blasted,
And all my hoped gaine is turnd to scathe:
Of all the seede that in my youthe was sowne
Was nought but brakes and brambles to be mowne.
My boughes with bloosmes that crowned were at firste,
And promised of timely fruite such store,
Are left both bare and barrein now at erst;
The flattring fruite is fallen to grownd before.
And rotted ere they were halfe mellow ripe;
My harvest, wast, my hope away dyd wipe.
The fragrant flowres, that in my garden grewe,
Bene withered, as they had bene gathered long;
Theyr rootes bene dryed up for lacke of dewe,
Yet dewed with teares they han be ever among.
Ah! who has wrought my Rosalind this spight,
To spil the flowres that should her girlond dight?
And I, that whilome wont to frame my pype
Unto the shifting of the shepheards foote,
Sike follies nowe have gathered as too ripe,
And cast hem out as rotten and unsoote.
The loser Lasse I cast to please no more;
One if I please, enough is me therefore.
And thus of all my harvest-hope I have
Nought reaped but a weedye crop of care;
Which, when I thought have thresht in swelling sheave,
Cockel for corne, and chaffe for barley, bare:
Soone as the chaffe should in the fan be fynd,
All was blowne away of the wavering wynd.
So now my yeare drawes to his latter terme,
My spring is spent, my sommer burnt up quite;
My harveste hasts to stirre up Winter sterne,
And bids him clayme with rigorous rage hys right:
So nowe he stormes with many a sturdy stoure;
So now his blustring blast eche coste dooth scoure.
1 too early.
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