IN VERSE.
cli
TO SPENCER.
If I should now forget, or not remember thee,
Thou, Spencer, mightest a foule rebuke and shame impute to mee;
For I to open shew did loue thee passing well,
And thou wert he at parture whom I loathed to bid farewell;
And as I went thy friend, so I continue still,
No better proofe thou canst then this desire of true good will.
I doe remember well when needes I should away,
And that the poste would licence us no longer time to stay;
Thou wrongst me by the fist, and holding fast my hand,
Didst crave of me to send thee newes, and how I liked the land.
It is a sandy soile, no very fruitfull vaine,
More waste and woodie grounds there are then closes fit for graine:
Yet graine there growing is, which they untimely take,
And cut or eare the corne be ripe; they mowe it on a stake;
And laying sheafe by sheafe, their haruest so they drie;
They make the greater haste for feare the frost the corne destroy.
For in the winter time, so glarie is the ground,
As neither grass nor other graine in pastures may be found:
In coms the cattel then, the sheepe, the colt, the cowe,
Fast by his bed the mowsike then a lodging doth allowe,
Whom he with fodder feedes, and holds as deere as life,
And thus they weare the winter with the mowsike and his wife.
Seuen months the winter dures, the glare it is so great,
As it is May before he turne his ground to sowe his wheate;
The bodies eke that die, unburied lie they then,
Laid up in coffins made of firre, as well the poorest men,
As those of greater state; the cause is lightly found,
For that in winter time they cannot come to breake the ground;
And wood so plenteous is, quite throughout all the land,
As rich and poor, at time of death, assur’d of coffins stand.
Perhaps thou musest much, how this may stand with reason,
That bodies dead can uncorrupt abide so long a season;
Take this for certaine trothe, as soon as heate is gone,
The force of colde the bodie binds as hard as any stone,
Without offence at all to any living thing:
And so they lye in perfect state till next returne of springe.
Their beasts be like to ours, as farre as I can see,
For shape and shewe, but somewhat lesse of bulke and bone they be;
Thou, Spencer, mightest a foule rebuke and shame impute to mee;
For I to open shew did loue thee passing well,
And thou wert he at parture whom I loathed to bid farewell;
And as I went thy friend, so I continue still,
No better proofe thou canst then this desire of true good will.
I doe remember well when needes I should away,
And that the poste would licence us no longer time to stay;
Thou wrongst me by the fist, and holding fast my hand,
Didst crave of me to send thee newes, and how I liked the land.
It is a sandy soile, no very fruitfull vaine,
More waste and woodie grounds there are then closes fit for graine:
Yet graine there growing is, which they untimely take,
And cut or eare the corne be ripe; they mowe it on a stake;
And laying sheafe by sheafe, their haruest so they drie;
They make the greater haste for feare the frost the corne destroy.
For in the winter time, so glarie is the ground,
As neither grass nor other graine in pastures may be found:
In coms the cattel then, the sheepe, the colt, the cowe,
Fast by his bed the mowsike then a lodging doth allowe,
Whom he with fodder feedes, and holds as deere as life,
And thus they weare the winter with the mowsike and his wife.
Seuen months the winter dures, the glare it is so great,
As it is May before he turne his ground to sowe his wheate;
The bodies eke that die, unburied lie they then,
Laid up in coffins made of firre, as well the poorest men,
As those of greater state; the cause is lightly found,
For that in winter time they cannot come to breake the ground;
And wood so plenteous is, quite throughout all the land,
As rich and poor, at time of death, assur’d of coffins stand.
Perhaps thou musest much, how this may stand with reason,
That bodies dead can uncorrupt abide so long a season;
Take this for certaine trothe, as soon as heate is gone,
The force of colde the bodie binds as hard as any stone,
Without offence at all to any living thing:
And so they lye in perfect state till next returne of springe.
Their beasts be like to ours, as farre as I can see,
For shape and shewe, but somewhat lesse of bulke and bone they be;
