Prologue

I COME but as a harbinger, being sent

To tell you what these preparations mean.

Look for no glorious state; our Muse is bent

Upon a barren subject, a bare scene.

We could afford this twig a timber-tree,

Whose strength might boldly on your favours build;

Our russet, tissue; drone, a honey-bee;

Our barren plot, a large and spacious field;

Our coarse fare, banquets; our thin water, wine;

Our brook, a sea; our bat's eyes, eagle's sight;

Our poet's dull and earthly Muse, divine;

Our ravens, doves; our crow's black feathers, white.

  But gentle thoughts, when they may give the foil,

  Save them that yield, and spare where they may spoil.

Thomas Heywood

Ye Little Birds That Sit And Sing

YE little birds that sit and sing

  Amidst the shady valleys,

And see how Phyllis sweetly walks

  Within her garden-alleys;

Go, pretty birds, about her bower;

Sing, pretty birds, she may not lour;

Ah, me! methinks I see her frown;

  Ye pretty wantons, warble!

Go, tell her through your chirping bills,

  As you by me are bidden,

To her is only known my love,

  Which from the world is hidden.

Go, pretty birds, and tell her so;

See that your notes strain not too low,

For still, methinks, I see her frown;

  Ye pretty wantons, warble!

Go, tune your voices' harmony,

  And sing, I am her lover;

Strain loud and sweet, that every note

  With sweet content may move her;

And she that hath the sweetest voice,

Tell her I will not change my choice;

Yet still, methinks, I see her frown;

  Ye pretty wantons, warble!

Oh, fly! make haste! se, see, she falls

  Into a pretty slumber!

Sing round about her rosy bed

  That, waking, she may wonder:

Say to her, 'tis her lover true

That sendeth love to you, to you!

And when you hear her kind reply,

  Return with pleasant warblings.

Thomas Heywood

Pack, Clouds, Away

PACK, clouds, away, and welcome day,

  With night we banish sorrow;

Sweet air, blow soft; mount, lark, aloft

  To give my Love good-morrow!

Wings from the wind, to please her mind,

  Notes from the lark I'll borrow;

Bird, prune thy wing, nightingale, sing,

  To give my Love good-morrow!

    To give my Love good-morrow

    Notes from them all I'll borrow.

Wake from the nest, robin-redbreast,

  Sing, birds, in every furrow;

And from each bill, let music shrill

  Give my fair Love good-morrow!

Blackbird and thrush in every bush,

  Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow,

You pretty elves, amongst yourselves

  Sing my fair Love good-morrow!

    To give my Love good-morrow

    Sing, birds, in every furrow!

Thomas Heywood

Hymn to Diana

HAIL, beauteous Dian, queen of shades,

That dwells beneath these shadowy glades,

Mistress of all those beauteous maids

  That are by her allowed.

Virginity we all profess,

Abjure the worldly vain excess,

And will to Dian yield no less

  Than we to her have vowed.

The shepherds, satyrs, nymphs, and fauns

For thee will trip it o'er the lawns.

Come, to the forest let us go,

And trip it like the barren doe:

The fauns and satyrs still do so,

  And freely thus they may do.

The fairies dance and satyrs sing,

And on the grass tread many a ring,

And to their caves their ven'son bring;

  And we will do as they do.

The shepherds, satyrs, nymphs, and fauns

For thee will trip it o'er the lawns.

Our food is honey from the bees,

And mellow fruits that drop from trees;

in chase we climb the high degrees

  Of every steepy mountain.

And when the weary day is past,

We at the evening hie us fast,

And after this, our field repast,

  We drink the pleasant fountain.

The shepherds, satyrs, nymphs, and fauns

For thee will trip it o'er the lawns.

Thomas Heywood

Praise of Ceres

WITH fair Ceres, Queen of Grain,

  The reaped fields we roam, roam, roam:

Each country peasant, nymph, and swain,

  Sing their harvest home, home, home;

Whilst the Queen of Plenty hallows

Growing fields as well as fallows.

Echo, double all our lays,

  Make the champians* sound, sound, sound             [fields]

To the Queen of Harvest praise,

  That sows and reaps our ground, ground, ground.

Ceres, Queen of Plenty, hallows

Growing fields as well as fallows.

Thomas Heywood