POEMS DISCOVERED AMONG THE PAPERS OF SIR KENELM DIGBY.
Since I last wrote to you on the subject of these poems, I have discovered the remaining portions of Ben Jonson's poem on the Lady Venetia: I have therefore no doubt now that my MS. is a genuine autograph; and if so, not only this, but the "Houreglasse," which was inserted in your 63rd No., is Ben Jonson's. This last has, I think, never been published; nor have I ever seen in print the followings lines, which are written in the same hand and on the same paper as the "Houreglasse." They were probably written after Lady Venetia's death.
"You wormes (my rivals), whiles she was alive,
How many thousands were there that did strive
To have your freedome? for theyr sakes forbeare,
Unseemely holes in her soft skin to wear,
But if you must (as what worme can abstaine?)
Taste of her tender body, yet refraine
With your disordered eatings to deface her,
And feed yourselves so as you most may grace her.
First through her eartippes, see you work a paire
Of holes, which, as the moyst enclosed ayre [air]
Turnes into water, may the cold droppes take,
And in her eares a payre of jewels make.
That done, upon her bosome make your feaste,
Where on a crosse carve Jesus in her brest.
Have you not yet enough of that soft skinne,
The touch of which, in times past, might have bin
Enough to ransome many a thousande soule
Captiv'd to love? then hence your bodies roule
A little higher; where I would you have
This epitaph upon her forehead grave;
Living, she was fayre, yong, and full of witt;
Dead, all her faults are in her forehead writt."
If I am wrong in supposing this never to have been printed, I shall feel much obliged by one of your correspondents informing me of the fact.
H. A. B.
Trin. Col. Cambridge.