Not proud Alcynous himselfe can vaunt
Of goodlier orchards or of braver trees
Than I have planted; yet thou wilt not graunt
My simple sute, but like the honey bees
Thou suckst the flowre till all the sweet be gone,
And loost mee for my coyne till I have none.
Leave Guendolen, sweet hart; though she be faire,
Yet is she light; not light in vertue shining,
But light in her behaviour, to impaire
Her honour in her chastities declining;
Trust not her teares, for they can wantonnize,
When teares in pearle are trickling from her eyes.
If thou wilt come and dwell with me at home,
My sheepcote shall be strowed with new greene rushes:
Weele haunt the trembling prickets as they rome
About the fields, along the hauthorne bushes;
I have a pie-bald curre to hunt the hare,
So we will live with daintie forrest fare.
Nay, more than this, I have a garden plot,
Wherein there wants nor hearbs, nor roots, nor flowers;
Flowers to smell, roots to eate, hearbs for the pot,
And dainty shelters when the welkin lowers:
Sweet-smelling beds of lillies, and of roses,
Which rosemary banks and lavender incloses.
There growes the gilliflowre, the mynt, the dayzie
Both red and white, the blue-veynd violet;
The purple hyacinth, the spyke to please thee,
The scarlet dyde carnation bleeding yet:
The sage, the savery, and sweet margerum,
Isop, tyme, and eye-bright, good for the blinde and dumbe.
The pinke, the primrose, cowslip and daffodilly,
The hare-bell blue, the crimson cullumbine,
Sage, lettis, parsley, and the milke-white lilly,
The rose and speckled flowre cald sops-in-wine,
Fine pretie king-cups, and the yellow bootes,
That growes by rivers and by shallow brookes.
And manie thousand moe I cannot name
Of hearbs and flowers that in gardens grow,
I have for thee, and coneyes that be tame,
Young rabbets, white as swan, and blacke as crow;
Some speckled here and there with daintie spots:
And more I have two mylch and milke-white goates.
All these and more Ile give thee for thy love,
If these and more may tyce thy love away:
I have a pidgeon-house, in it a dove,
Which I love more than mortall tongue can say.
And last of all Ile give thee a little lambe
To play withall, new weaned from her dam.
But if thou wilt not pittie my complaint,
My teares, nor vowes, nor oathes, made to thy beautie:
What shall I doo but languish, die, or faint,
Since thou dost scorne my teares, and my soules duetie:
And teares contemned, vowes and oaths must faile,
And where teares cannot, nothing can prevaile.
Compare the love of faire Queene Guendolin
With mine, and thou shalt ee how she doth love thee:
I love thee for thy qualities divine,
But shee doth love another swaine above thee:
I love thee for thy gifts, she for hir pleasure;
I for thy vertue, she for beauties treasure.