Edward, who was the seventeenth earl of Oxford, of the family of Vere, succeeded his father in his title and honours in 1563, and died an aged man in 1604. See Mr. Walpole's Noble Authors. Athen. Oxon, &c.
[Walpole was in error when he stated that Lord Oxford died an aged man, for that nobleman was only about sixty at the time of his death. Sir Egerton Brydges points out in his edition of the Paradise of Dainty Devices (British Bibliographer, vol. iii.), that the earl could not have been born earlier than 1540 or 1541, because his elder half-sister Katherine, widow of Edward, Lord Windsor, died in January, 1599, aged 60. The chief events of his life are these. In 1585 he was the chief of those who embarked with the Earl of Leicester for the relief of the states of Holland and Zealand. In 1586 he sat as Lord Great Chamberlain of England on the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots. In 1588 he hired and fitted out ships at his own charge against the Spanish Armada. In 1589 he sat on the trial of Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, and in 1601 on the trials of the Earls of Essex and Southampton. His private character was far from good, and his honour was tarnished by his dispute with Sir Philip Sidney. He used his first wife (a daughter of the great Burleigh) cruelly, in revenge for the statesman's treatment of his great friend, Thomas, Duke of Norfolk. In his early youth he travelled in Italy, and returned from that country a finished coxcomb, bringing home with him Italian dresses, perfumes, and embroidered gloves. He presented a pair of the latter to Queen Elizabeth, who was so pleased with them that she was drawn with them on her hands. The earl was buried at Hackney, on the 6th of July, 1604.
Percy might have spared rather more praise for this pretty little poem.]
Come hither shepherd's swayne:
"Sir, what do you require?"
I praye thee, shewe to me thy name.
"My name is Fond Desire."
When wert thou borne, Desire? 5
"In pompe and pryme of may."
By whom, sweet boy, wert thou begot?
"By fond Conceit men say."
Tell me, who was thy nurse?
"Fresh Youth in sugred joy." 10
What was thy meate and dayly foode?
"Sad sighes with great annoy."
What hadst thou then to drinke?
"Unsavoury lovers teares."
What cradle wert thou rocked in? 15
"In hope devoyde of feares."