To which the woods shal answer, and theyr eccho ring. 260
Ring ye the bels, ye yong men of the towne,
And leave your wonted labors for this day:
This day is holy; doe ye write it downe,
That ye for ever it remember may.
This day the sunne is in his chiefest hight, 265
With Barnaby the bright,
From whence declining daily by degrees,
He somewhat loseth of his heat and light,
When once the Crab behind his back he sees.
But for this time it ill ordained was, 270
To chose the longest day in all the yeare,
And shortest night, when longest fitter weare:
Yet never day so long, but late would passe.
Ring ye the bels, to make it weare away,
And bonefiers make all day, 275
And daunce about them, and about them sing:
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.
Ah! when will this long weary day have end,
And lende me leave to come unto my love?
How slowly do the houres theyr numbers spend! 280
How slowly does sad Time his feathers move!
Hast thee, O fayrest planet, to thy home
Within the westerne fome:
Thy tyred steedes long since have need of rest.
Long though it be, at last I see it gloome, 285
And the bright evening star with golden creast
Appeare out of the east.
Fayre childe of beauty, glorious lampe of love,
That all the host of heaven in rankes doost lead,
And guydest lovers through the nightes dread, 290
How chearefully thou lookest from above,
And seemst to laugh atweene thy twinkling light,
As joying in the sight
Of these glad many, which for joy doe sing,
That all the woods them answer, and their echo ring! 295
Now ceasse, ye damsels, your delights forepast;
Enough is it that all the day was youres:
Now day is doen, and night is nighing fast:
Now bring the bryde into the brydall boures.
The night is come, now soone her disaray, 300
And in her bed her lay;
Lay her in lillies and in violets,
And silken courteins over her display,
And odourd sheetes, and Arras coverlets.
Behold how goodly my faire love does ly, 305
In proud humility!
Like unto Maia, when as Jove her tooke
In Tempe, lying on the flowry gras,
Twixt sleepe and wake, after she weary was
With bathing in the Acidalian brooke. 310
Now it is night, ye damsels may be gon,
And leave my love alone,
And leave likewise your former lay to sing:
The woods no more shal answere, nor your echo ring.
Now welcome, night! thou night so long expected, 315
That long daies labour doest at last defray,
And all my cares, which cruell Love collected,
Hast sumd in one, and cancelled for aye:
Spread thy broad wing over my love and me,
That no man may us see, 320
And in thy sable mantle us enwrap,
From feare of perrill and foule horror free.
Let no false treason seeke us to entrap,
Nor any dread disquiet once annoy
The safety of our joy: 325
But let the night be calme and quietsome,
Without tempestuous storms or sad afray:
Lyke as when Jove with fayre Alcmena lay,
When he begot the great Tirynthian groome:
Or lyke as when he with thy selfe did lie, 330
And begot Majesty.
And let the mayds and youngmen cease to sing:
Ne let the woods them answer, nor theyr eccho ring.
Let no lamenting cryes, nor dolefull teares,
Be heard all night within, nor yet without: 335
Ne let false whispers, breeding hidden feares,
Breake gentle sleepe with misconceived dout.
Let no deluding dreames, nor dreadful sights,
Make sudden sad affrights;
Ne let house-fyres, nor lightnings helplesse harmes, 340
Ne let the Pouke, nor other evill sprights,
Ne let mischivous witches with theyr charmes,
Ne let hob goblins, names whose sense we see not,
Fray us with things that be not.
Let not the shriech oule, nor the storke be heard, 345
Nor the night raven that still deadly yels,
Nor damned ghosts cald up with mighty spels,
Nor griesly vultures make us once affeard:
Ne let th’ unpleasant quyre of frogs still croking
Make us to wish theyr choking. 350
Let none of these theyr drery accents sing;
Ne let the woods them answer, nor theyr eccho ring.
But let stil Silence trew night watches keepe,
That sacred Peace may in assurance rayne,
And tymely Sleep, when it is tyme to sleepe, 355
May poure his limbs forth on your pleasant playne,
The whiles an hundred little winged loves,
Like divers fethered doves,
Shall fly and flutter round about our bed,
And in the secret darke, that none reproves, 360
Their prety stealthes shall worke, and snares shal spread
To filch away sweet snatches of delight,
Conceald through covert night.
Ye sonnes of Venus, play your sports at will:
For greedy Pleasure, carelesse of your toyes, 365
Thinks more upon her paradise of joyes,
Then what ye do, albe it good or ill.
All night therefore attend your merry play,
For it will soone be day:
Now none doth hinder you, that say or sing, 370
Ne will the woods now answer, nor your eccho ring.
Who is the same which at my window peepes?
Or whose is that faire face that shines so bright?
Is it not Cinthia, she that never sleepes,
But walkes about high heaven al the night? 375
O fayrest goddesse, do thou not envy
My love with me to spy:
For thou likewise didst love, though now unthought,
And for a fleece of woll, which privily
The Latmian shephard once unto thee brought, 380
His pleasures with thee wrought.
Therefore to us be favorable now;
And sith of wemens labours thou hast charge,
And generation goodly dost enlarge,
Encline thy will t’ effect our wishfull vow, 385
And the chast wombe informe with timely seed,
That may our comfort breed:
Till which we cease our hopefull hap to sing,
Ne let the woods us answere, nor our eccho ring.
And thou, great Juno, which with awful might 390
The lawes of wedlock still dost patronize,
And the religion of the faith first plight
With sacred rites hast taught to solemnize,
And eeke for comfort often called art
Of women in their smart, 395
Eternally bind thou this lovely band,
And all thy blessings unto us impart.
And thou, glad Genius, in whose gentle hand
The bridale bowre and geniall bed remaine,
Without blemish or staine, 400
And the sweet pleasures of theyr loves delight
With secret ayde doest succour and supply,
Till they bring forth the fruitfull progeny,
Send us the timely fruit of this same night.
And thou, fayre Hebe, and thou, Hymen free, 405
Grant that it may so be.
Til which we
cease your further prayse to sing,
Ne any woods shal answer, nor your eccho ring.
And ye high heavens, the temple of the gods,
In which a thousand torches flaming bright 410
Doe burne, that to us wretched earthly clods
In dreadful darknesse lend desired light,
And all ye powers which in the same remayne,
More then we men can fayne,
Poure out your blessing on us plentiously, 415
And happy influence upon us raine,
That we may raise a large posterity,
Which from the earth, which they may long possesse
With lasting happinesse,
Up to your haughty pallaces may mount, 420
And for the guerdon of theyr glorious merit,
May heavenly tabernacles there inherit,
Of blessed saints for to increase the count.
So let us rest, sweet love, in hope of this,
And cease till then our tymely joyes to sing: 425
The woods no more us answer, nor our eccho ring.
Song, made in lieu of many ornaments
With which my love should duly have bene dect.
Which cutting off through hasty accidents,
Ye would not stay your dew time to expect, 430
But promist both to recompens,
Be unto her a goodly ornament,
And for short time an endlesse moniment.
FINIS
Astrophel
A Pastorall Elegie vpon the death of the most Noble and valorous Knight, Sir Philip Sidney.
The poem Astrophel serves as a prologue to a collection of obituary poems to Sir Philip Sidney, one of the leading poets of the Renaissance. Published in the same volume with Colin Clout’s Come Home Again in 1595, Astrophel is dedicated to Sidney’s widow, who in the spring of 1590 had become, by remarriage, the Countess of Essex. The authors of the other poems following Spenser’s poem, though undeclared, have all been traced by scholars through contemporary evidence.
Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586) was an English poet, courtier and soldier, who is chiefly remembered for his monumental sonnet cycle ‘Astrophel and Stella’. A friend as well as rival of Spenser, Sidney was tragically killed at the Battle of Zutphen at the age of 31.
CONTENTS
Astrophel
The Mourning Muse of Thestylis
A Pastorall Aeglogue upon the Death of Sir Phillip Sidney, Knight, &c.
An Elegie, or Friends Passion, for His Astrophill
An Epitaph upon the Right Honourable Sir Phillip Sidney, Knight: Lord Governor of Flushing
Another of the Same
A PASTORALL ELEGIE UPON THE DEATH OF THE MOST NOBLE AND VALOROUS KNIGHT, SIR PHILIP SIDNEY
DEDICATED
TO THE MOST BEAUTIFULL AND VERTUOUS LADIE, THE COUNTESSE OF ESSEX
Astrophel
SHEPHEARDS, that wont on pipes of oaten reed
Oft times to plaine your loves concealed smart,
And with your piteous layes have learnd to breed
Compassion in a countrey lasses hart,
Hearken, ye gentle shepheards, to my song, 5
And place my dolefull plaint your plaints emong.
To you alone I sing this mournfull verse,
The mournfulst verse that ever man heard tell;
To you, whose softened hearts it may empierse
With dolours dart for death of Astrophel: 10
To you I sing, and to none other wight,
For well I wot my rymes bene rudely dight.
Yet as they been, if any nycer wit
Shall hap to heare, or covet them to read,
Thinke he, that such are for such ones most fit, 15
Made not to please the living but the dead.
And if in him found pity ever place,
Let him be moov’d to pity such a case.
A GENTLE shepheard borne in Arcady,
Of gentlest race that ever shepheard bore, 20
About the grassie bancks of Hæmony
Did keepe his sheep, his litle stock and store.
Full carefully he kept them day and night,
In fairest fields; and Astrophel he hight.
Young Astrophel, the pride of shepheards praise, 25
Young Astrophel, the rusticke lasses love,
Far passing all the pastors of his daies,
In all that seemly shepheard might behove:
In one thing onely fayling of the best,
That he was not so happie as the rest. 30
For from the time that first the nymph, his mother,
Him forth did bring, and taught her lambs to feed,
A sclender swaine, excelling far each other
In comely shape, like her that did him breed,
He grew up fast in goodnesse and in grace, 35
And doubly faire wox both in mynd and face.
Which daily more and more he did augment,
With gentle usage and demeanure myld,
That all mens hearts with secret ravishment
He stole away, and weetingly beguyld. 40
Ne Spight it selfe, that all good things doth spill,
Found ought in him that she could say was ill.
His sports were faire, his joyance innocent,
Sweet without sowre, and honny without gall,
And he himselfe seemd made for meriment, 45
Merily masking both in bowre and hall:
There was no pleasure nor delightfull play,
When Astrophel so ever was away.
For he could pipe, and daunce, and caroll sweet,
Emongst the shepheards in their shearing feast; 50
As somers larke that with her song doth greet
The dawning day forth comming from the East.
And layes of love he also could compose:
Thrise happie she whom he to praise did chose.
Full many maydens often did him woo 55
Them to vouchsafe emongst his rimes to name,
Or make for them, as he was wont to doo
For her that did his heart with love inflame.
For which they promised to dight for him
Gay chapelets of flowers and gyrlonds trim. 60
And many a nymph both of the wood and brooke,
Soone as his oaten pipe began to shrill,
Both christall wells and shadie groves for-sooke,
To heare the charmes of his enchanting skill;
And brought him presents, flowers if it were prime, 65
Or mellow fruit if it were harvest time.
But he for none of them did care a whit,
(Yet wood gods for them often sighed sore,)
Ne for their gifts, unworthie of his wit,
Yet not unworthie of the countries store. 70
For one alone he cared, for one he sight,
His lifes desire, and his deare loves delight.
Stella the faire, the fairest star in skie,
As faire as Venus or the fairest faire,
(A fairer star saw never living eie,) 75
Shot her sharp pointed beames through purest aire.
Her he did love, her he alone did honor,
His thoughts, his rimes, his songs were all upon her.
To her he vowd the service of his daies,
On her he spent the riches of his wit: 80
For her he made hymnes of immortall praise,
Of onely her he sung, he thought, he writ.
Her, and but her, of love he worthie deemed;
For all the rest but litle he esteemed.
Ne her with ydle words alone he wowed, 85
And verses vaine, (yet verses are not vaine)
But with brave deeds, to her sole service vowed,
And bold atchievements, her did entertaine.
For both in deeds and words he nourtred was,
Both wise and hardie (too hardie, alas!) 90
In wrestling nimble, and in renning swift,
I
n shooting steddie, and in swimming strong:
Well made to strike, to throw, to leape, to lift,
And all the sports that shepheards are emong:
In every one he vanquisht every one, 95
He vanquisht all, and vanquisht was of none.
Besides, in hunting such felicitie,
Or rather infelicitie, he found,
That every field and forest far away
He sought, where salvage beasts do most abound. 100
No beast so salvage, but he could it kill;
No chace so hard, but he therein had skill.
Such skill, matcht with such courage as he had,
Did prick him foorth with proud desire of praise,
To seek abroad, of daunger nought y’drad, 105
His mistresse name, and his owne fame, to raise.
What need perill to be sought abroad,
Since round about us it doth make aboad?
It fortuned, as he that perilous game
In forreine soyle pursued far away, 110
Into a forest wide and waste he came,
Where store he heard to be of salvage pray.
So wide a forest and so waste as this,
Nor famous Ardeyn, nor fowle Arlo, is.
There his welwoven toyles and subtil traines 115
He laid the brutish nation to enwrap:
So well he wrought with practise and with paines,
That he of them great troups did soone entrap.
Full happie man (misweening much) was hee,
So rich a spoile within his power to see. 120
Eftsoones, all heedlesse of his dearest hale,
Full greedily into the heard he thrust,
To slaughter them, and worke their finall bale,
Least that his toyle should of their troups be brust.
Wide wounds emongst them many one he made, 125
Now with his sharp borespear, now with his blade.
His care was all how he them all might kill,
That none might scape (so partiall unto none):
Ill mynd, so much to mynd anothers ill,
As to become unmyndfull of his owne: 130
But pardon that unto the cruell skies,
That from himselfe to them withdrew his eies.
So as he rag’d emongst that beastly rout,
A cruell beast of most accursed brood
Upon him turnd (despeyre makes cowards stout) 135
And, with fell tooth accustomed to blood,
Launched his thigh with so mischievous might,
That it both bone and muscles ryved quight.
So deadly was the dint and deep the wound,
And so huge streames of blood thereout did flow, 140
That he endured not the direfull stound,
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