e feelingly the weeps Troys painted woes : forrow, like a heavy hanging bell,

e fet on ringing, with his own weight goes; n little ftrength rings out the doleful knell. ucrece fet a work, fad tales doth tell

o pencil'd pensiveness, and colour'd forrow; he lends them words, and she their looks doth borrow.

throws her eyes about the painting round, whom the finds forlorn fhe doth lament. aft the fees a wretched image bound, : piteous looks to Phrygian fhepherds lent; face, tho' full of cares, yet fhew'd content. award to Troy with these blunt fwains he goes,

mild, that patience feem'd to fcorn his woes.

m the painter labour'd with his skill,
ide deceit, and give the harmless show,
umble gait, calm looks, eyes wailing still,
ow unbent, that feem'd to welcome woe;
ks, neither red, nor pale, but mingled fo,
at blafhing red no guilty inftance gave,
rafhy pale, the fair that falfe hearts have.

like a conftant and confirmed devil,
atertain'd a fhow fo feeming juft;
therein fo infconc'd his fecret evil,
jealousy itself could not miftruft,
creeping craft and perjury should thrust
o fo bright a day fuch black-fac'd storms,
blot with hell-born fin fuch faint-like forms.

picture the advisedly perus'd,

thid the painter for his wondrous skill:
g, fome fhape in Sinon's was abus'd,
r a form lodg'd not a mind fo ill.
till on him the gaz'd, and gazing still,
th figns of truth in his plain face the spied,
at the concludes, the picture was belied.

not be (quoth fhe) that fo much guile, would have faid, can lurk in fuch a look; Tarquin's fhape came in her mind the while, from her tongue, can lurk, from cannot, anot be, fhe in that fenfe forfook,

ad turn'd it thus, It cannot be I find,

[took:

at fuch a face thould bear a wicked mind.

Pen as fubtle Sinon here is painted, ber fad, fo weary and fo miid,

if with grief or travel he had fainted) ne came Tarquin armed, so be guil'd 1 outward honefty, but yet deli'd OL. II.

With inward vice; as Priam him did cherish, So did I Tarquin, fo my Troy did perish.

Look, look how liftning Priam wets his eyes
To fee those borrow'd tears, that Sinon sheds !
Priam, why art thou old, and yet not wife?
For every tear he falls, a Trojan bleeds:
His eye drop fire, no water thence proceeds. [pity,
Thofe round clear pearls of his that move thy
Are balls of quenchless fire to burn thy city.

Such devils fteal effects from lightless hell;
For Sinon in his fire doth quake with cold,
And in that cold hot-burning fire doth dwell;
These contraries fuch unity do hold,

Only to flatter Fools and make them bold:

So Priam's trust false Sinons tears doth flatter, That he finds means to burn his Troy with

water.

Here all enrag'd fuch paffion her affails,
That patience is quite beaten from her breaft;
She tears the fenfeless Sinon with her nails,
Comparing him to that unhappy gueft,
Whole deed hath made herfelf, herself deteft.
At last the smilingly with this gives o'er,
Fool! fool! quoth fhe, his wounds will not be

fore.

Thus ebbs and flows the current of her forrow, And time doth weary time with her complaining She looks for night, and then the longs for mor

row,

And both the thinks too long with her remaining; Short time feems long, in forrows sharp fuflaining.

Tho' woe be heavy, yet it seldom fleeps,
And they that watch, fee time how flow it
creeps.

Which all this time hath over-flipt her thought,
That the with painted images hath spent,
Being from the feeling of her own grief brought,
By deep furmife of others detriment,
Lofing her woes in thews of discontent.

It cafeth fome, tho' none it ever cur'd,
To think their dolour others have endur'd.

But now the mindful meffenger comes, back,
Brings home his lord, and other company;
Who finds his Lucrece clad in mourning black,
And round about her tear-distained eye
Blue circles ftream'd, like rainbows in the fky.
Thefe watergalls in her dim element,
Foretell new storms to those already spent.

Which when her fad-beholding husband faw,
Amazedly in her fad face he ftares :

Her eyes though fod in tears, look red, and raw,
Her lively colour kill'd with deadly cares.

He hath no power to afk her how the fares:
But food like old acquaintance in a trance,
Met far from home, wondring each other's

chance.

Sf

At laft he takes her by the bloodless hand,
And thus begins: What uncouth ill event
Hath thee befall'n, that thou doft trembling ftand?
Sweet love! what ipite hath thy fair colour
spent?

Why art thou thus attir'd in difcontent?

Unmask, dear Dear! this moody heaviness,
And tell thy grief that we may give redress.

Three times with fighs fhe gives her forrows fire,
E'er once the can difcharge one word of woe :
At length addrefs'd to answer his defire,
She modeftly prepares to let them know
Her honour is ta'en prifoner by the foe;
While Collatine and his conforted lords
With fad attention long to hear her words.

And now this pale fwan, in her wat'ry neft,
Begins the fad dirge of her certain ending.
Few words, quoth fhe, fhall fit the trefpaís beft,
Where no excufe can give the fault amending;
In me more woes than words are now depending:
And my laments would be drawn out too long,
To tell them all with one poor tired tongue.

Then be this all the talk it hath to fay,
Dear hufband, in the intereft of thy bed
A stranger came, and on that pillow lay,
Where thou waft wont to reft thy weary head;
And what wrong elfe may be imagined

By foul inforcement might be done to me,
From that, alas! thy Lucrece is not free.

For in the dreadful dead of dark midnight, With fhining faulchion in my chamber came A creeping creature with a flaming light, And foftly cry'd, awake thou Roman dame ! And entertain my love elfe lafting fhame

On thee and thine this night I will inflict, If thou my love's defire do contradict.

For fome hard-favour'd groom of thine, quoth her
Unless thou yoke thy liking to my will,
I'll murder freight, and then I'll flaughter thee,
And Iwear I found you where you did fulfil
The loathfome act of luft; and fo did kill

The lechers in their deed: this act will be
My fame, and thy perpetual infamy.

With this I did begin to ftart and cry,
And then against my heart he fet his fword,
Swearing, unless I took all patiently,
I fhould not live to fpeak another word:
So fhould my fhame ftill reft upon record,
And never be forgot in mighty Rome,
Th' adult'rate death of Lucrece, and her groom.

O! teach me how to make mine own excufe,
Or, at the leaft, this refuge let me find;
Though my grofs blood be ftain'd with this abu,
Immaculate and spotless is my mind:
That was not forc'd, that never was inclin'd
To acceflary yieldings; but ftill pure,
Doth in her poifon'd closet yet endure.

Lo! here the hopeless merchant of this lofs, With head deciin'd, and voice damm'd up wh

woe,

With fad fet eyes and wretched arms across,
From lips new-waxen pale begins to blow
The grief away, that itops his answer fo,

But wretched as he is, he ftrives in vain; What he breathes out, his breath drinks p again.

As through an arch the violent roaring tide
Out-runs the eye, that doth behold his hate;
Yet in the eddie boundeth in his pride
Back to the strait, that forc'd him on so fast,
In rage fent out, recall'd in rage being past :

Even fo his fighs, his forrows make a saw, To push grief on, and back the fame gris draw.

Which speechlefs woe of his, poor fhe attendethy
And his untimely frenzy thus awaketh :
Dear Lord! thy forrow to my forrow lendeth
Another power, no flood by raining flacketh;
My woc too fenfible, thy paflion maketh

More feeling painful; let it then fuffice
To drown one woc, one pair of weeping er

And for my fake, when I might charm thee fe, For fhe, that was thy Lucrece-now attend rej Be fuddenly revenged on my foe,

Thine, mine, his own; fuppofe thou dost defed

my pure mind with the foul act difpence, ow declined honour to advance ? any terms acquit me from this chance? e poifon'd fountain clears itfelf again; d why not I from this compelled itain?

this they all at once began to fay, ody's ftain her mind untainted clears; with a joylefs fmile fhe turns away ace, that map, which deep impreffion bears d misfortune carv'd in with tears. no, quoth the, no dame hereafter living, my excufe fhall claim excufes giving.

with a figh, as if her heart would break, rows forth Tarquin's name. He, he, fhe fays:

ore than he, her poor tongue could not fpeak,

er many accents and delays,

ely breathings, fick and thort affays, utters this, He, he, fair Lord, 'tis he

t guides this hand to give this wound to me.

ere the sheathed in her harmless breaft sful knife, that hence her foul unsheathed; low did bail it from the deep unrest

t polluted prifon where it breathed: atrite fighs unto the clouds bequeathed inged fpright, and through her wounds doth fly

4

lafting date from cancel'd destiny.

till, aftonish'd with this deadly deed,
Collatine and all his lordly crew,
crece' father, that beholds her bleed,
f on her felf-flaughter'd body threw :
om the purple fountain Brutus drew
murd'rous knife, and as it left the place,
blood in poor revenge held it in chase.

bbling from her breast, it doth divide
flow rivers, that the crimson blood
her body in on every side,

ke the late fack'd island vastly stood
id unpeopled in this fearful flood.

e of her blood ftill pure and red remain'd, lome look'd black, and that falfe Tarquin

itain'd.

Poor broken glafs! I often did behold
In thy fwect femblance my old age new-born;
But now that fair fresh mirror, dim and old,
Shews me a bare-bon'd death by time out-worn.
O from my cheeks my image thou haft torn!
And shiver'd all the beauty of my glass,
That I no more can fee, what once I was.

O Time, ceafe thou thy courfe, and last no longer,

If they furccafe to be, that should furvive;
Shall rotten death make conqueft of the stronger,
And leave the faltring feeble fouls alive?
The old bees die, the young poffefs the hive:
Then live fweet Lucrece, live again, and fee
Thy father die, and not thy father thee.

By this ftarts Collatine as from a dream,
And bids Lucretius give his forrow place;
And then in key-cold Lucrece' bleeding ftream
He falls, and bathes the pale fear in his face,
And counterfeits to die with her a space;

Till manly fhame bids him poffefs his breath,
And live to be revenged on her death.

The deep vexation of his inward foul
Hath ferv'd a dumb arrest upon his tongue :
Who mad that forrow fhould his ufe control,
Or keep him from heart-eating words fo long
Begins to talk; but through his lips do throng
Weak words, fo thick come in his poor heart's
aid,

That no man could diftinguish what he faid.

Yet fometime Tarquin was pronounced plain,
But through his teeth, as if the name he tore,
This windy tempeft, till it blow up rain,
Held back his forrow's tide to make it more.
At laft it rains, and bufy winds give o'er:

Then fon and father weep with equal ftrife,
Who fhould weep moft for daughter, or for

wife.

The one doth call her his, the other his; Yet neither may poffefs the claim they lay. The father fays, fhc's mine; O mine fhe is, Replies her husband; do not take away My forrow's intereft; let no mourner fay,

He weeps for her; for fhe was only mine, And only must be wail'd by Coliatine.

O quoth Lucretius, I did give that life, Which he too early and too late hath spill'd. ,Woe! woe! quoth Collatine, fhe was my wife, I owned her, and 'tis mine that the hath kill'd. My daughter and my wife with clamours fill'd The disperst air, who holding Lucrece' life, Anfwer'd their cries, my daughter, and my wife.

Brutus, who pluck'd the knife from Lucrece' fide,
Seeing fuch emulation in their woe,

Began to clothe his wit in ftate and pride,
Burying in Lucrece's wound his felly's fhew:
He with the Romans was esteemed fo,

As filly jeering idiots are with kings,
For sportive words, and uttering foolish things.

But now he throws that shallow habit by,
Wherein deep policy did him disguise;
And arm'd his long-hid wits advisedly,
To check the tears in Collatinus' eyes.
Thou wronged lord of Rome, quoth he, arise;
Let my unfounded self, suppos'd a fool,
Now fet thy long-experienc'd wit to school.
Why Collatine, is woe the cure for woe?
Do wounds help wounds, or grief help grievous
Is it revenge to give thyfelf a blow [deeds?
For his foul act, by whom thy fair wife bleeds?
Such childish humour from weak minds proceeds.
Thy wretched wife miftook the matter fo,
To flay herself, that should have flain her foe.

Courageous Roman! do not steep thy heart
In fuch relenting dew of lamentations;
But kneel with me, and help to bear thy part,
To rouse our Roman gods with invocations,
That they will fuffer these abominations

(Since Rome herself in them doth ftand dif-
grac'd)
[chas'd.

By our strong arms from forth her fair streets

Now by the capital, that we adore!
And by this chafte blood fo unjustly stain'd!
By heaven's fair fun, that breeds the fat earth's
ftore!

By all our country's rites in Rome maintain'd,
And by chafte Lucrece' foul, that late complaind
Her wrongs to us, and by this bloody knife!
We will revenge the death of this true wife.
This faid, he ftruck his hand upon his breast,
And kifs'd the fatal knife to end his vow;
And to his proteftation urg'd the rest,
Who wondring at him did him words allow :
Then jointly to the ground their knees they
bow,

And that deep vow which Brutus made be
fore,

He doth again repeat, and that they swore.

When they had fworn to this advised doom,
They did conclude to bear dead Lucrece thence,
To fhew the bleeding body throughout Rome,
And fo to publifh Tarquin's foul offence,
Which being done, with speedy diligence,

The Roman's plausibly did give consent,
To Tarquin's everlasting banishment.

T T..

I.

M faireft creatures we defire increase,

t thereby beauty's rofe might never die, as the riper fhould by time decease, tender heir might bear his memory: thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, lft thy light's flame with felf-fubftantial fuel, ting a famine where abundance lies, Telf thy foe, to thy fweet felf too cruel.

Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament,
And only herald to the gaudy spring,
Within thine own bud burieft thy content,
And, tender churl, mak'ft waste in niggarding.
Pity the world, or elfe this glutton be,

To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee.

i. e. Thomas Thorpe, in whofe name the fonnets were firft entered in Stationers Hall.