Cloris. Come, bright girls, come all together,1
And bring all your offering hither ;
Ye most brave and buxom bevy,

All your goodly graces levy;
Come in majesty and state,
Our bridal here to celebrate.

Mert. For our Tita is this day

Claia. Married to a noble fay.

Claia. Whose lot will't be the way to strew On which to church our bride must go?

Mert. That (I think) as fitt'st of all,

To lively Lelipa will fall.

Cloris. Summon all the sweets that are,

To this nuptial to repair,

Till with their throngs themselves they smother,
Strongly stifling one another,

And at last they all consume,

And vanish in one rich perfume.

Mert. For our Tita is this day
Claia. Married to a noble fay.

Mert. By whom must Tita married be?

'Tis fit to that we all should see.

Claia. The priest he purposely doth come,

Th' arch-Flamen of Elizium.

Cloris. With tapers let the temples shine,
Sing to Hymen hymns divine!
Load the altars, till there rise
Clouds from the burnt sacrifice;
With your censors sling aloof
Their smells, till they ascend the roof.
Mert. For our Tita is this day
Claia. Married to a noble fay.

1 Altogether in the original, a common way of printing the phrase in old works.

Mert. But coming back when she is wed, Who breaks the cake above her head?1

Claia. That shall Mertilla, for she's tallest, And our Tita is the smallest.

Cloris. Violins, strike up aloud,
Ply the gittern, scour the crowd!
Let the nimble hand belabour

The whistling pipe and drumbling tabor:
To the full the bagpipe rack,

Till the swelling leather crack.

Mert. For our Tita is this day

Claia. Married to a noble fay.

Claia. But when to dine she takes her seat, What shall be our Tita's meat?

Mert. The gods this feast as to begin,

Have sent of their ambrosia in.

Cloris. Then serve we up the straw's rich berry,

The respas, and Elizian cherry;

The virgin honey from the flowers

In Hibla, wrought in Flora's bowers:

Full bowls of nectar, and no girl

Carouse but in dissolved pearl.

Mert. For our Tita is this day
Claia. Married to a noble fay.

Claia. But when night comes and she must go
To bed, dear nymphs, what must we do?
Mert. In the posset must be brought,

2

And points be from the bridegroom caught.

Cloris. In masques, in dances, and delight, And rear-banquets, pass the night;

Then about the room we ramble,

Scatter nuts, and for them scramble,

1 This curious custom is alluded to in Brand's Popular Antiquities.

2 The points or tags that were used to hold the dress.

Over stools and tables tumble,
Never think of noise nor rumble.
Mert. For our Tita is this day
Claia. Married to a noble fay.

[From Lane's "Triton's Trumpet," a MS. in the British Museum, Bib. Reg. 17 B. xv.]

FROM

ROM Faerie Lande, I com, quoth Danus now,
Ha! that, quoth June, mee never chauncd to
knowe,

Ne could or nould thigh poet Spencer tell,
(So farr as mote my witt this ridle spell)

Though none that breatheth livinge aier doth knowe,
Wheare is that happie land of Faerie,

Which I so oft doe vaunt yet no wheare showe,
But vouch antequities which no bodie maie knowe.

No marveile that, quoth Danus mirrelie,
For it is movable of Mercurie,

Which Faeries with a trice doe snatch up hence,
Fro sight and heering of the common sense;

Yet coms on sodaines to the thoughtlesse eye
And eare (favored to heere theire minstrelsy),
Ne bootes climbe promontories yt to spie,
For then the Faeries dowt the seeinge eye.

Onlie right seld it to some fewe doth chaunce,
That (ravishd) they behold it in a traunse,
Wheare yt a furor calls, rage, extacie,
Shedd but on the poetick misterie,
Which they with serious apprehension tend,
Ells from them also yt doth quicklie wend :
But caught with it they deale most secretly,
As deignes the Muse instruct them waerely.

The glorie wheaerof doth but this arive,
They farr more honord dead are then alive.
But now folke vaunt by use, to call yt prittie,
Them selves theareby comparinge (vâh) more wittie;
Nathlesse kinges, captaines, clercks, astrologers,
And everie learnd th'ideal spirit admires.

But ah! well fare his lines alive not dead,

Yf of his readers his reward bee bread.

Which
proves, while poets thoughts up sore divine,
These fleshe-flies, earth wormes, welter but in slyme.
Ha! yet near known was, but meere poetrie,
Came to ann ancor at sadd povertie.