HE soote season, that bud and bloom forth brings,

THE

With green hath clad the hill and eke the vale :

The nightingale with feathers new she sings;

The turtle to her mate hath told her tale:

Summer is come, for every spray now springs,
The hart hath hung his old head on the pale;

The buck in brake his winter coat he flings;
The fishes flete with new-repaired scale;
The adder all her slough away she slings;
The swift swallow pursueth the flies smale;
The busy bee her honey now she mings;
Winter is worn that was the flowers' bale:
And thus I see among these pleasant things
Each care decays, and yet my sorrow springs.

THE SHEPHERD'S COMMENDATION OF HIS NYMPH.

BY EDWARD VERE, EARL OF OXFORD.-1534-1604.

some time on the He took an active

[EDWARD VERE, EARL OF OXFORD, was born about the year 1534, and after having been educated in Cambridge, spent Continent, from which he returned a perfect coxcomb. part in the destruction of the Spanish Armada, and sat on the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots. His poems, which are full of conceits, have never been collected.

He died in 1604.]

Compares not with her white,
Whose hairs are all sunbeams.

So bright my nymph doth shine
As day unto my eyne.

With this there is a red,
Exceeds the damask rose :
Which in her cheeks is spread
Where every favour grows;
In sky there is no star
But she surmounts it far.

When Phoebus from the bed

Of Thetis doth arise,

The morning blushing red,
In fair carnation wise;

He shows in my nymph's face,

As queen of every grace.

This pleasant lily white,
This taint of roseate red,
This Cynthia's silver light,

This sweet fair Dea spread.

These sunbeams in mine eye,
These beauties make me die.

BY THOMAS SACKVILLE.-1536-1608.

[THOMAS SACKVILLE, EARL OF DORSET, the son of Sir Richard Sackville, was born at Withyam in Sussex, in 1536, and was educated at Oxford and Cambridge. He became a student of the Inner Temple, and while there composed the first tragedy ever written in the English language. After having published that and the "Mirrour for Magistrates," he bade adieu to the Muses, and became a statesman. His integrity and vigour procured him many important appointments from Elizabeth, and caused his elevation to the highest honours and dignities. He died suddenly at the Council Board in 1608, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.]

HE wrathful winter 'proaching on apace,

THE

With blust'ring blasts had all ybared the treen,
And old Saturnus with his frosty face

With chilling cold had pierced the tender green;
The mantles wrent, wherein enwrapped been
The gladsome groves that now lay overthrown,
The tapets torn, and every bloom down blown.

The soil that erst so seemly was to seen,
Was all despoiled of her beauty's hue:

And soote fresh flowers (wherewith the summer's queen
Had clad the earth) now Boreas' blasts down blew,
And small fowls flocking, in their song did rue