The Affectionate Shepherd | Page 9

sweete Amintas, vertuous minde,?Should I forget thy learning or thy love,?Well might I be accounted but unkinde,?Whose pure affection I so oft did prove,?Might my poore plaints hard stones to pitty move!?His losse should be lamented of each creature,?So great his name, so gentle was his nature.
But sleepe his soule in sweet Elysium,?(The happy haven of eternall rest);?And let me to my former matter come,?Proving, by reason, shepheard's life is best,?Because he harbours vertue in his brest;?And is content, (the chiefest thing of all),?With any fortune that shall him befall.
He sits all day lowd-piping on a hill,?The whilst his flocke about him daunce apace,?His hart with joy, his eares with musique fill:?Anon a bleating weather beares the bace,?A lambe the treble, and to his disgrace?Another answers like a middle meane,?Thus every one to beare a part are faine.
Like a great king he rules a little land,?Still making statutes and ordayning lawes,?Which if they breake, he beates them with his wand;?He doth defend them from the greedy jawes?Of rav'ning woolves, and lyons bloudy pawes.?His field, his realme; his subjects are his sheepe;?Which he doth still in due obedience keepe.
First he ordaines by act of parlament,?(Holden by custome in each country towne),?That if a sheepe (with any bad intent)?Presume to breake the neighbour hedges downe,?Or haunt strange pastures that be not his owne,?He shall be pounded for his lustines,?Untill his master finde out some redres.
Also if any prove a strageller?From his owne fellowes in a forraine field,?He shall be taken for a wanderer,?And forc'd himselfe immediatly to yeeld;?Or with a wyde-mouth'd mastive curre be kild;?And if not claimd within a twelve month's space,?He shall remaine with land-lord of the place.
Or if one stray to feede far from the rest,?He shall be pincht by his swift pye-bald curre;?If any by his fellowes be opprest,?The wronger, (for he doth all wrong abhorre),?Shall be well bangd so long as he can sturre,?Because he did anoy his harmeles brother,?That meant not harme to him nor any other.
And last of all, if any wanton weather,?With briers and brambles teare his fleece in twaine,?He shall be forc'd t' abide cold frosty weather,?And powring showres of ratling stormes of raine,?Till his new fleece begins to grow againe:?And for his rashnes he is doom'd to goe?Without a new coate all the winter throw.
Thus doth he keepe them still in awfull feare,?And yet allowes them liberty inough;?So deare to him their welfare doth appeare,?That when their fleeces gin to waxen rough,?He combs and trims them with a rampicke bough,?Washing them in the streames of silver Ladon,?To cleanse their skinnes from all corruption.
Another while he wooes his country wench,?With chaplet crownd and gaudy girlonds dight,?Whose burning lust her modest eye doth quench;?Standing amazed at her heavenly sight,?Beauty doth ravish sense with sweet delight,?Clearing Arcadia with a smoothed browe,?When sun-bright smiles melt flakes of driven snowe.
Thus doth he frollicke it each day by day,?And when night comes drawes homeward to his coate,?Singing a jigge or merry roundelay,?For who sings commonly so merry a noate,?As he that cannot chop or change a groate??And in the winter nights his chiefe desire,?He turnes a crabbe or cracknell in the fire.
He leads his wench a country horne-pipe round,?About a may-pole on a holy-day,?Kissing his lovely lasse with garlands crownd,?With whoopping heigh-ho singing care away.?Thus doth he passe the merry month of May,?And all th' yere after, in delight and joy;?Scorning a king, he cares for no annoy.
What though with simple cheere he homely fares,?He lives content; a king can doo no more,?Nay, not so much, for kings have manie cares,?But he hath none, except it be that sore?Which yong and old, which vexeth ritch and poore,?The pangs of love. O! who can vanquish Love??That conquers kingdomes, and the gods above.
Deepe-wounding arrow, hart-consuming fire,?Ruler of reason, slave to tyrant beautie,?Monarch of harts, fuell of fond desire,?Prentice to folly, foe to fained duetie.?Pledge of true zeale, affections moitie,?If thou kilst where thou wilt, and whom it list thee,?Alas! how can a silly soule resist thee?
By thee great Collin lost his libertie,?By thee sweet Astrophel forwent his joy;?By thee Amyntas wept incessantly,?By thee good Rowland liv'd in great annoy;?O cruell, peevish, vylde, blind-seeing boy,?How canst thou hit their harts, and yet not see??If thou be blinde, as thou art faind to bee.
A shepheard loves no ill, but onely thee;?He hath no care, but onely by thy causing:?Why doost thou shoot thy cruell shafts at mee??Give me some respite, some short time of pausing:?Still my sweet love with bitter lucke th'art sawcing: Oh, if thou hast a minde to shew thy might,?Kill mightie kings, and not a wretched wight.
Yet, O enthraller of infranchizd harts,?At my poore hart if thou wilt needs be ayming,?Doo me this favour, show me both thy darts,?That I may chuse the best for my harts mayming,?A free