For when, alas! I saw the tyrant kyng
Content not only from his nephewes twayne
To ryve worldes blysse, but also al worldes beyng,
Saunce earthly gylt ycausing both be slayne,
My hart agreyved that such a wretch shoulde raygne,
Whose bluddy brest so salvaged out of kynde,
That Phalaris had never so bluddy a minde.
Ne could I brooke him once wythin my brest,
But wyth the thought my teeth would gnashe withal:
For though I earst wer his by sworne behest;
Yet when I sawe mischiefe on mischiefe fall,
So diepe in blud, to murder prynce and all,
Ay then thought I, alas, and wealaway,
And to my selfe thus mourning would I say.
If neyther love, kynred, ne knot of bloud,
His own alegeaunce to his prynce of due,
Nor yet the state of trust wherein he stoode,
The worldes defame, nor nought could turn him true,
Those gylteles babes, could they not make him rue?
Nor could theyr youth, nor innocence withal
Move him from reving them theyr lyfe and all?
Alas, it could not move him any jote,
Ne make him once to rue or wet his iye,
Sturde him no more than that that styrreth not:
But as the rocke or stone that wyl not plye,
So was his hart made hard to crueltye,
To murder them; alas I weepe in thought,
To thinke on that which this fell wretche hath wrought.
That nowe when he had done the thinge he sought,
And as he would, complysht and cumpast all,
And sawe and knewe the treason he had wrought
To God and man, to slaye his prynce and all,
Then seeinde he fyrst to doubte and dreade us all,
And me in chiefe, whoes death all meanes he myght,
He sought to wurke by malice and by might.
Such heapes of harmes upharbard in his brest,
With envyous hart my honour to deface,
As knowing he that I whych woted best
His wretched dryftes, and all his cursed case,
If ever sprang within me sparke of grace,
Must nedes abhorre him and his hatefull race:
Now more and more can cast me out of grace.
Which sodayne chaunge, when I by secrete chaunce,
Had well perceyved by proofe of envious frowne,
And sawe the lot that did me to advaunce
Hym to a kyng that sought to cast me downe,
To late it was to linger any stowne :
Syth present choyse lay cast before myne iye,
To wurke his death, or I my selfe to dye.
And as the knyght in fyeld among his foes,
Beset wyth swordes, must slay or there be slayne:
So I, alas, lapt in a thousand woes,
Beholding death in every syde so playne,
I rather chose by sum slye secrete trayne
To wurke his death, and I to lyve thereby,
Than he to lyve, and I of force to dye.
Which heavy choyse so hastened me to chose,
That I in parte agreyved at his disdayne,
In part to wreke the dolefull death of those
Two tender babes, his sillye nephewes twayne,
By him alas commaunded to be slɩyne,
With paynted chere humbly before his face, Strayght tooke my leave, and rode to Brecknocke place.
And there as close and covert as I myght,
My purposed practise to his passe to bryng,
In secrete driftes, I lingred day and night:
All howe I might depose this cruell kyng,
That seemd to all so much desyred a thyng,
As thereto trusting I emprysde the same;
But to much trusting brought me to my bane.
For while I nowe had fortune at my becke,
Mistrusting I no earthly thing at all,
Unwares, alas, least looking for a checke,
She mated me in turning of a ball:
When least I fearde, then nerest was my fall,
And when whole hoastes wer prest to stroy my foen,
She chaunged her chere, and left me post alone.
I had upraysde a mighty band of men,
And marched furth in order of array,
Leadyng my power amyd the forest Dene,
Agaynst that tyrant banner to displaye:
But loe my souldiers cowardly shranke away.
For such is fortune when she lyst to frowne;
Who seemes most sure, him soonest whurles she
downe.
O let no prynce put trust in commontie,
Nor hope in fayth of gyddy peoples mynde,
But let all noble men take hede by me,
Loe, where is truth or trust? or what could bynde
That by the proofe to well the payne do fynde:
The vayne people, but they will swarve and swaye,
As chaunce bryngs chaunge, to dryve and draw that
way?
Rome, thou that once advaunced up so hye,
Thy staye, patron, and flower of excellence,
Hast nowe throwen him to depth of miserye,
Exiled him that was thy whole defence,
He comptest it not an horryble offence;
To reven him of honour and of fame,
That wan it thee, when thou hadst lost the same.
Beholde Camillus, he that erst revyved
The state of Rome, that dyeng he dyd fynde,
Of his own state is nowe alas depryved,
Banisht by them whom he dyd thus det bynde :
That cruel folke, unthankeful and unkynde,
Declared wel theyr false inconstancye,
And fortune eke her mutability.
And thou Scipio, a myrrour mayst thou be
To all nobles, that they learn not too late,
Howe they once trust the unstable commontye,
Thou that recuredst the torne dismembred state,
Even when the conquerour was at the gate,
Art now expide, as though thou not deserved
To rest in her, whom thou hadst so preserved.
Ingrateful Rome hast shewed thy crueltye,
On hym, by whom thou lyvest yet in fame,
But nor thy dede, nor his desert shall dye,
But his owne wurdes shal witness aye the same :
For loe hys grave doth thee most justly blame.
And with disdayne in marble sayes to thee:
Unkynde countrey, my bones shalt thou not see.
What more unwurthy than this his eryle :
More just than this the wofull playnt he wrote:
Or who could shewe a playner proofe the while,
Of moste false fayth, than they that thus forgot
His great desertes: that so deserved not:
His cindres yet loe, doth he them denye,
That him denyed amongst them for to dye.
Milciades, O happy hast thou be,
And well rewarded of thy countrey men.
If in the fyeld when thou hadst forst to flye
By thy prowes, thre hundred thousand men,
Content they had bene to eryle thee then :
And not to cast thee in depth prison so,
Laden wyth gyves to ende thy lyfe in woe.
Alas howe harde and steely hartes had they,
That not contented there to have thee dye,
With fettred gyves in pryson where thou laye,
Increast so far in hateful crueltye,
That buryall to thy corps, they eke denye
He wyl they graunt the same tyll thy sonne have Put on thy gyves to purchase thee a grave.
Loe Hanniball as long as fired fate,
And bryttle fortune had ordayned so,
Who evermore advaunst his countrey state
Then thou, that lyvedst for her and for no moe:
But when the stormy waves began to grow,
Without respect of thy desertes erwhile,
Art by thy countrey throwen into exyle.
Unfrendly Fortune, shall I thee now blame :
Or shal I faulte the fates that so ordayne?
Or art thou Jove the causer of the same?
Or crueltie her selfe, doth she constrayne?
Or on whom els alas shal I complayne?
O trustles world I can accusen none,
But fyckle fayth of commontye alone.
The polipus nor the chameleon straunge,
That turne them selves to every hewe they see,
Are not so full of bayne and fickle chaunge
As is this false unstedfast commontye.
Loe I alas with mine adversitie
Have tryed it true, for they are fled and gone,
And of an host there is not left me one.
That I alas in this calamitie
Alone was left, and to my selfe mought playne
This treason, and this wretched cowardye,
And eke with teares bewepen and complayne
My hateful hap, styll lookyng to be flayne.
Wandryng in woe, and to the gods on hye
Cleapyng for vengeance of this treacherye.
And as the turtle that hath lost her make,
Whom grypyng sorowe doth so sore attaynt,
With doleful voyce and sound whych she doth make
Mourning her losse, fylles all the grove with playnt;
So I, alas! forsaken, and forsaynt,
With restles foote the wud come up and downe,
Which of my dole al shyvering doth resowne.
And beyng thus alone, and all forsake,
Amyd the thycke, forwandred in despayer,
As one dismayed ne wyst what waye to take,
Untyll at last gan to my mynde repayer,
A man of mine called Humfrey Banastar:
Wherewyth me feeling much recomforted,
hope of succour to his house I fled,
Who beyng one whom earst I had upbrought
Even from his youth, and loved and lyked best,
To gentrye state avauncing him from nought;
And had in secrete truste above the rest,
Of specyal trust nowe being thus dystrest
Full secreatly to him I me conveyed
Not douting there but I should fynde some ayde.
But out alas on cruell trecherye,
When that this caytief once an ynkling hard,
How that Kyng Rychard had proclaymde, that he
Which me descryed should have for his rewarde
A thousand poundes, and farther be prefarde,
His truthe so turnde to treason, all distaynde,
That fayth quyte fled, and I by truste was traynde.
For by this wretch I beyng strayt betrayed,
To one John Mitton, shiriffe of Shropshire then,
All sodaynely was taken, and convayed
To Salisbury, wyth rout of harnest men,
Unto Kyng Rychard there encamped then:
Fast by the citye with a myghtye hoste
Withouten doome where head and lyfe I lost.
And with these wordes, as if the are even there
Dismembred had his head and corps aparte,
Dead fel he downe: and we in woful feare
Stoode mazed when he would to lyef revert :
But deadly griefes still grewe about his hart,
That styll he laye, sumtyme revived wyth payne,
And wyth a sygh becuming dead agayne.
Mydnyght was cum, and every vitall thing
With swete sound slepe theyr weary lyms did rest,
The beastes were still, the lytle byrdes that syng,
Nowe sweetely slept besides theyr mothers brest.
The olde and all were shrowded in theyr nest.
The waters calme, the cruel seas did ceas,
The wuds, the fyeldes, and all thinges held theyr peace.
The golden stars wer whyrlde amyd thyer race,
And on the earth did laugh with twinkling lyght,
When eche thing nestled in his restyng place,
Forgat dayes payne with pleasure of the nyght:
The hare had not the greedy houndes in sight,
The fearfull dear of death stood not in doubt,
The partrydge drept not of the falcons foot.
The ougly beare nowe myndeth not the stake,
Nor howe the cruell mastyves do hym tear;
The stag lay still unroused from the brake,
The fomy boar feard not the hunters spear.
All thing was still in desert, bush, and brear,
With quyet heart now from their travailes rest,
Soundly they slept in midst of all their rest.
When Buckyngham amidst his plaint opprest,
With surgyng sorowes and with pinching paynes
In sort thus sowned, and with a sigh he ceast.
To tellen furth the treachery and the traynes,
Of Banastar, which him so sore distraynes.
That from a sigh he falles into a sounde,
And from a sounde lyeth ragyng on the ground.
So twiching wer the panges that he assayed,
And he so sore with rufull rage distraught,
To thinke upon the wretch that hym betrayed,
Whom earst he made a gentylman of naught,
That more and more agreved with this thought,
He stormes out sighes, and with redoubled sore,
Stroke with the furies, rageth more and more.
Who so hath seene the bull chased with dartes,
And with dyepe woundes forgald and gored so,
Tyl he oppressed with the deadlye smartes,
Fall in a rage, and runne upon his foe,
Let him I saye, beholde the ragyng woe
Of Buckyngham, that in these grypes of gryefe
Rageth gaynst him that hath betrayed his lyef.
With blud red iyen he stareth here and there, Frothing at mouth, with face as pale as cloute: When loe my lymmes were trembling all for feare, And I amazde, stoode styll in dread and doubt, While I mought see him throwe his armes about : And gaynst the ground him selfe plounge with such force,
As if the lyfe forth wyth should leave the corps.
With smoke of syghes sumtyme I myght beholde
The place al dymde, like to the mornyng myst:
And strayt agayne the teares how they downrolde
Alongst his cheekes, as if the ryvers hyst :
Whoes flowing streemes ne wer no sooner whist,
But to the stars such dreadfull shoutes he sent,
As if the trone of mighty Jove should rent.
And I the while with spirites wel nye bereft,
Behold the plyght and panges that dyd him strayne,
And howe the blud his deadly colour left,
And strayt returnde with flamyng red agayne:
When sodaynly amid his ragyng payne,
He gave a sygh, and with that sygh he sayed:
O! Banaster, and strayt agayne he stayed.
Dead laye his corps as dead as any stone,
Tyll swellyng syghes stormyng within his brest
Upraysde his head, that downe ward fell anone,
With lookes upcast, and syghes that never ceast:
Furth streamde the teares, recordes of his unrest,
When he wyth shrykes thus groveling on the ground,
Ybrayed these wordes with shryll and doleful sound.
Heaven and earth, and ye eternal lampes
That in the heavens wrapt, wyl us to rest,
Thou bryght Phebe, that clearest the nightes dampes,
Witnes the playntes that in these panges opprest
I woful wretche unlade out of my brest.
And let me yeald my last wordes ere I part,
You, you, I call to record of my smart.
And thou, Alecto, feede me wyth thy foode,
Let fal thy serpentes from thy snaky heare,
For such relyefe wel fittes me in this moode,
To feede my playnt with horror and wyth feare,
While rage afreshe thy venomd worme arear.
And thou Sibilla, when thou seest me faynte,
Addres thy selfe the gyde of my complaynt.
And thou, O Jove, that with thy depe fordoome
Dost rule the earth, and raygne above the skyes,
That wrekest wronges, and gevest the dreadful doome
Agaynst the wretche that doth thy trone despyse,
Receyve these wurdes, and wreake them in such wyse,
As heaven and earth may witnesse and beholde,
Thy heapes of wrath upon this wretche unfolde.
Thou, Banaster, gaynst thee I clepe and call
Unto the gods, that they just vengeaunce take
On thee, thy bloud, thy stayned stocke and all :
O Jove, to thee, above the rest I make
My humble playnt, guyde me that what I speake
May be thy wyll upon thys wretche to fall, On thee, Banaster, wretche of wretches all.
O would to God, that cruel dismal daye,
That gave me lyght fyrst to behold thy face,
With fowle eclipse had reft my syght away:
The unhappy hower, the tyme, and eke the place,
The sunne and moone, the sters, and all that was
In theyr aspectes helping in ought to thee,
The earth, and ayer, and all accursed bee,
And thou, caytief, that like a monstar swarved,
From kynde and kyndenes, hast thy mayster lorne,
Whom neyther truth, nor trust wherein thou served,
Ne his desertes, could move, nor thy fayth sworne
Howe shal I curse, but wysh that thou unborne
Had bene, or that the earth had rent in twaye,
And swallowed thee in cradle as thou laye.
To this did I even from thy tender youth
Witsave to bring thee up: dyd I therefore
Beleve the oath of thy undoubted trouth?
Advaunce thee up, and trust thee evermore?
By trusting thee that I should dye therefore?
O wretche, and wurse than wretche, what shal I say,
But cleap and curse gaynst thee and thyne for aye?
Hated be thou, disdaynd of every wyght,
And poynted at where ever that thou goe,
A trayterous wretche, unwurthy of the light,
Be thou estemed: and to encrease thy woe,
The sound be hatefull of thy name also:
And in this sort with shame and sharpe reproche,
Leade thou thy life till greater grief approch.
Dole and despayer, let those be thy delight,
Wrapped in woes that can not be unfolde,
To wayle the day, and wepe the weary night,
With rayny iyen and syghes can not be tolde,
And let no wyght thy woe seeke to withholde :
But coumpt thee wurthy (wretche) of sorrowes store,
That suffryng much, oughtest still to suffer more.
Deserve thou death, yea be thou demed to dye
A shamefull death, to ende thy shamefull lyfe :
A syght longed for, joyfull to everye iye,
Whan thou shalt be arraygned as a thief,
Standing at bar, and pleading for thy lyef,
With trembling toung in dread and dolors rage,
Lade with white lockes, and fowerskore yeres of age.
Yet shall not death delyver thee so soone
Out of thy woes, so happye shalt thou not bee:
But to the eternal Jove this is my boone,
That thou may live thine eldest sonne to see
Reft of his wits, and in a fowle bores stye
To ende his dayes in rage and death distrest,
A wurthy tumbe where one of thyne should rest.
And after this, yet pray I more, thou may
Thy second sonne see drowned in a dyke,
And in such sorte to close his latter daye,
As heard or seen earst hath not bene the lyke:
Ystrangled in a puddle not so deepe
As halfe a foote, that such hard losse of lyfe,
So cruelly chaunst, may be thy greater gryefe.
And not yet shall thy hugie sorrowes cease; Jove shal not so withholde his wrath fro thee,
But that thy plagues may more and more increas,
Thou shalt still lyve, that thou thy selfe mayst see
Thy deare doughter stroken with leprosye:
That she that earst was all thy hole delyght,
Thou now mayst loath to have her cum in sight.
And after that, let shame and sorrowes gryefe.
Feede furth thy yeares continually in wo,
That thou mayst live in death, and dye in lyef,
And in this sorte forewayld and wearyed so,
At length thy ghost to parte thy body fro
This pray I Jove, and wyth this latter breath,
Vengeaunce I aske upon my cruell death.
This sayd, he floung his retchles armes abrode,
And groveling flat upon the ground he lay,
Which with his teeth he al to gnasht and gnawed:
Depe groanes he set, as he that would awaye.
But loe in vayne he dyd the death assay:
Although I thinke was never man that knewe,
Such deadly paynes where death dyd not ensewe.
So strove he thus a while as with the death,
Nowe pale as lead, and colde as any stone.
Nowe styl as calme, nowe storming forth a breath
Of smoaky syghes, as breath and al were gone :
But every thing hath ende: so he anone
Came to him selfe, when wyth a sygh outbrayed,
With woful cheare these woful wurdes he sayd.
Ah where am I, what thing, or whence is this? Who reft my wyts? or howe do I thus lye? My lims do quake, my thought agasted is, Why syghe I so? or whereunto do I
Thus grovel on the ground: and by and by Upraysde he stoode, and with a sygh hath stayed, When to him selfe returned, thus he sayed.
Suffiseth nowe this playnt and this regrete,
Whereof my hart his bottome hath unfraught:
And of my death let pieres and princes wete
The wolves untrust, that they thereby be taught.
And in her wealth, sith that such chaunge is wrought,
Hope not to much, but in the myds of all Thinke on my death, and what may them befall.
So long as fortune would permyt the same,
I lyved in rule and ryches wyth the best :
And past my time in honour and in fame;
That of mishap no feare was in my brest;
But false fortune whan I suspected least,
Dyd turne the wheele, and wyth a dolefull fall
Hath me bereft of honour, life, and all.
Loe what avayles in ryches fluds that flowes:
Though she so smylde as all the world wer his :
Even kinges and kesars Lyden fortunes throwes,
And simple sorte must bear it as it is.
Take hede by me that blithd in balefull blisse :
My rule, my riches, royall blud and all,
Whan fortune frounde, the feller made my fall.
For hard mishaps that happens unto such,
Whoes wretched state earst never fell no chaunge,
Agryve them not in any part so much,
As theyr distres to whome it is so straunge,
That all theyr lyves nay passed pleasures raunge:
Theyr sodayne wo that ay wield welth at will,
Algates their hartes more pearcingly must thrill.
For of my byrth, my blud was of the best,
Fyrst borne an Earle, than Duke by due discent :
To swinge the sway in court amonge the rest,
Dame Fortune me her rule most largely lent.
And kynd with corage so my corps had blent,
That loe on whom but me dyd she most smyle:
And whom but me lo, dyd she most begyle?
Now hast thou heard the whole of my unhap,
My chaunce, my chaunge, the cause of all my care:
In wealth and wo, how fortune dyd me wrap,
With world at will to win me to her snare.
Byd kynges, byd kesars, byd all states beware,
And tell them this from me that tryed it true:
Who reckles rules, right soone may hap to rue.
A Lesson how to confer every Abstract with his Month, and how to find out Huswifery Verses by the Pilcrow, and Champion from Woodland.
Is every Month, ere in aught be begun,
Read over that month what avails to be done;
So neither this travell may seem to be lost,
Nor thou to repent of this trifeling cost.
The figure of Abstract and Month do agree,
Which one to another relations be:
These Verses so short, without figure that stand,
Be points of themselves, to be taken in hand.
In Husbandry matters, where Pilcrow ye find,
That Verse appertaineth to Huswif'ry kind;
So have ye more lessons, if there ye look well,
Than Huswifery Book doth utter or tell.
Of Champion Husbandry now do I write,
Which heretofore never this book did recite;
With lessons approved, by practise and skill,
To profit the ignorant, buy it that will.
The Champion differs from Severall much,
For want of partition, closier, and such:
One name to them both do I give now and than,
For Champion country, and Champion man.
¶ The Author's Epistle to the late Lord William Paget, wherein he doth discourse of his own bringing up, and of the goodness of the said Lord his Master unto him, and the occasion of this his Book, thus set forth of his own long Practise.
TIME tries the troth in every thing; Herewith let men content their mind, Of works which best may profit bring, Most rash to judge, most often blind. As therefore troth in time shall crave, So let this book just favor have.
Take you, my Lord and Master, than Unless mischance mischanceth me, Such homely gift of me your man, Since more in court I may not be. And let your praise won heretofore, Remain abroad for evermore.
My serving you, thus understand,
And God his help, and yours withall,
Did cause good luck to take mine hand,
Erecting one, most like to fall.
My serving you, I know it was, Enforced this to come to pass.
Since being once at Cambridge taught,
Of court, ten years, I made assay;
No musick then was left unsaught,
Such care I had to serve that way,
When joy 'gan slake, then made I change,
Expelled mirth for musick strange.
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