How many long hours have I told

Since first my love was vowed to you! And yet, alas! she doth not know Whether her servant love or no.

How many walls as white as snow,
And windows clear as any glass,
Have I conjured to tell you so,

Which faithfully performed was!
And yet you'll swear you do not know
Whether your servant love or no.

How often hath my pale lean face,
With true characters of my love,
Petitioned to you for grace,

Whom neither sighs nor tears can move! O cruel, yet do you not know

Whether your servant love or no?

And wanting oft a better token,

I have been fain to send my heart, Which now your cold disdain hath broken, Nor can you heal 't by any art :

O look upon 't, and you shall know Whether your servant love or no.-Anon.

LXXXIV.

TO SLEEP.

COME, sleep, and with thy sweet deceiving,

Lock me in delight awhile;

Let some pleasing dreams beguile
All my fancies; that from thence,

I may feel an influence,

All my powers of care bereaving!

Though but a shadow, but a sliding,
Let me know some little joy!
We that suffer long annoy
Are contented with a thought,
Through an idle fancy wrought:
Oh! let my joys have some abiding.

Beaumont and Fletcher.

LXXXV.

HIS EPITAPH.

ONLY a little more

I have to write,

Then I'll give o'er,

And bid the world good-night.

Behold this living stone,

I rear for me,

Ne'er to be thrown

Down, envious Time, by thee.

Pillars let some set up,

If so they please,

Here is my hope

And my Pyramides.

Robert Herrick.

LXXXVI.

TO BLOSSOMS.

FAIR pledges of a fruitful tree,

Why do ye fall so fast?

Your date is not so past,

But you may stay yet here awhile
To blush and gently smile;
And go at last.

What, were ye born to be

An hour or half's delight;

And so to bid good-night?

Twas pity Nature brought ye forth
Merely to show your worth,
And lose you quite.

But you are lovely leaves, where we
May read how soon things have
Their end, though ne'er so brave :
And after they have shown their pride
Like you, awhile, they glide

Into the grave.-Robert Herrick.

LXXXVII.

AN ODE FOR BEN JONSON.

AH, Ben!

Say how or when

Shall we thy guests
Meet at those lyric feasts
Made at the Sun,

The Dog, the Triple Tun,
Where we such clusters had

As made us nobly wild, not mad?
And yet each verse of thine
Outdid the meat, outdid the frolic wine.
My Ben!

Or come agen,

Or send to us

Thy wit's great overplus;

But teach us yet

Wisely to husband it,

Lest we that talent spend ;

And having once brought to an end

That precious stock,-the store

Of such a wit the world should have no more.

Robert Herrick.

LXXXVIII.

AN AWAKENING SONG.

SISTER, awake! close not your eyes!
The day her light discloses,

And the bright morning doth arise
Out of her bed of roses.

See, the clear sun, the world's bright eye,

In at our window peeping :

Lo! how he blusheth to espy

Us idle wenches sleeping.

Therefore, awake! make haste, I say,

And let us, without staying,

All in our gowns of green so gay
Into the park a-maying.—Anon.

LXXXIX.

FROM "THE TWO NOBLE

KINSMEN."

ROSES, their sharp spines being gone,
Not royal in their smells alone,
But in their hue;
Maiden-pinks, of odour faint,
Daisies smell-less yet most quaint,
And sweet thyme true;

Primrose, first-born child of Ver,
Merry spring-time's harbinger,
With her bells dim;

Oxlips in their cradles growing,
Marigolds on death-beds blowing,
Larks'-heels trim.

All, dear Nature's children sweet,
Lie 'fore bride and bridegroom's feet,
Blessing their sense!

Not an angel of the air,

Bird melodious or bird fair,

Be absent hence!

The crow, the slanderous cuckoo, nor
The boding raven, nor chough hoar,
Nor chattering pie,

May on our bride-house perch or sing,
Or with them any discord bring,

But from it fly!-John Fletcher.

XC.

THE BROWN OWL.

SWEET Suffolk owl, so trimly dight

With feathers like a lady bright,