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XII

Crabbed age and youth cannot live together :
Youth is full of pleasance, age is full of care;
Youth like summer morn, age like winter weather;
Youth like summer brave, age like winter bare.
Youth is full of sport, age's breath is short;

Youth is nimble, age is lame;

Youth is hot and bold, age is weak and cold;
Youth is wild, and age is tame.

Age, I do abhor thee; youth, I do adore thee;
O, my love, my love is young!

Age, I do defy thee: O, sweet shepherd, hie thee,
For methinks thou stay'st too long.

5

10

XIII

Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good;
A shining gloss that vadeth suddenly;
A flower that dies when first it 'gins to bud;
A brittle glass that's broken presently:

A doubtful good, a gloss, a glass, a flower,
Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour.

And as goods lost are seld or never found,
As vaded gloss no rubbing will refresh,
As flowers dead lie wither'd on the ground,
As broken glass no cement can redress,

So beauty blemish'd once's for ever lost,
In spite of physic, painting, pain and cost.

5

IO

XIV

Good night, good rest.

Ah, neither be my

She bade good night that kept my rest away;
And daff'd me to a cabin hang'd with care,
To descant on the doubts of my decay.

share :

'Farewell,' quoth she, and come again to-morrow : Fare well I could not, for I supp'd with sorrow.

Yet at my parting sweetly did she smile,
In scorn or friendship, nill I construe whether:
'T may be, she joy'd to jest at my exile,
"T may be, again to make me wander thither :

Wander,' a word for shadows like myself,
As take the pain, but cannot pluck the pelf.

6

IO

XV

Lord, how mine eyes throw gazes to the east!
My heart doth charge the watch; the morning rise
Doth cite each moving sense from idle rest.

Not daring trust the office of mine

eyes,
While Philomela sits and sings, I sit and mark,
And wish her lays were tuned like the lark;
For she doth welcome daylight with her ditty,
And drives away dark dreaming night;
The night so pack'd, I post unto my pretty;
Heart hath his hope and eyes their wished sight;

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Sorrow changed to solace and solace mix'd with sorrow; For why, she sigh'd, and bade me come to-morrow. Were I with her, the night would post too soon; But now are minutes added to the hours;

To spite me now, each minute seems a moon;
Yet not for me, shine sun to succour flowers!

15

Pack night, peep day; good day, of night now borrow;
Short, night, to-night, and length thyself to-morrow.

XVI

It was a lording's daughter, the fairest one of three,
That liked of her master as well as well might be,
Till looking on an Englishman, the fair'st that eye could see,
Her fancy fell a-turning.

Long was the combat doubtful that love with love did fight,
To leave the master loveless, or kill the gallant knight: 6
To put in practice either, alas, it was a spite

Unto the silly damsel!

But one must be refused; more mickle was the pain That nothing could be used to turn them both to gain, 10 For of the two the trusty knight was wounded with disdain : Alas, she could not help it!

Thus art with arms contending was victor of the day, Which by a gift of learning did bear the maid away: Then, lullaby, the learned man hath got the lady gay; 15 For now my song is ended.

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