| Previous Page | Next Page |
O grant me then this short content,
For forc’d I am to thee to fliie:
My sighes do not make thee relent,
Nor teares thy hart do mollifie.
Nothing of mine doth giue thee payne,
Nor thou think’st of no remedie:
Mistresse how long shall I sustaine
such ill, as still thou dost applie?
In death there is no helpe, be sure,
But in thy will, where it doth lie:
For all those illes which death doth cure,
Alas, they are but light to trie:
My troubles do not trouble thee,
Nor hope to touch thy soule so nie:
O from a will that is so free,
What should I hope, when I do crie?
How can I mollifie that braue
And stonie hart, of pittie drie?
Yet Mistresse turne those eies (that haue
No peeres) shining like stars in skie:
But turne them not in angrie sort,
If thou wilt not kill me thereby:
Though yet in anger, or in sport,
Thou killest onely with thine eie.
After they had first with a concent of musicke sung this song, two plaied, the one vpon a Lute, the other vpon a siluer sounding Harpe, being accompanied with the sweete voice of my Don Felix: the great ioy that I felt in hearing him, cannot be imagined, for (me thought) I heard him nowe, as in that happie and passed time of our loues. But after the deceit of this imagination was discouered, seeing with mine eies, and hearing with mine eares, that this musicke was bestowed vpon another and not on me, God knowes what a bitter death it was vnto my soule: And with a gree∣uous sigh, that caried almost my life away with it, I asked mine host, if he knew what the Ladie was, for whose sake the musick was made? He answered me, that he could not imagine on whom it was bestowed, bicause in that streete dwelled manie noble and faire Ladies. And when I saw he could not satisfie my request, I bent mine eares againe to heare my Don Felix, who now to the tune of a delicate harpe whereon he sweetely plaied, began to sing this Sonnet following.
A Sonnet.
MY painefull yeeres impartiall Loue was spending
In vaine and booteles hopes my life appaying,
And cruell Fortune to the world bewraying
Strange samples of my teares that haue no ending.
Time euerie thing to truth at last commending,
Leaues of my steps such markes, that now betraying
And all deceitfull trusts shall be decaying,
And none haue cause to plaine of his offending.
Shee, whom I lou’d to my obliged power,
That in her sweetest loue to me discouers
Which neuer yet I knew (those heauenly pleasures,)
And I do saie, exclaiming euery hower,
Do not you see, what makes you wise, O Louers?
Loue, Fortune, Time, and my faire Mystresse treasures.
The Sonnet being ended, they paused a while, playing on fower Lutes togither, and on a paire of Virginals, with such heauenly melodie, that the whole worlde
| Previous Page | Next Page |