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WHen that I poore soule was borne,
I was borne vnfortunate:
Presently the Fates had sworne
To foretell my haplesse state.
Titan his faire beames did hide,
Phoebe ‘clips’d her siluer light,
In my birth my mother dide,
Yong, and faire in heauie plight.
And the nurse, that gaue me sucke,
Haplesse was in all her life:
And I neuer had good lucke
Being maide or married wife.
I lou’d well, and was belou’d,
And forgetting, was forgot:
This a haplesse marriage mou’d,
Greeuing that it kils me not.
With the earth would I were wed,
Then in such a graue of woes
Daily to be buried,
Which no end nor number knowes.
Yong my father married me,
Forc’t by my obedience:
Syrenus, thy faith, and thee
I forgot, without offence.
Which contempt I pay so far,
Neuer like was paide so much:
Iealousies doe make me war,
But without a cause of such.
I doe goe with iealous eies
To my foldes, and to my sheepe,
And with iealousie I rise,
When the day begins to peepe.
At his table I doe eate,
In his bed with him I lie,
But I take no rest, nor meate,
Without cruell iealousie.
If I aske him what he ailes,
And whereof he iealous is?
In his answere then he failes:
Nothing can he say to this.
In his face there is no cheere,
But he euer hangs the head:
In each corner he doth peere,
And his speech is sad and dead.
Ill the poore soule liues ywisse,
That so hardly married is.
The time was once, when Dianas teares and dolefull song and the sorrow, that by her sadde lookes she expressed, might haue so much mooued Syrenus hart, as put the Shepherdes life in such danger, that all other remedies (but onely proceeding from the same) had beene impossible to haue helpt it; whose eies and hart, since now they were deliuered out of that dangerous prison, tooke no delight to beholde Dia∣na, nor greeued at her sorrowfull lamentations. And the Shepherd Syluanus had lesse cause in his minde to be condolent for any greefe that Diana had, considering she neuer had the smallest regard of the greatest woes which he passed for her sake. Onely Seluagia helped her with her teares, fearefull (by the fall of her ioy) of her own fortune, whereupon she said to Syrenus. There is no perfection, beautie, nor fauour, in natures gift, which she hath not liberally bestowed on Diana, bicause her beautie is peerelesse, her wit and discretion admired, her good graces excellent, and all other her commendable parts, which a Shepherdesse should haue, not to be secon∣ded: since in the lest of them, that made her such a woonder in our age, there was neuer any yet that excelled her. Onlie one thing she wanted, which I euer suspec∣ted and feared, and this was her good Fortune, which woulde neuer accompanie her, to haue made her liue a contented and ioyfull life, which (to speake the truth)
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