Earl of Leicester,
that Sidney wrote his masque the "Lady of the May" in honour of Queen
Elizabeth's visit in 1578. "Was Raleigh retired there," writes Mr. W.
J. Linton (_Rare Poems_, p. 257), "during some season of her
displeasure? There is a look of him about this song, not unlike the
lines to Cynthia; and what mistress but Majesty should appoint his place
of retirement?

'Wanstead, my Mistress saith this is the doom.'"

The two lines that close each stanza are from a song in Sidney's
"Arcadia."

_Page_ 37. "Who, known to all, unknown to himself dies." From Seneca's
"Thyestes:"--

"qui notus nimis omnibus
Ignotus moritur sibi."

_Page_ 39. "How many things."--I have given four of John Maynard's
"Twelve Wonders of the World" (cf. pp. 44-5, 69); and, if I am not
mistaken, the reader will like to see the remaining eight. There is much
freshness and piquancy in these quaint old rhymes, which were written by
no less a poet than Sir John Davies.

"THE DIVINE.

My calling is Divine,
And I from God am sent;
I will no chop-church be,
Nor pay my patron rent,

Nor yield to sacrilege;
But like the kind true mother,
Rather will lose all the child
Than part it with another.

Much wealth I will not seek,
Nor worldly masters serve,
So to grow rich and fat
While my poor flock doth starve.

THE SOLDIER.

My occupation is
The noble trade of kings
The trial that decides
The highest right of things.

Though Mars my master be,
I do not Venus love,
Nor honour Bacchus oft,
Nor often swear by Jove.

Of speaking of myself
I all occasion shun,
And rather love to do,
Than boast what I have done.

THE LAWYER.

The law my calling is;
My robe, my tongue, my pen
Wealth and opinion gain
And make me judge of men.

The known dishonest cause,
I never did defend
Nor spun out suits in length,
But wish'd and sought an end;

Nor counsel did bewray,
Nor of both parties take,
Nor ever took I fee
For which I never spake.

THE PHYSICIAN.

I study to uphold
The slippery state of man,
Who dies when we have done
The best and all we can.

From practice and from books
I draw my learned skill,
Not from the known receipt
Or 'pothecary's bill.

The earth my faults doth hide,