before death
stops our breath;
other joyes
are but toyes
and to be lamented.

_Viat._ Well sung, Master; this dayes fortune and pleasure, and this
nights company and Song, do all make me more and more in love with
_Angling._ Gentlemen, my Master left me alone for an hour this day, and
I verily believe he retir'd himself from talking with me, that he might
be so perfect in this Song; was it not Master?

_Pisc._ Yes indeed, for it is many yeers since I learn'd it, and having
forgotten a part of it, I was forced to patch it up by the help of my
own invention, who am not excellent at Poetry, as my part of the Song
may testifie: But of that I will say no more, least you should think I
mean by discommending it, to beg your commendations of it. And
therefore without replications, lets hear your Ketch, Scholer, which I
hope will be a good one, for you are both Musical, and have a good
fancie to boot.

_Viat._ Marry, and that you shall, and as freely as I would have my
honest Master tel me some more secrets of fish and fishing as we walk
and fish towards _London_ to morrow. But Master, first let me tell you,
that that very hour which you were absent from me, I sate down under a
Willow tree by the water side, and considered what you had told me of
the owner of that pleasant Meadow in which you then left me, that he
had a plentiful estate, and not a heart to think so; that he had at
this time many Law Suites depending, and that they both damp'd his
mirth and took up so much of his time and thoughts, that he himselfe
had not leisure to take the sweet content that I, who pretended no
title, took in his fields; for I could there sit quietly, and looking
on the water, see fishes leaping at Flies of several shapes and
colours; looking on the Hils, could behold them spotted with Woods and
Groves; looking down the Meadows, could see here a Boy gathering
_Lillies_ and _Lady-smocks_, and there a Girle cropping _Culverkeys_
and _Cowslips_, all to make Garlands sutable to this pleasant Month of
_May_; these and many other Field-flowers so perfum'd the air, that I
thought this Meadow like the field in _Sicily_ (of which _Diodorus_
speaks) where the perfumes arising from the place, makes all dogs that
hunt in it, to fall off, and to lose their hottest sent. I say, as I
thus sate joying in mine own happy condition, and pittying that rich
mans that ought this, and many other pleasant Groves and Meadows about
me,