in;
To sin our feet are wash'd with milk of roes
And dried again with coals of lightning.
O Lord, thou see'st the proudest sin's poor slave,
And with his bridle pull'st him to the grave!
For my sake, then, spare lovely Absalon.

* * * * *

Thomas Nash assisted Marlowe in _The Tragedy of Dido_, but _Summer's
Last Will and Testament_ (1592) is the only example of his independent
dramatic work preserved for us. ''Tis no play neither, but a show', says
one of its characters in describing it; and the same person, continuing,
supplies this brief summary to its contents: 'Forsooth, because the
plague reigns in most places in this latter end of summer, Summer must
come in sick; he must call his officers to account, yield his throne to
Autumn, make Winter his executor, with tittle-tattle Tom-boy.' The
officers thus called to account are Ver, Solstitium, Sol, Orion, Harvest
and Bacchus. Each enters in appropriate guise, with a train of
attendants singing or dancing. Thus we have such stage-directions as,
'Enter Ver, with his train, overlaid with suits of green moss,
representing short grass, singing': 'Enter Harvest, with a scythe on his
neck, and all his reapers with sickles, and a great black bowl with a
posset in it, borne before him: they come in singing': 'Enter Bacchus,
riding upon an ass trapped in ivy, himself dressed in vine leaves, and
a garland of grapes on his head; his companions having all jacks in
their hands, and ivy garlands on their heads; they come singing.'
Several of the songs have the true ring of country choruses; probably
they were such, borrowed quite frankly by the dramatist, who would
expect his audience to be familiar with them and even possibly to join
in the singing. Such a one is this harvesting song--

Merry, merry, merry; cheery, cheery, cheery;
Trowl the black bowl to me;
Hey derry, derry, with a poup and a lerry,
I'll trowl it again to thee.
Hooky, hooky, we have shorn,
And we have bound,
And we have brought Harvest
Home to town.

Others again are more restrained, though almost all have a certain
charming artlessness about them. A verse may be quoted from the Spring
Song.

The palm and may make country houses gay,
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day,
And hear we aye birds tune this merry lay,
Cuckow, jug, jug, pu-we, to-wit, to-whoo.

Regarded as a