flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields;
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy's spring: but sorrow's fall.

Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy bed of roses,
Thy cup, thy kirtle, and thy posies,
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten;--
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.

The belt of straw and ivy-buds,
Thy coral clasps and amber studs,--
All these in me no means can move,
To come to thee, and be thy love.

What should we talk of dainties, then,
Of better meat than's fit for men?
These are but vain: that's only good
Which God hath bless'd and sent for food.

But could youth last, and love still breed;
Had joys no date, nor age no need;
Then those delights my mind might move,
To live with thee, and be thy love.

Sir Walter Raleigh.

[See "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love," page 50.]

LOVE FOR LOVE.

Away with these self-loving lads
Whom Cupid's arrow never glads!
Away, poor souls, that sigh and weep,
In love of them that lie and sleep!
For Cupid is a merry god,
And forceth none to kiss the rod.

Sweet Cupid's shafts, like Destiny,
Do causeless good or ill decree;
Desert is borne out of his bow,
Reward upon his wing doth go:
What fools are they that have not known
That Love likes no laws but his own!

My songs, they be of Cynthia's praise:
I wear her rings on holy days;
On every tree I write her name,
And every day I read the same:
Where Honour Cupid's rival is,
There miracles are seen of his.

If Cynthia crave her ring of me,
I blot her name out of the tree;
If doubt do darken things held dear,
Then "farewell nothing," once a year:
For many run, but one must win;
Fools only hedge the cuckoo in.

The worth that worthiness should move
Is love, which is the due of love;
And love as well the shepherd can
As can the mighty nobleman:--
Sweet nymph, 'tis true, you worthy be;
Yet, without love, nought worth to me.

Fulke-Greville, Lord Brooke.

CUPID AND MY CAMPASPE: APELLES' SONG.

Cupid and my Campaspe played
At cards for kisses: Cupid paid.
He stakes his quiver, bows and arrows,
His mother's doves and team of sparrows;
Loses them too; then down he throws
The coral of his lip, the rose
Growing on 's cheek,