"When your fat dishes smoke hote vpon your table,
Then layde ye songes and balades magnifie,
If they be mery, or written craftely,
Ye clappe your handes and to the making harke,
And one say to other, lo here a proper warke."
He says that minstrels and singers are highly favoured at court, especially
those of the French gise. Also jugglers and pipers.
The personal references throughout the Eclogues, in addition to those
already mentioned, though not numerous, are of considerable interest. The
learned Alcock, Bishop of Ely (1486-1500), and the munificent founder of
Jesus College, Cambridge, stands deservedly high in the esteem of a poet
and priest, so zealous of good works as Barclay. The poet's humour thus
disguises him.--(Eclogue I., A iii., recto.):--
"Yes since his dayes a cocke was in the fen,
I knowe his voyce among a thousande men:
He taught, he preached, he mended euery wrong;
But, Coridon alas no good thing bideth long.
He all was a cocke, he wakened vs from slepe,
And while we slumbred, he did our foldes hepe.
No cur, no foxes, nor butchers dogges wood,
Coulde hurte our fouldes, his watching was so good.
The hungry wolues, which that time did abounde,
What time he crowed, abashed at the sounde.
This cocke was no more abashed of the foxe,
Than is a lion abashed of an oxe.
When he went, faded the floure of all the fen;
I boldly dare sweare this cocke neuer trode hen!
This was a father of thinges pastorall,
And that well sheweth his Church cathedrall,
There was I lately about the middest of May,
Coridon his Church is twenty sith more gay
Then all the Churches betwene the same and Kent,
There sawe I his tome and Chapell excellent.
I thought fiue houres but euen a little while,
Saint John the virgin me thought did on me smile,
Our parishe Church is but a dongeon,
To that gay Churche in comparison.
If the people were as pleasaunt as the place
Then were it paradice of pleasour and solace,
Then might I truely right well finde in my heart.
There still to abide and neuer to departe,
But since that this cocke by death hath left his song,
Trust me Coridon there many a thing is wrong,
When I sawe his figure lye in the Chapell-side,
Like death for weping I might no longer bide.
Lo all good thinges so sone away doth glide,
That no man liketh to long doth rest and abide.
When the good is gone (my mate this is the case)
Seldome the better reentreth in the place."
The excellence of his subject carries the poet quite beyond himself in
describing the general lamentation at the death of this worthy prelate;
with an unusual power of imagination he thus pictures the sympathy of the
towers, arches, vaults and images of Ely monastery:
"My harte sore mourneth when I must specify
Of the gentle cocke whiche sange so mirily,
He and his flocke wer like an union
Conioyned in one without discention,
All the fayre cockes which in his dayes crewe
When death him touched did his departing rewe.
The pretie palace by him made in the fen,
The maides, widowes, the wiues, and the men,
With deadly dolour were pearsed to the heart,
When death constrayned this shepheard to departe.
Corne, grasse, and fieldes, mourned for wo and payne,
For oft his prayer for them obtayned rayne.
The pleasaunt floures for wo faded eche one,
When they perceyued this shepheard dead and gone,
The okes, elmes, and euery sorte of dere
Shronke vnder shadowes, abating all their chere.
The mightie walles of Ely Monastery,
The stones, rockes, and towres semblably,
The marble pillers and images echeone,
Swet all for sorowe, when this good cocke was gone,
Though he of stature were humble, weake and leane,
His minde was hye, his liuing pure and cleane,
Where other feedeth by beastly appetite,
On heauenly foode was all his whole delite."
Morton, Alcock's predecessor and afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury
(1486-1500), is also singled out for compliment, in which allusion is made
to his troubles, his servants' faithfulness, and his restoration to favour
under Richard III. and Henry VII. (Eclogue III.):--
"And shepheard Morton, when he durst not appeare,
Howe his olde seruauntes were carefull of his chere;
In payne and pleasour they kept fidelitie
Till grace agayne gaue him aucthoritie
Then his olde fauour did them agayne restore
To greater pleasour then they had payne before.
Though for a season this shepheard bode a blast,
The greatest winde yet slaketh at the last,
And at conclusion he and his flocke certayne
Eche true to other did quietly remayne."