Sheets of Raynes[265], long, large, and wide,
And dyvers devyses of clothes chaynged oft;
Or vicious chapleyns walking by my syde,
Voyde of all vertue, fullfilled with pryde,
Which bathe caused me, by report of suche fame,
For ther myslyvyng to have an yll name.
This is my last complaynt, I can say you no more,
But farewell my servant that faythefull hathe be;
Note well these words, quod he, I pray the therfore,
And wright them thus playn, as I have told them the,
All which is trewe, thou knowest well, parde;
Thou faylledst me not, untill that I dyed,
And now I must depart, I maye no longer byde!
SPECIMEN
OF
AN EPITAPHE ON QUENE MARIE.
BY GEORGE CAVENDISH:
CONSISTING OF FIFTEEN STANZAS.
Discend from hevyn, O Muse Melpomene,
Thou mournfull goddesse, with thy sisters all,
Passe in your playnts the wofull Niobe,
Tome musyke to mone with teeres eternall,
Blake be your habetts, dyme, and funeral;
For deathe bathe bereft, to our great dolour,
Mary our mastres, our quene of honor.
Our quene of honor, compared aptly
To VERITAS VICTRIX, daughter of Tyme,
By God assisted, amased in armye,
When she a virgin cleare, without cryme,
By ryght, without might, did happely clyme
To the stage royal, just inheritor,
Proclaymed Mary our quene of honor.
TH'AUCTOR TO HIS BOOKE.
Crepe forthe, my boke, under the proteccion
Of suche as have bothe learnyng and eloquence;
Humbly submyttyng the to the correccion
Of worthy writers of virtuous excellence,
Besechyng all them, of ther benygn pacience
To take the meanyng, however the matter frame,
Of this thyn auctor, abasshed of his name.
For, first of all, whan I do behold
Of famous writers the goodly circumstance,
My quaking hand my penne unnethe can hold,
So dombe I ame of doctryn, lame of experience,
Stakeryng in style, onsavery of sentence,
Save oonly hope, that saithe withouten fayll,
That my well meanyng shall quytt my travayll.
Thus, not presumyng of learnyng ne eloquence,
Hope made me shove the boote from the shore;
Desyryng no thyng for my fare or expence,
But only good wyll; I aske no more:
And for[266] the hurt of envy that myght rore,
I shall set my shrowd[267] for my defence,
Under the mantell of well wyllyng audyence.
And principally this my work for to assist,
I humbly beseche that Lord that is eternall
To defend my penne that wrott this with my fist,
To be my savegard, my staffe, and my wall;
And consequently for feare least I shold fall
In the daynger of the learned[268] and honorable sort,
I pray them all my lamenes to support.
Least perchaunce the pleasaunt floode do faylle
Of witty writing or sugred eloquence,
Followe, therfore, good wyll at the boots taylle,
Me to preserve in the waves of ignorance,
Socoured by hope and gentill sufferance:
Nowe hale uppe, skuller; God graunt me wynd,
And Jhesu defend me to my lives end.
Whan thou, my boke, comest into the prease
Bothe of the wyse and learned multitude,
To excuse thyn auctor thou canst do no lesse,
Wantyng learnyng, and of utterance rude,
Which did never this enterprise entrude;
Trustyng either of wytt or learnyng,
But for an exercise, and non other thyng.
FINIE ET COMPILÉ LE XXIIIJ JOUR DE JUNIJ
Ā REGNO[=R] PHILIPPI REX & REGINE MARIE IIIJ^{TO}. & V^{TO}.[269]
PER LE AUCTOR G. C.
_Novus Rex, nova Lex: Nova sola Regina, probz pene ruina._
FINIS.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY THOMAS DAVISON, WHITEFRIARS.
FOOTNOTES:
[246] _umber_, i. e. shade, _ombre_, Fr.
[247] _kynd_, is _nature_.
[248] _gystes_, or _gests_, are _actions_.
[249] For his _behove_, for his _behoof_ or _advantage_.
[250] To put in _ure_, i. e. to put in _use_. Thus in Ferrex and
Porrex, by Sackville:
And wisdome willed me without protract
In speedie wise to put the same in _ure_.
[251] _estatts_, i. e. nobles, persons of rank or great estate.
[252] This word was used by our ancestors to signify any thing _greasy_
or _filthy_; the revolutions of language have at length confined it to
one only of its ancient acceptations, that of _obscenity_.
[253] _sely_, i. e. _simple_.
[254] _gold and byse_, is gold and _purple_.
[255] _entaylled_, i. e. carved, vide p. 300.
[256] This is no uninteresting picture of the seclusion desired by our
ancestors in the old geometric style of gardening. Of this curious
knot-garden of Wolsey the remains are still to be seen at Hampton
Court, the maze there forming part of it.
[257] _I past not of_, i. e. I cared not for.
[258] _vaylled_, availed.
[259] _rathest_, i. e. soonest.
[260] _blent_, i. e. _blind_.
[261] This is a version of the concluding passage of the Life of the
Cardinal.
[262] _wyst_, i. e. knew.
[263] for the _nons_, or _nonce_, for the _purpose_.
[264] This is _Tittenhanger_, in Hertfordshire, which Wolsey held as
Abbot of St. Albans: there was formerly a palace belonging to the
Abbots of St. Albans there.
[265] Sheets of _Raynes_. The fine linen used by our ancestors is
frequently called cloth of _Raynes_. Rennes in Brittanny was formerly
celebrated for its manufacture of fine linen. In the enumeration of the
cardinal's treasures at Hampton Court, many pieces of cloth of Raynes
are mentioned. In the Old Phrase Book, entitled Vulgaria, by W. Horman,
1519, is the following passage: "He weareth a shurte of _Raynis_ whan
curser wold serve him."
[266] "And _for_ the hurt of envy," i. e. _against_ the hurt of envy.
Envy being the _cause_ of his seeking to shrowd himself.
[267] A _shrowd_, signified a shield or buckler, and metaphorically any
kind of defence, coverture, or place of protection.
[268] ----"least I shold fall _In the daynger_ of the learned and
honorable sort."
That is, "lest I should encounter their _censure_, or fall into the
control of their severe judgment." The phrase has its origin from the
barbarous Latin _in dangerio_, and is common to Chaucer and our elder
writers as well as to Shakspeare and his cotemporaries.
[269] By this is meant the Fourth Year of the Reign of Philip, and
the Fifth of Queen Mary, answering to 1558. The Latin rhyming couplet
Cavendish appears to have added after the commencement of Elizabeth's
reign. How far from a true prophecy it proved, the long and prosperous
reign of Elizabeth may witness.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
There are many typographical irregularities present in this book.
The two most frequent are superscripted characters, indicated here with
a preceding carat (^) symbol, and macrons.
Non-UTF-8 standard macrons are indicated with a bracket and equals sign. For
example: an 'm' with a macron over it appearing in the original text is
transcribed as [=m].
Minor obvious punctuation and printer errors were repaired.
Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as
possible, including obsolete and variant spellings, inconsistent
hyphenation, and other inconsistencies.
There are many unusual characters present in this book. In the text
version, these characters are rendered using the Distributed
Proofreaders' standard (for example, [=M] for a capital M with a macron
(bar) over it).
End of Project Gutenberg's The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, by George Cavendish