TO THE

RIGHT HONORABLE HENRY WRIOTHESLY,

EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON, AND BARON OF TITCHFIELD.

RIGHT HONORable,

I KNOW not how I shall offend in dedicating my unpolished lines to your Lordship, nor how the world will censure me for choosing so strong a prop to support so weak a burthen only if your honor seem but pleased, I account myself highly praised, and vow to take advantage of all idle hours till I have honored you with some graver labor. But if the first heir of my invention prove deformed, I shall be sorry it had so noble a godfather, and never after ear1 so barren a land, for fear it yield me still so bad a harvest. I leave it to your honorable survey, and your honor to your heart's content; which I wish may always answer your own wish, and the world's hopeful expectation.

Your Honor's in all duty,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

1 Ear, plough.

Ilonor. As a duke is now styled "your grace," so "your honor formerly the usual mode of address to noblemen in general.

VENUS AND ADONIS.

EVEN as the sun with purple-colored face
Had ta'en his last leave of the weeping morn,
Rose-cheeked Adonis1 hied him to the chase;
Hunting he loved, but love he laughed to scorn;
Sick-thoughted Venus makes amain unto him,
And like a bold-faced suitor, 'gins to woo him.

"Thrice fairer than myself," thus she began,
"The field's chief flower, sweet above compare,
Stain to all nymphs, more lovely than a man,
More white and red than doves or roses are;
Nature that made thee, with herself at strife,
Saith that the world hath ending with thy life.

1 The poem of "Hero and Leander," although Marlowe's por tion of it was not published till 1598, was probably well known in the poetical circles. The following lines are in the first sestyad:

"The men of wealthy Sestos every year,

For his sake whom their goddess held so dear,
Rose-cheeked Adonis, kept a solemn feast."