extent indebted to Radcliffe's production. The story, however, was well-known, and existed in other shapes; Chaucer having long before rendered it familiar to English readers in the Canterbury Tales. The date of the receipt in Henslowe's Diary-19 December, 1599-determines the date of the play from which the following songs are derived.]

THE PLEASANT COMEDY OF PATIENT GRISSELL.

SWEET CONTENT.

ART thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers?

Oh, sweet content!

Art thou rich, yet is thy mind perplexed?
Oh, punishment!

Dost thou laugh to see how fools are vexed
To add to golden numbers, golden numbers?
O, sweet content! O, sweet, &c.

Work apace, apace, apace, apace;
Honest labour bears a lovely face;

Then hey noney, noney, hey noney, noney.

Canst drink the waters of the crispèd spring?
O, sweet content!

Swimmest thou in wealth, yet sinkest in thine

O, punishment!

[own tears? Then he that patiently want's burden bears,

No burden bears, but is a king, a king!

O, sweet content! &c.

LULLABY.

Work apace, apace, &c.

OLDEN slumbers kiss your eyes,
Smiles awake you when you rise.
Sleep, pretty wantons; do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby:
Rock them, rock them, lullaby.

ВЕ

Care is heavy, therefore sleep you;
You are care, and care must keep you.
Sleep, pretty wantons; do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby:

Rock them, rock them, lullaby.

BEAUTY, ARISE!

EAUTY, arise, shew forth thy glorious shining;
Thine eyes feed love, for them he standeth pining

Honour and youth attend to do their duty

To thee, their only sovereign beauty.

Beauty, arise, whilst we, thy servants, sing,
Io to Hymen, wedlock's jocund king.

Io to Hymen, Io, Io, sing,

Of wedlock, love, and youth, is Hymen king.

Beauty, arise, thy glorious lights display,
Whilst we sing Io, glad to see this day.
Io, Io, to Hymen, Io, Io, sing,

Of wedlock, love, and youth, is Hymen king.

JOHN WEBSTER.

[IN passionate energy and intensity of expression Webster resembles Marston and transcends him. He had a profounder dramatic power, and possessed a command over the sources of terror which none of our dramatists have exhibited so effectively. To move a terror skilfully,' observes Lamb, 'to touch a soul to the quick, to lay upon fear as much as it can bear, to wear and weary a life till it is ready to drop, and then step in with mortal instruments to take its last forfeit: this only a Webster can do. Writers of an inferior genius may 'upon horror's head horrors accumulate,' but they cannot do this. They mistake quantity for quality, they terrify babies with painted devils,' but they know not how a soul is capable of being moved; their terrors want dignity, their affright

ments are without decorum.' This criticism refers specially to the Duchess of Malfy, but indicates generally that peculiar quality of Webster's genius which chiefly distinguishes him from his contemporaries.

The earliest notice of Webster occurs in 1602. He is said to have been clerk of St. Andrew's, Holborn, and a member of the Merchants Tailors' Company; but Mr. Dyce could not discover any trace of his name, although he searched the registers of the church, and the MSS. belonging to the Parish Clerk's Hall. In tracing, in his collected edition of Webster's works, the order of his productions, and examining every collateral question of authorship likely to throw any light upon his identity, Mr. Dyce has supplied all the information that can be obtained respecting him. It relates almost exclusively to his writings. His personal history is buried in obscurity.]

THE WHITE DEVIL; OR, VITTORIA COROMBONA. 1612.

A DIRGE.

CALL for the robin-redbreast and the wren,
Since o'er shady groves they hover,
And with leaves and flowers do cover
The friendless bodies of unburied men.
Call unto his funeral dole

The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole,

To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm,
And (when gay tombs are robbed) sustain no harm ;
But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men,
For with his nails he'll* dig them up again.

* 'I never saw anything like this Dirge, except the Ditty which reminds Ferdinand of his drowned Father in the Tempest. As that is of the water, watery; so this is of the earth, earthy. Both have that intenseness of feeling, which seems to resolve itself into the elements which it contemplates.'-LAMB.

THE DUCHESS OF MALFY.

1623.

THE MADMAN'S SONG.

LET us howl some heavy note,

O, some deadly dogged howl,

Sounding, as from the threatning throat
Of beasts and fatal fowl!

As ravens, screech-owls, bulls and bears,
We'll bell, and bawl our parts,

"Till irksome noise have cloyed your ears,
And corrosived your hearts.

At last, whenas our quire wants breath,
Our bodies being blessed,

We'll sing, like swans, will welcome death,
And die in love and rest.

THE PREPARATION FOR EXECUTION.

HARK, now everything is still,

The screech-owl, and the whistler shrill, Call upon our dame aloud,

And bid her quickly don her shroud!
Much you had of land and rent;
Your length in clay's now competent:
A long war disturbed your mind;
Here your perfect peace is signed.
Of what is't fools make such vain keeping?
Since their conception, their birth weeping,
Their life a general mist of error,

Their death, a hideous storm of terror.
Strew your hair with powders sweet,
Don clean linen, bathe your feet,
And (the foul fiend more to check,)
A crucifix let bless your neck:
'Tis now full tide 'tween night and day;
End your groan, and come away.

JOHN WEBSTER AND WILLIAM ROWLEY.

L

THE THRACIAN WONDER. 1661.

WOMAN'S LOVE.

OVE is a law, a discord of such force,

That 'twixt our sense and reason makes divorce; Love's a desire, that to obtain betime,

We lose an age of years plucked from our prime;
Love is a thing to which we soon consent,
As soon refuse, but sooner far repent.

Then what must women be, that are the cause
That love hath life? that lovers feel such laws?
They're like the winds upon Lepanthæ's shore,
That still are changing: O, then love no more!
A woman's love is like that Syrian flower,
That buds, and spreads, and withers in an hour.

I

LOVE MUST HAVE LOVE.

CARE not for these idle toys,

That must be wooed and prayed to;
Come, sweet love, let's use the joys
That men and women used to do.

The first man had a woman
Created for his use you know;
Then never seek so close to keep
A jewel of a price so low.

Delay in love's a lingering pain,
That never can be cured;
Unless that love have love again,
'Tis not to be endured.