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And great the fear conceived by every one,
Of Hydra's hideous form and dreadful power,
Doubting in time this monster would devour
All their best flocks, whose dainty wool consorts
Itself with scarlet in all Princes' Courts.

Not Jason, nor the adventurous youths of Greece,
Did bring from Colchos any richer fleece:
In emulation of the Grecian force,

These Worthies nine prepared a wooden horse,
And, pricked with pride of like success, devise
How they may purchase glory by this prize,
And, if they give to Hydra's head the fall,
It will remain a platform unto all

Their brave achievements, and in time to come,
Per fas aut nefas they'll erect a throne.

Clubs are turned trumps: so now the lot is cast
With fire and sword to Hydra's den they haste,
Mars in the ascendant, Sol in Cancer now,
And Lerna Lake to Pluto's Court must bow.
What though they are rebuked by thundering Jove,
'Tis neither gods or men that can remove
Their minds from making this a dismal day:
These nine will now be actors in this play,
And summon Hydra to appear anon
Before their witless combination.

But his undaunted spirit, nursed with meat
Such as the Cyclops gave their babes to eat,
Scorned their base accons, for with Cecrops' charm
He knew he could defend himself from harm

Of Minos, Eacus, and Radamand,

Princes of Limbo, who must out of hand
Consult 'bout Hydra what must now be done.
Who having sate in Counsel one by one
Return this answer to the Stygian fiends;

And first grim Minos spake, "Most loving friends,
Hydra prognosticks ruin to our state,

And that our kingdom will grow desolate;

But if one head from thence be ta'en away,
The body and the members will decay."
"To take in hand," said Eacus, "this task,
Is such as hare-brained Phaeton did ask
Of Phoebus to begird the world about,
Which, granted, put the nether lands to rout.
Presumptuous fools learn wit at too much cost,
For life and labour both at once he lost."
Stern Radamantus being last to speak,
Made a great hum, and thus did silence break:
“What if with rattling chains or iron bands
Hydra be bound either by feet or hands,
And after being lashed with smarting rods,
He be conveyed by Styx unto the gods,
To be accused on the upper ground
Of læsæ majestatis; this crime found,
'Twill be impossible from thence I trow
Hydra shall come to trouble us below."
This sentence pleased the friends exceedingly,
That up they tossed their bonnets and did cry,
"Long live our Court in great prosperity!"
The Sessions ended, some did straight devise
Court Revels, antics, and a world of joys;
Brave Christmas gambols, therewith open hall
Kept to the full, and sport the Divell and all!
Labours despised, the looms are laid away,
And this proclaimed the Stygian holiday!
In came grim Minos with his motley beard,
And brought a distillation well prepared;
And Eacus, who is as sure as text,
Came in with his preparatives the next.
Then Radamantus, last and principall,
Feasted the Worthies in his sumptuous hall.
There Charon, Cerberus, and the rout of fiends,
Had lap enough, and so their pastime ends.

THE GHYRLOND OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARIE.1

ERE are five letters in this blessed name, Which, changed, a five-fold mystery design;

The M the Myrtle, A the Almonds claim, R Rose, I Ivy, E sweet Eglantine.

These form thy ghyrlond. Whereof Myrtle Green,
The gladdest ground to all the numbered five,
Is so implexèd, and laid in between,

As Love here studied to keep Grace alive.

The second string is the sweet Almond bloom,
Upmounted high upon Selinis crest;

As it alone, and only it, had room

To knit thy crown, and glorify the rest.

The third is from the garden called the Rose,
The Eye of flowers, worthy for his scent
To top the fairest Lily now that grows,
With wonder on the thorny regiment.

The fourth is humble Ivy, intersert

But lowly laid, as on the earth asleep, Preservèd in her antique bed of Vert,

No faith's more firm, or flat, than where't doth

creep.

But that which sums all is the Eglantine,

Which, of the field, is 'cleped the sweetest brier,

1 From "The Female Glory; or, the Life and Death of our Blessed Lady, the holy Virgin Mary, God's own Immaculate Mother. London, printed by Thomas Harper, for John Waterson. 1635." I doubt much whether these stanzas are Jonson's. F. C.

Inflamed with ardour to that mystic shine
In Moses' bush, unwasted in the fire.

Thus Love, and Hope, and burning Charity,
Divinest graces, are so intermixed
With odorous sweets and soft humility,

As if they adored the Head whereon they're fixed.

THE REVERSE, ON THE BACK SIDE.

HESE Mysteries do point to three more great,

On the reverse of this your circling crown, All pouring their full share of graces down, The glorious Trinity in Union met.

Daughter, and Mother, and the Spouse of God,
Alike of kin to that most blessed Trine
Of persons, yet in Union ONE divine,
How are thy gifts and graces blazed abroad!

Most holy and pure Virgin, blessèd Maid,

Sweet Tree of life, King David's strength and

tower,

The House of gold, the Gate of heaven's power, The Morning Star, whose light our Fall hath stayed.

Great Queen of Queens, most mild, most meek, most wise,

Most venerable Cause of all our joy,

Whose cheerful look our sadness doth destroy,
And art the spotless mirror to man's eyes.

The Seat of Sapience, the most lovely Mother,
And most to be admired of thy sex,

Who mad'st us happy all in thy reflex,
By bringing forth GOD's only Son, no other.

Thou Throne of glory, beauteous as the Moon,
The rosy Morning, or the rising Sun,

Who like a Giant hastes his course to run,
Till he hath reached his two-fold point of Noon.
How are thy gifts and graces blazed abroad

Through all the lines of this circumference, T' imprint in all purged hearts this virgin sense Of being Daughter, Mother, Spouse of GOD. B. I.

COCK LORREL'S SONG.2

HEN broiled and broacht on a butcher's prick [skewer],

The kidney came in of a Holy Sister;

This bit had almost made his devilship sick, That his doctor did fear he would need a glister:

"For hark," quoth he, "how his belly rumbles!"
And then with his paw-that was a reacher-
He pulled-to a pie of a Traitor's numbles,
And the giblets of a Silent Teacher.

The jowl of a Jailor was served for a fish,

With vinegar pist by the Dean of Dunstable,

Two Aldermen lobsters asleep in a dish,

With a dried Deputye, and a sousèd Constable.

These got him so fierce a stomach again

That now he wants meat whereon to feed-a; He called for the victuals were dressed for his train, And they brought him up an Olla podrida,

2 In the recently published volume of Loose and Humorous Songs, from Bishop Percy's folio MS., is a version of the Cocklorrel Song in the Gipsies Metamorphosed, which contains a multitude of various readings, and the above six stanzas, which take the place of the single one, commencing "The jowl of a jailor served for a fish," at vol. vii. p. 394. F. C.

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