LOVE.”

WHAT thing is love?—for sure love is a thing :-
Love is a prick, love is a sting, love is a pretty, pretty
thing;
Love is a fire, love is a coal,
Whose flame creeps in at every hole;
And, as myself can best devise,
His dwelling is in ladies' eyes,
From whence he shoots his dainty darts
In to the lusty gallants' hearts:
And ever since was call'd a god
That Mars with Venus play'd even and odd.

- * o - . . . TO BE SUNG AFTER DON KIN dangesos.t.)

(From a Manuscript in the Cottonian Library, Vesp. A. Kiv.)

. . . . . . f

: . A

-
It was a maid of my country, * *

As she came by the hawthorn tree,
As full of flowers as might be seen,
She marvell'd to see the tree so green.

*

t
At last she asked of this tree, #"
How came this freshness unto thee,
And every branch so fair and clean 2. !
I marvel that you grow so green. ;: o *.

. . . . so **** * Why did Ritson, who has given this, ballad among his Ancient Songs, 1790, p. 146, omit to mention that the MS. has “G. Peele” appended to it ! our poet's name is indeed written in a much more modern hand than the ballad, but it must have been there long before Ritson's day. That Peele was really the author of it, I think very doubtful. - . . . . . . ." t Donkin Dargeson] “This tune, whatever it was, appears to have been in use till after the Restoration.”—Ritson.

The tree made answer by and by,
I have good cause to grow triumphantly;
The sweetest dew that ever be seen
Doth fall on me to keep me green.

Yea, quoth the maid, but where you grow,
You stand at hand for every blow,
Of every man for to be seen,
I marvel that you grow so green.

Though many one take flowers fro’ me,
And many a branch out of my tree,
I have such store they will not be seen,
For more and more my twigs grow green.

But how and they chance to cut thee down,
And carry thy branches into the town 2
Then will they never no more be seen,
To grow again so fresh and green.

Though that you do, it is no boot,
Although they cut me to the root,
Next year again I will be seen
To bud my branches fresh and green.

And you, fair maid, can not do so,
For if you let your maidhood go,
Then will it never no more be seen,
As I with my branches can grow green.
VOL. II. s

The maid with that began to blush,
And turn'd her from the hawthorn bush;
She thought herself so fair and clean,
Her beauty still would ever grow green.

When that she heard this marvellous doubt,
She wander'd still then all about,
Suspecting still what she would ween,
Her maidhood lost would never be seen.

With many a sigh she went her way,
To see how she made herself so gay,
To walk, to see, and to be seen,

And so outfac'd the hawthorn green.

Besides all that, it put her in fear,
To talk with company any where,
For fear to lose the thing that should be seen
To grow as were the hawthorn green.

But after this never I could hear
Of this fair maiden any where,
That ever she was in forest seen,
To talk again of the hawthorn green.

Fragments of the Hunting of Cupid, from a MS. volume, (consisting chiefly of extracts from books,) by William DRUMMOND of Hawthornden, belonging to the Society of Scottish Antiquaries.

THE HUNTING OF CUPID,”

BY GEORGE PEELE OF OXFORD, PASTORAL.

ON the snowie browes of Albion. Sueet woodes sueet running brookes, y' chide in a pleasant tune and make quiet murmur, leaving [laving 21 the lilies, mints and waterflowers in ther gentle glide. making her face the marke of his wondring eies and his eyes the messengers of his woundit hart. Like a candle keepith but a litil roome zet blazeth round about. Heardgroome wo his strauberrie lasse. Some w" his sueet hart making false position putting a schort sillabe wher a long one should be. some a