usage off them in yt. cause: requesting you most earnestly, y'., for our cause and intercession, it may please you to let them be relieved of their present straicts, and wt. soever further accusation or pursuite is depending on y'. ground; respecting both their former merit in ye forthe setting off ye. Evangil, ye. simplicitie of their conscience in this defence which cannot well be thirlit* by compulsion, and yo. greate slander wch, cannot faile to fall out upon their further straicting for any such occasion, wch, (we assure us) your zeale to religion, besides ye. expéctation we have off your good will to pleasure us, will willingly accord to, at our request: Having such proofes from time to time of our like disposition in any mater wch, you recommend unto us. And thus, right excellent, right high, and mightie Princesse, our dearest Sister and Cosin, we comit you to God's good protection.

From Edinburgh the xii of June, 1591."

The Kings Ma. Lre to one of his Servants† in England. Ao. Dni. 1600.

"ALTHOUGH I never doubted, and was ever sufficiently enformed of ye goodwill borne towards me in a lawful sort, (for, otherwaies, I never did or shall require ye. same) by all the honest subjects of England, that I sincerely profess ye. onelie true religion professed and by lawes established in both realmes; the bond of conscience being ye onelie sure bond for tying of affections to them, whom to they owe a natural and obligatorie subjection; yet having ye. same renued and confirmed unto me by your late advertisements, I thought good by these presents (all written wth, my own hand) to set you down a resolution

for them in this matter: wh. is, yt. you shall assure all ye. honest men you can meete wth, that are affected to religion, so (as was said) professed, and that in ye. princely word of a Christian king, that as I have ever, without swarving, professed and maintained ye. same within all ye, bounds and circuit of my kingdom, so they may perswade themselves, yt. how soone soever it shall please God, lawfully to possesse me of y°. crowne of y'. kingdom wherein they are subjects, I will not onelie maintaine and continue ye. profession of ye. Gospell therein, but whall, neither suffer nor permit any other religion to be professed and allowed wth.in ye. limits of ye. same. But because you were, at your last being wth me, acquainted more particularly with my intention in ye. premisses, as also because your selfe is so well approved and known to ye. best sort there; you shall, by tongue, more particularly enforme them of my mind therein; resolving them concerning such malicious calumnies and unjust imputations, as have bin, from time to time, by my undeserved enemies contrived and geven forth against me. And thus I bid you hartilie farewell.

JAMES R."

King James was born of Roman Catholic parents, but was brought up in Presbyterian principles. While the Catholics, therefore, hoped to meet with increased indulgence, the Presbyterians flattered themselves that their monarch would promote the reforming of the Church of England upon the plan of that of Scotland: but James conformed to the Protestant religion, as established in the reign of Edward the Sixth, and as ratified by Queen Elizabeth.

SONNETS by JOHN DAVIES of HEREFORD,

Affixed to his Triumph of Death: or Picture of the Plague, according to the Life, as it was in anno Domini, 1603. Printed in 1609.

To the good Knight and my much honored Scholler, Sir Philip Carey.

SITH Death, deare Sir, hath lately beene so fell,

To reave that life, than deare life dearer farre:
This record of his greater rage may quell

The lesse, perhaps, in your particular.

Faine would I, if I could, beguile your griefe,
With telling you of others heavie harmes :
But, ah! such guile gives griefe too true reliefe
In your true humane heart, that pity warmes.
Life is a plague; for who doth live, must die :
Yet some that have the plague doe scape alive
So life's more mortall than mortalitie.
Then sith that life, like death, doth life deprive,
You may rejoice, sith your Adolphus liv'd,
True virtue's life, which cannot be depriv'd.

Vivat post funera Virtus.

e;

To the right worshipful my deere scholler Sir Humfrey Baskervile of Earsley, Knight: and the no lesse lovely than vertuous Lady his wife.

Sith I am lecturing my noblest schollers,

You, being two, this lecture deigne to reade;

211.

For though it treats of nought but death and dollers,*
Yet it with pleasure may your passion feede;

For plagues to see implagu'd, doth nature please,
Although good nature gladly grieves thereat :
As we are well-ill pleas'd to see at seas

The wofull'st wracke, while we are safe from that.
In health to tell what sicknesse we have past,
Makes us more sound; for gladness health defends:
O then your eies on this plague's-picture cast,
To glad and grieve you, for glad-grievous ends.
But my sole end, by this poore meane to ye,
Is but to tie your eares and hearts to me.

To my worthy and worthily beloved scholer, Thomas Bodenham,
Esq. sonne and heire apparant of Sir Roger Bodenham of
Rotherwas, Knight of the Bathe.

And if among them that are deare to me,
Remembred by my pen, (my Muse's tongue)
I should forget to shew my love to thee;
Myselfe, but much more thee, I so should wrong;
Nay, wrong the right which I to thee do owe:
But never shall my love so guilefull prove

As not to pay thee so deserv'd a due;
For, I confesse, thou well deserv'st my love.
Thou wert my scholer; and if I could teach
So good a pupill such a lesson ill

By mine example, I might so impeach

Mine honest fame, and quite disgrace my skill.
But when I learne thee such detested lore,
Then loathe my love, and learne of me no more.
Yours, as what's most yours,

JOHN DAVIES.

* Dolours.

LEYDEN'S LAI OF THE ETTERCAP.

THE following very ingenious, playful, and accurate imitation of the style of our ancient metrical romances was penned by the learned Editor of the Complaint of Scotland, a short time after Ritson had put forth his three octavo volumes of the antiquated reliques of our national poesy; in the glossary to which he had vented a morbid sarcasm on Mr. George Ellis, by whose liberal interference those volumes were presented to the public.

The Lai of the Ettercap.*

A FRAGMENT.

Now shal y tellen to ye, y wis,

Of that Squyere hizt Ellis,

And his Damet so fre:

So hende he is by goddes mizt,

That he nis not ymake a knizt

It is the mor pitè.

He knoweth better eche glewe,
Than y can to ye shewe

Oither bi plume or greffe:

• Or Attircop: meaning either a poisonous insect, or a passionate and malignant person. See the Scottish Glossaries of Mr. G. Chalmers and J. Sibbald.

The accomplished daughter of the venerable Sir Peter Parker, Bart. late Admiral of the Fleet.