Here one man's hand lean'd on another's head,
Her nose being shadow'd by his neighbour's ear;
Here one, being throng'd, bears back, all boll'n and
red;

Another, smother'd, seems to pelt and swear;
And in their rage such signs of rage they bear,
As, but for loss of Nestor's golden words,
It seem'd they would debate with angry swords.

For much imaginary work was there;
Conceit deceitful, so compact, so kind,
That for Achilles' image stood his spear,
Grip'd in an armed hand; himself, behind,
Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind:
A hand, a foot, a face, a leg, a head,
Stood for the whole to be imagined.

And from the walls of strong-besieged Troy
When their brave hope, bold Hector, march'd to field,
Stood many Trojan mothers, sharing joy
To see their youthful sons bright weapons wield;
And to their hope they such odd action yield,
That, through their light joy, seemed to appear
(Like bright things stain'd) a kind of heavy fear.

And, from the strond of Dardan where they fought,
To Simois' reedy banks the red blood ran,
Whose waves to imitate the battle sought
With swelling ridges; and their ranks began
To break upon the galled shore, and then
Retire again, till meeting greater ranks
They join, and shoot their foam at Simois' banks.

To this well-painted piece is Lucrece come,
To find a face where all distress is stêl'd.
Many she sees, where cares have carved some,
But none where all distress and dolour dwell'd,
Till she despairing Hecuba beheld,

Staring on Priam's wounds with her old eyes,
Which bleeding under Pyrrhus' proud foot lies.

In her the painter had anatomiz'd

Time's ruin, beauty's wreck, and grim care's reign;
Her cheeks with chaps and wrinkles were disguis'd:
Of what she was, no semblance did remain :
Her blue blood chang'd to black in every vein,
Wanting the spring that those shrunk pipes had fed,
Shew'd life imprison'd in a body dead.

On this sad shadow Lucrece spends her eyes,
And shapes her sorrow to the beldame's woes,
Who nothing wants to answer her but cries,
And bitter words, to ban her cruel foes:
The painter was no God to lend her those;
And therefore Lucrece swears he did her wrong,
To give her so much grief, and not a tongue.

Poor instrument, quoth she, without a sound,
I'll tune thy woes with my lamenting tongue:
And drop sweet balm in Priam's painted wound,
And rail on Pyrrhus that hath done him wrong,
And with my tears quench Troy, that burns so long;
And with my knife scratch out the angry eyes
Of all the Greeks that are thine enemies.

Shew me the strumpet that began this stir,
'That with my nails her beauty I may tear.
Thy heat of lust, fond Paris, did incur

This load of wrath that burning Troy doth bear;
Thy eye kindled the fire that burneth here.
And here in Troy, for trespass of thine eye,
The sire, the son, the dame, and daughter die

Why should the private pleasure of some one
Become the public plague of many mo
Let sin, alone committed, light alone
Upon his head that hath trangressed so :
Let guiltless souls be freed from guilty woe:
For one's offence why should so many fall,
To plague a private sin in general?

Lo, here weeps Hecuba, here Priam dies,
Here manly Hector faints, here Troilus swounds;
Here friend by friend in bloody channel lies,
And friend to friend gives unadvised wounds,
And one man's lust these many lives confounds:
Had doting Priam check'd his son's desire,
Troy had been bright with fame, and not with fire.

Here feelingly she weeps Troy's painted woes:
For sorrow, like a heavy-hanging bell,
Once set on ringing, with his own weight goes;
Then little strength rings out the doleful knell;
So Lucrece set a-work, sad tales doth tell
To pencil'd pensiveness and colour'd sorrow
She lends them words, and she their looks doth
borrow.

She throws her eyes about the painting, round,
And whom she finds forlorn, she doth lament:
At last she sees a wretched image bound,
That piteous looks to Phrygian shepherds lent;
His face, though full of cares, yet shew'd content.
Onward to Troy with the blunt swains he goes,
So mild, that Patience seem'd to scorn his woes.

In him the painter labour'd with his skill
To hide deceit, and give the harmless shew,
An humble gait, calm looks, eyes wailing still,
A brow unbent, that seem'd to welcome woe;
Cheeks, neither red nor pale, but mingled so
That blushing red no guilty instance gave,
Nor ashy pale the fear that false hearts have

But, like a constant and confirmed devil,
He entertained a shew so seeming just,
And therein so ensconc'd his secret evil,
That jealousy itself could not mistrust,
False-creeping craft and perjury should thrust
Into so bright a day such black'd-fac'd storms,
Or blot with hell-born sin such saint-like forms.

The well-skill'd workman this mild image drew
For perjur'd Sinon, whose enchanting story
The credulous old Priam after slew;
Whose words, like wild-fire, burnt the shining glory
Of rich-built Ilion, that the skies were sorry,
And little stars shot from their fixed places,
When their glass fell, wherein they view'd their faces.

This picture she advisedly perus'd,
And chid the painter for his wond'rous skill;
Saying, some shape in Sinon's was abus'd,
So fair a form lodg'd not a mind so ill;
And still on him she gaz'd; and gazing still,
Such signs of truth in his plain face she spy'd,
That she concludes the picture was bely'd.

It cannot be, quoth she, that so much guile-
(She would have said) can lurk in such a look;
But Tarquin's shape came in her mind the while,
And from her tongue, can lurk from cannot took;
It cannot be she in that sense forsook,
And turn'd it thus: "It cannot be, I find,
But such a face should bear a wicked mind."

For even as subtle Sinon here is painted,
So sober-sad, so weary, and so mild,
(As if with grief or travail he had fainted,)
To me came Tarquin armed; so beguil'd
With outward honesty, but yet defil'd
With inward vice: as Priam him did cherish,
So did I Tarquin; so my Troy did perish.

Look, look, how listening Priam wets his eyes,
To see those borrow'd tears that Sinon sheds.
Priam, why art thou old, and yet not wise?
For every tear he falls, a Trojan bleeds;
His eye drops fire, no water thence proceeds:
Those round clear pearls of his, that move thy pity,
Are balls of quenchless fire to burn thy city.

Such devils steal effects from ightless hell;
For Sinon in his fire doth quake with cold,
And in that cold, hot-burning fire doth dwell;
These contraries such unity do hold,
Only to flatter fools, and make them bold:
Sɔ Priam's trust false Sinon's tears doth flatter,
That he finds means to burn his Troy with water.

Here, all enrag'd, such passion her assails,
That patience is quite beaten from her breast.
She tears the senseless Sinon with her nails,
Comparing him to that unhappy guest,
Whose deed hath made herself, herself detest:
At last she smilingly with this gives o'er;
Fool! fool! quoth she, his wounds will not be sore.

Thus ebbs and flows the current of her sorrow,
And time doth weary time with her complaining.
She looks for night, and then she longs for morrow,
And both she thinks too long with her remaining:
Short time seems long in sorrow's sharp sustaining.
Though woe be heavy, yet it seldom sleeps;
And they that watch, see time how slow it creeps.

Which all this time hath overslipp'd her thought,
That she with painted images hath spent ;
Being from the feeling of her own grief brought
By deep surmise of others detriment;
Losing her woes in shews of discontent.
It easeth some, though none it ever cur'd,
To think their dolour others have endur'd.

But now the mindful messenger, come back,
Brings home his lord and other company;
Who finds his Lucrece clad in mourning black:
And round about her tear-distained eye
Blue circles stream'd, like rainbows in the sky;
These water-galls in her dim element
Foretel new storms to those already spent.

Which when her sad-beholding husband saw,
Amazedly in her sad face he stares:

Her eyes, though sod in tears, look'd red and raw,
Her lively colour kill'd with deadly cares.
He hath no power to ask her how she fares;
But stood, like old acquaintance in a trance,
Met far from home, wondering each other's chance.

At last he takes her by the bloodless hand,
And thus begins: What uncouth ill event
Hath thee befal'n, that thou dost trembling stand?
Sweet love, what spite hath thy fair colour spent?
Why art thou thus attir'd in discontent?
Unmask, dear dear, this moody heaviness.
And tell tay grief, that we may give redress.

Three times with sighs she gives her sorrow re
Ere once she can discharge one word of woe:
At length address'd to answer his desire,
She modestly prepares to let them know
Her honour is ta'en prisoner by the foe;
While Collatine and his consorted lords
With sad attention long to hear her words.

And now this pale swan in her watery nest
Begins the sad dirge of her certain ending:
Few words, quoth she, shall fit the trespass best,
Where no excuse can give the fault amending:
In me more woes than words are now depending;
And my laments would be drawn out too long,
To tell them all with one poor tired tongue.

Then be this all the task it hath to say:
Dear husband, in the interest of thy bed
A stranger came, and on that pillow lay
Where thou wast wont to rest thy weary head;
And what wrong else may be imagined
By foul enforcement might be done to me,
From that, alas! thy Lucrece is not free.

For in the dreadful dead of dark midnight,
With shining falchion in my chamber came
A creeping creature, with a flaming light,
And softly cry'd, Awake, thou Roman dame,
And entertain my love; else lasting shame
On thee and thine this night I will inflict,
If thou my love's desire do contradict.

For some hard-favour'd groom of thine, quoth ka
Unless thou yoke thy liking to my will,
I'll murder straight, and then I'll slaughter tnes
And swear I found you where you did fulfi
The loathsome act of lust, and so did kill
The lechers in their deed: this act will be
My fame, and thy perpetual infamy.

With this I did begin to start and cry,
And then against my heart he set his sword;
Swearing, unless I took all patiently,
I should not live to speak another word:
So should my shame still rest upon record;
And never be forgot in mighty Rome

The adulterate death of Lucrece and her groom

Mine enemy was strong, my poor self weak,
And far the weaker with so strong a fear:
My bloody judge forbade my tongue to speak,
No rightful plea might plead for justice there.
His scarlet lust came evidence to swear
That my poor beauty had purloin'd his eyes,
And when the judge is rob'd, the prisoner dies.

O, teach me how to make mine own excuse !
Or, at the least, this refuge let me find;
Though my gross blood be stain'd with this abuse,
Immaculate and spotless is my mind;
That was not forc'd; that never was inclin'd
To accessary yieldings, but still pure
Doth in her poison'd closet yet endure.

Lo here, the hopeless merchant of this loss,
With head declin'd, and voice damn'd up with woe,
With sad-set eyes, and wretched arms across,
From lips new-waxen pale begins to blow
The grief away, that stops his answers so:
But wretched as he is, he strives in vain.
What he breathes out, his breath drinks up again.

The one doth call her his, the other his,
Yet neither may possess the claim they lay.
The father says, she's mine: O, mine she is,
Replies the husband: Do not take away
My sorrow's interest; let no mourner say
He weeps for her, for she was only mine,
And only must be wail'd by Collatine.

O, quoth Lucretius, I did give that life,
Which she too early and too late hath spill'd.
Woe, woe, quoth Collatine, she was my wife,
I ow'd her, and 'tis mine that she hath kill'd,
My daughter and my wife with clamours fill'd
The dispers'd air, who holding Lucrece' life,
Answer'd their cries, my daughter and my wife.

Brutus, who pluck'd the knife from Lucrece' side,
Seeing such emulation in their woe,
Began to clothe his wit in state and pride,
Burying in Lucrece' wound his folly's shew.
He with the Romans was esteemed so
As silly-jeering idiots are with kings,

For sportive words, and uttering foolish things.

But now he throws that shallow habit by,
Wherein deep policy did him disguise;
And arm'd his long-hid wits advisedly,
To check the tears in Collatinus' eyes.
Thou wronged lord of Rome, quoth he, arise;
Let my unsounded self, suppos'd a fool,
Now set thy long-experienc'd wit to school.

Why, Collatine, is woe the cure for woe? [deeds ? Do wounds help wounds, or grief help grievous Is it revenge to give thyself a blow,

For his foul act by whom thy fair wife bleeds? Such childish humour from weak minds proceeds; Thy wretched wife mistook the matter so,

To slay herself, that should have slain her foe.

Courageous Roman, do not steep thy heart
In such relenting dew of lamentations:
But kneel with me, and help to bear thy part,
To rouse our Roman gods with invocations,
That they will suffer these abominations,
Since Rome herself in them doth stand disgrac'd,
By our strong arms from forth her fair streets chas'd.

Now by the Capitol that we adore,

And by this chaste blood so unjustly stain'd,
By heaven's fair sun, that breeds the fat earth's store,
By all our country rights in Rome maintain'd,
And by chaste Lucrece' soul, that late complain'd
Her wrongs to us, and by this bloody knife,
We will revenge the death of this true wife.
This said, he struck his hand upon his breast,
And kiss'd the fatal knife, to end his vow;
And to his protestation urg'd the rest,
Who wondering at him, did his words allow :
Then jointly to the ground their knees they bow
And that deep vow which Brutus made before
He doth again repeat, and that they swore.

T. T.*

I.

FROM fairest creatures we desire increase,
That thereby beauty's rose might never die,
But as the riper should by time decease,

His tender heir might bear his memory:
But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes,
Feed'st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel,
Making a famine where abundance lies,

Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel, Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament, And only herald to the gaudy spring, Within thine own bud buriest thy content,

And, tender churl, mak'st waste in niggarding. Pity the world, or else this glutton be, To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee.

III.

Look in thy glass, and tell the face thou viewest,
Now is the time that face should form another;
Whose fresh repair if now thou not renewest,
Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.
For where is she so fair, whose un-ear'd womb
Disdains the tillage of thy husbandry?

Or who is he so fond, will be the tomb
Of his self-love, to stop posterity?
Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee
Calls back the lovely April of her prime:
So thou through windows of thine age shalt see,
Despite of wrinkles, this thy golden time.
But if thou live, remember'd not to be,
Die single, and thine image dies with thee.
IV.

Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend

Upon thyself thy beauty's legacy?
Nature's bequest gives nothing, but doth lend;
And being frank, she lends to those are free.
Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse
The bounteous largess given thee to give?
Profitless usurer, why dost thou use

So great a sum of sums, yet canst not live?
For having traffic with thyself alone,

Thou of thyself thy sweet self dost deceive. Then how, when nature calls thee to be gone, What acceptable audit canst thou leave? Thy unus'd beauty must be tomb'd with thee, Which, used, lives thy executor to be.