This is cold comfort, sais my lord,

To wellcome a stranger thus to the sea: Yet Ile bring him and his shipp to shore, Or to Scottland hee shall carrye mee.

Then a noble gunner you must have,
And he must aim well with his ee,
And sinke his pinnace into the sea,

Or else hee never orecome will bee:
And if you chance his shipp to borde,
This counsel I must give withall,
Let no man to his topcastle goe

To strive to let his beams downe fall.

And seven pieces of ordinance,

I pray your honour lend to mee,

On each side of my shipp along,

And I will lead you on the sea.

A glasse Ile sett, that may be seene,
Whether you sayle by day or night;

120

125

130

And when he saw his pinnace sunke,

Lord, how his heart with rage did swell. "Nowe cutt my ropes, itt is time to be gon; Ile fetch yond pedlars backe mysell," When my Lord sawe Sir Andrewe loose, Within his heart hee was full faine :

"Nowe spread your ancyents, strike up drummes,

Sound all your trumpetts out amaine."

Fight on, my men, Sir Andrewe sais,
Weale howsoever this geere will sway;
Itt is my lord admirall of England,

Is come to seeke mee on the sea.
Simon had a sonne, who shott right well,
That did Sir Andrewe mickle scare;

In att his decke he gave a shott,
Killed threescore of his men of warre.

15

50

30

55

55

Then Henrye Hunt with rigour hott

And to-morrowe, I sweare, by nine of the clocke 135 You shall meet with Sir Andrewe Barton knight.

And never an English nor Portingall

With that the pinnace itt shott off,

THE SECOND PART.

THE merchant sett my lorde a glasse

Soe well apparent in his sight,

And on the morrowe, by nine of the clocke.

He shewed him Sir Andrewe Barton knight.

His hachebord it was 'gilt' with gold,
Soe deerlye dight it dazzled the ee:
Nowe by my faith, Lord Howarde sais,
This is a gallant sight to see.

Take in your ancyents, standards eke,

So close that no man may them see;
And put me forth a white willowe wand,
As merchants use to sayle the sea.
But they stirred neither top, nor mast
Stoutly they past Sir Andrew by.
What English churles are yonder, he sayd,
That can soe litle curtesye?

Now by the roode, three yeares and more
I have beene admirall over the sea;

Without my leave can passe this way. Then called he forth his stout pinnace; "Fetch backe yond pedlars nowe to mee: I sweare by the masse, yon English churles Shall all hang att my maine-mast tree."

Full well Lord Howard might it ken; For itt stroke down my lord's fore mast, And killed fourteen of his men. Come hither, Simon, sayes my lord,

Looke that thy word be true, thou said; For at my maine-mast thou shall hang,

What may a man now thinke, or say ?

Yonder merchant theefe, that pierceth Lee, He was my prisoner yesterday.

If thou misse thy marke one shilling bread. Simon was old, but his heart itt was bold. His ordinance he laid right lowe; He put in chaine full nine yardes long, With other great shott lesse, and moe; And he lette goe his great gunnes shott: Soe well be settled itt with his ee, The first sight that Sir Andrew sawe, He see his pinnace sunke in the sea.

Alas a comelye youth is slaine !

Ver. 5, hached with gold.' MS. V. 35, i. e. discharged chais shot.

i. e. did not salute

Ver. 67, 84, pounds, MS. V. 75, bearinge, sc. the carrie well, &c. But see Gloss.

And when he had on this armour of proofe,
He was a gallant sight to see :
Ah! nere didst thou meet with living wight,
My deere brother, could cope with thee."
lord,
And looke your shaft that itt goe right,
Shoot a good shoote in time of need,

Come hither Horseley, sayes my

And for it thou shalt be made a knight. Ile shoot my best, quoth Horseley then,

105

Your honour shall see, with might and maine;110 But if I were hanged at your maine-mast,

I have now left but arrowes twaine.

Sir Andrew he did swarve the tree,
With right good will he swarved then :
Upon his breast did Horsley hitt,

But the arrow bounded back agen.
Then Horseley spyed a privye place

With a perfect eye in a secrette part; Under the spole of his right arme

He smote Sir Andrew to the heart.

"Fight on, my men, Sir Andrew sayes,
A little Ime hurt, but yett not slaine;
Ile but lye downe and bleede a while,
And then Ile rise and fight againe.
"Fight on, my men, Sir Andrew sayes,
And never flinche before the foe;
And stand fast by St. Andrewes crosse
Untill you heare my whistle blowe."

They never heard his whistle blow,

115

120

125

Which made their hearts waxe sore adread: 130 Then Horseley sayd, Aboard, my lord, For well I wott Sir Andrew's dead. They boarded then his noble shipp, They boarded it with might and maine; Eighteen score Scots alive they found,

The rest were either maimed or slaine.

Lord Howard then a letter wrote,

137

15C

And sealed it with seale and ring; "Such a noble prize have I brought to your grace

As never did subject to a king:

135

Lord Howard tooke a sword in hand,

And off he smote Sir Andrewes head, "I must have left England many a daye, If thou wert alive as thou art dead."

110

He caused his body to be cast

Over the hatchbord into the sea,

I wold give, quoth the king, a thousand markes,
This man were alive as hee is dead :

Yett for the manfull part hee playd,

Which fought soe well with heart and hand, 190 His men shall have twelvepence a day,

Till they come to my brother kings high land.

that it entirely refers to a private story. A young lady of the name of Bothwell, or rather Boswell having been, together with her child, deserted by her husband or lover, composed these affecting lines herself; which here are given from a copy in the Editor's folio MS. corrected by another in Allan Ramsay's Miscellany.

BALOW, my babe, lye still and sleipe!
It grieves me sair to see thee weipe:
If thoust be silent, Ise be glad,
Thy maining maks my heart ful sad.
Balow, my boy, thy mothers joy,
Thy father breides me great annoy.

Balow, my babe, ly stil and sleipe,
It grieves me sair to see thee weepe.

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Thy winsome smiles maun eise my paine; My babe and I'll together live,

He'll comfort me when cares doe grieve:
My babe and I right saft will ly,
And quite forgeit man's cruelty.
Balow,

40

S.c.

Balow, &c.

15

The catastrophe of Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley, the unfortunate husband of Mary Queen of Scots, is the subject of this ballad. It is here related in that partial imperfect manner, in which such an event would naturally strike the subjects of another kingdom; of which he was a native. Henry appears to have been a vain capricious worthless young man, of weak understanding, and dissolute morals. But the beauty of his person, and the inexperience of his youth, would dispose mankind to treat him with an indulgence, which the cruelty of his murder would afterwards convert into the most tender pity and regret and then imagination would not fail to adorn his memory with all those virtues he ought to have possessed. This will account for the extravagant elogium bestowed upon him in the first stanza, &c.

Henry Lord Darnley was eldest son of the Earl of Lennox, by the Lady Margaret Douglas, niece of Henry VIII. and daughter of Margaret Queen of Scotland by the Earl of Angus, whom that princess married after the death of James IV.-Darnley, who

• When sugar was first imported into Europe, it was a very great dainty; and therefore the epithet sugred is used by all our old writers metaphorically to express extreme and delicate sweetness. (See above, No. XI. v. 10.) Sugar at present is cheap and common; and therefore suggests now a coarse and vulgar idea.

had been born and educated in England, was but in his 21st year, when he was murdered, Feb. 9, 1567-8. This crime was perpetrated by the Earl of Bothwell, not out of respect to the memory of Riccio, but in order to pave the way for his own marriage with the queen.

This ballad, (printed, with a few corrections, from the Editor's folio MS.) seems to have been written soon after Mary's escape into England in 1568, see v. 65. It will be remembered at v. 5, that this princess was Queen Dowager of France, having been first married to Francis II. who died Dec. 4, 1560.

WOE worth, woe worth thee, false Scotlande!
For thou hast ever wrought by sleight;
The worthyest prince that ever was borne,
You hanged under a cloud by night

The following lines, if they display no rich vein of poetry, are yet so strongly characteristic of their great and spirited authoress, that the insertion of them will be pardoned. They are preserved in Puttenham's "Arte of English Poesie:" a book in which are many sly addresses to the queen's foible of shining as a poetess. The extraordinary manner in which these verses are introduced shews what kind of homage was exacted from the courtly writers of that age, viz.

"I find," says this antiquated critic "none example in English metre, so well maintaining this figure [Exargasia, or the Gorgeous, Lat. Expolitio] as that dittie of her majesties owne making, passing sweete and harmonicall; which figure beyng as his very original name purporteth the most bewtifull and gorgious of all others, it asketh in reason to be reserved for a last complement, and desciphred by a ladies penne, herselfe beyng the most bewtifull, or rather bewtie of queenes. And this was the occasion'; our soveraigne lady perceiving how the Scottish queenes residence within this realme at so great libertie and ease (as were skarce meete for so great and dangerous a prysoner) bred secret factions among

her people, and made many of the nobilitie incline to favour her partie: some of them desirous of innovation in the state: others aspiring to greater fortunes by her libertie and life: the queene our soveraigne ladie, to declare that she was nothing ignorant of those secret practizes, though she had long with great wisdome and pacience dissembled it, writeth this dittie most sweete and sententious, not hiding from all such aspiring minds the danger of their ambition and disloyaltie: which afterwards fell out most truly by th' exemplary chastisement of sundry persons, who in favour of the said Scot. Qu. declining from her majestie, sought to interrupt the quiet of the realme by many evill and undutifull practizes."

This sonnet seems to have been composed in 1569, not long before the Duke of Norfolk, the Earls of Pembroke and Arundel, the Lord Lumley, Sir Nich. Throcmorton, and others, were taken into custody. See Hume, Rapin, &c.-It was originally written in long lines or alexandrines, each of which is here divided into two.

The present edition is improved by some readings adopted from a copy printed in a collection from the papers of Sir John Harrington, intituled, "Nuga Antique," Lond. 1769, 12mo. where the verses a:

Pronounced after the northern marner dee.

This ballad is a proof of the little intercourse that subsisted between the Scots and English, before the accession of James I. to the crown of England. The tale which is here so circumstantially related does not appear to have had the least foundation in history, but was probably built upon some confused hearsay report of the tumults in Scotland during the minority of that prince, and of the conspiracies formed by different factions to get possession of his person. It should seem from ver. 97 to have been written during the regency, or at least before the death, of the Earl of Morton, who was condemned and executed June 2, 1581; when James was in his fifteenth year.

The original copy (preserved in the archives of the Antiquarian Society, London) is intitled, "A new Ballad, declaring the great treason conspired against the young king of Scots, and how one Andrew Browne an English-man, which was the king's chamberlaine, prevented the same. To the tune of Milfield, or els to Green-sleeves." At the end is subjoined the name of the author, W. Elderton. "Imprinted at London for Yarathe James, dwelling in Newgate Market, over against Ch. Church," in black-letter folio.

This Elderton, who had been originally an attorney in the sheriffs courts of London, and afterwards (if we may believe Oldys) a comedian, was a facetious fuddling companion, whose tippling and rhymes rendered him famous among his contemporaries. He

Ver. 1, dread, al. ed. V. 9, toyes, al. ed.

was author of many popular songs and ballads; and probably other pieces in this work, besides the following, are of his composing. He is believed to have fallen a victim to his bottle before the year 1592. His epitaph has been recorded by Camden, and translated by Oldys.

Hic situs est sitiens, atque ebrius Eldertonus,
Quid dico hic situs est? hic potius sitis est.
Dead drunk here Elderton doth lie;
Dead as he is, he still is dry:
So of him it may well be said,

Here he, but not his thirst, is laid.

See Stow's Lond. [Guild-hall.]- Biogr. Brit. [" Drayton," by Oldys, Note B.] Ath. Ox.-Camden's Remains.-The Exale-tation of Ale, among Beaumont's Poems, 8vo. 1653.

"Our alas!" what a griefe is this

That princes subjects cannot be true,
But still the devill hath some of his,
Will play their parts whatsoever ensue;
Forgetting what a grievous thing
It is to offend the anointed king?
Alas for woe, why should it be so,
This makes a sorrowful heigh ho.

In Scotland is a bonnie kinge,

As proper a youth as neede to be, Well given to every happy thing, That can be in a kinge to see:

She evidently means here the Queen of Scots.

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10