In joye yt maks our mirthe abounde,

In woe yt cheres our hevy sprites ;
Be-strawghted heads relyef hath founde,

By musickes pleasaunt swete delightes:
Our senses all, what shall I say more?
Are subjecte unto musicks lore.

The Gods by musicke have theire prayse;
The lyfe, the soul therein doth joye;

For, as the Romayne poet sayes,

In seas, whom pyrats would destroy,

A dolphin saved from death most sharpe
Arion playing on his harpe.

O heavenly gyft, that rules the mynd,

10

15

Even as the sterne dothe rule the shippe!

O musicke, whom the Gods assinde

To comforte manne, whom cares would nippe!
Since thow both man and beste doest move,
What beste ys he, wyll the disprove?

20

VI.

King Cophetua and the Beggar-Maid

is a story often alluded to by our old dramatic writers. Shakspeare in his Romeo and Juliet, act ii. sc. 1, makes Mercutio say,

"Her [Venus's] purblind son and heir, Young Adam Cupid, he that shot so true, When King Cophetua loved the beggar-maid."

As the 13th line of the following ballad seems here particularly alluded to, it is not improbable but Shakspeare wrote it shot so trim, which the players or printers, not perceiving the allusion, might alter to true. The former, as being the more humorous expression, seems most likely to have come from the mouth of Mercutio.2

In the 2nd Part of Hen. IV. act v. sc. 3, Falstaff is introduced affectedly saying to Pistoll,

"O base Assyrian knight, what is thy news?

Let king Cophetua know the truth thereof."

See above, preface to Song i. Book ii. of this vol. p. 106, 107. Since this conjecture was first made, it has been discovered that shot so trim was the genuine reading.-See Shakspeare, edit. 1793, xiv. 393.

These lines Dr. Warburton thinks were taken from an old bombast play of King Cophetua. No such play is, I believe, now to be found; but it does not therefore follow that it never existed. Many dramatic pieces are referred to by old writers, which are not now extant, or even mentioned in any list. In the infancy of the stage, plays were often exhibited that were never printed.

It is probably in allusion to the same play, that Ben Jonson says in his Comedy of Every Man in his Humour, act iii. sc. 4:

"I have not the heart to devour thee, an' I might be made as rich as King Cophetua."

At least there is no mention of King Cophetua's riches in the present ballad, which is the oldest I have met with on the subject.

It is printed from Rich. Johnson's Crown Garland of Goulden Roses, 1612, 12mo (where it is entitled simply, A Song of a Beggar and a King): corrected by another copy.

I READ that once in Affrica
A princely wight did raine,
Who had to name Cophetua,
As poets they did faine.
From natures lawes he did decline,
For sure he was not of my minde,
He cared not for women-kind,

But did them all disdaine.

But marke what hapned on a day;
As he out of his window lay,
He saw a beggar all in gray,

5

10

The which did cause his paine.

The blinded boy that shootes so trim
From heaven downe did hie,

He drew a dart and shot at him,

15

In place where he did lye:

Which soone did pierse him to the quicke,
And when he felt the arrow pricke,

Which in his tender heart did sticke,

20

"What sudden chance is this," quoth he,

He looketh as he would dye.

"That I to love must subject be,
Which never thereto would agree,
But still did it defie?"

3 See Mere's Wits Treas. fol. 283. Arte of Eng. Poes. 1589, pp. 51,

111, 143, 169.

Then from the window he did come,
And laid him on his bed;

A thousand heapes of care did runne
Within his troubled head.

25

For now he meanes to crave her love,
And now he seekes which way to proove
How he his fancie might remoove,

30

And not this beggar wed.
But Cupid had him so in snare,
That this poor begger must prepare
A salve to cure him of his care,

Or els he would be dead.

And as he musing thus did lye,

He thought for to devise

How he might have her companye,

That so did 'maze his eyes.

40

"In thee," quoth he, "doth rest my life;

"For thou," quoth he, "shalt be my wife,

And honoured for my queene;

What is thy name, faire maid?" quoth he.

That you wil take me for your choyce,

And my degree so base."

And when the wedding day was come,
The king commanded strait

The noblemen, both all and some,
Upon the queene to wait.

And she behaved herself that day
As if she had never walkt the way;
She had forgot her gowne of gray,
Which she did weare of late.
The proverbe old is come to passe,
The priest, when he begins his masse,
Forgets that ever clerke he was;

He knowth not his estate.

Ver. 90, i. e. tramped the streets.

Shakespeare (who alludes to this ballad in his Love's Labour Lost, act iv. sc. 1) gives the Beggar's name Zenelophon, according to all the old editions: but this seems to be a corruption; for Penelophon, in the text, sounds more like the name of a woman. The story of the King and the Beggar is also alluded to in King Rich. II. act. v. sc. 3.

Here you may read Cophetua,
Through long time fancie-fed,
Compelled by the blinded boy
The begger for to wed:

100

He that did lovers lookes disdaine,

To do the same was glad and faine,

Or else he would himselfe have slaine,
In storie, as we read.

V. 105, Here the poet, addresses himself to his mistress.

V. 112, sheweth was anciently the plur. numb.

An ingenious friend thinks the two last stanzas should change place.

VII.

Take thy Old Cloak about Thee

is supposed to have been originally a Scottish ballad. The reader here has an ancient copy in the English idiom, with an additional stanza (the 2d) never before printed. This curiosity is preserved in the Editor's folio MS., but not without corruptions, which are here removed by the assistance of the Scottish edit. Shakspeare in his Othello, act ii., has quoted one stanza, with some variations, which are here adopted: the old MS. readings are however given in the margin.