Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.

Parthenophil and Parthenophe

Canzon 2. Sing! sing, Parthenophil! sing! pipe! and play!

Barnabe Barnes (1569?–1609)

SING! sing, PARTHENOPHIL! sing! pipe! and play!

This feast is kept upon this plain,

Amongst th’ Arcadian shepherds everywhere,

For ASTROPHEL’s birthday! Sweet ASTROPHEL!

Arcadia’s honour! mighty PAN’s chief pride!

Where be the Nymphs? The Nymphs all gathered be

To sing sweet ASTROPHEL’s sweet praise!

ECHO! record what feasts be kept to-day

Amongst th’Arcadian shepherd swains!

What keep they, whiles they do the Muses cheer?

He cheered the Muses with celestial skill!

All Shepherds’ praise died with him, when he died!

He left no peer! Then, what deservèd he,

At whose pipe’s sound, the lambkin bays?

The bullocks leap! the fawns dance in array!

Kids skip! the Satyrs friskins fain!

Here stand a herd of Swains! Fair Nymphs stand there!

Swains dance! while Nymphs with flowers their baskets fill!

What was he to those Nymphs with garlands tied?

What tied him? Hath he to tell there bound t’ee?

How! To report his martial days?

Thrice happy man! that found this happy way!

His praise all Shepherds’ glory stains!

What doth PARTHENOPHE, my purchase dear?

What saith She, to her PARTHENOPHIL?

Shepherds! I fill sweet wines repurified,

And to his blessed Soul, this health have we!

Singing sweet Odes and Roundelays!

Let every man drink round besides this bay!

Where are the Nymphs and Fairy train?

STELLA, three garlands in her hand doth bear;

And those, for his sweet sake! she proffer will,

Unto th’Elizian souls! And I have spied

PARTHENOPHE, with spoil returns to me,

Of three great hearts. Sing Virelays!

Those golden darts fly never void of prey,

And STELLA sits (as if some Chain

Of Fancies bound her!) by that motley bier!

Where, with sweet eglantine and daffodil,

She, chaplets makes, with gold and scarlet dyed.

Here, COLIN sits, beneath that oaken tree!

ELIZA singing in his Lays!

Blest is Arcadia’s Queen! Kneel Swains, and say

That “She (which here chief Nymph doth reign)

May blessèd live! to see th’extremest year!”

For sacrifice, then, lambs and kidlings kill!

And be, by them, ELIZA glorified!

The Flower of Loves, and pure Virginity!

This Delian Nymph doth amaze!

The fairest deers, which in the forests stay!

Those harts (which proudest herds disdain;

And range the forests as without compeer!)

Submissive, yield themselves! that if She will,

She, them may wound! or on their swift backs ride!

Lions and bears, with beauty tameth She!

Shepherds! for Her! your voices raise!

ECHO! this favour, if I purchase may!

Do not herdgrooms there feign?

What want they? Speak! now, they be blest, if e’er!

What be the confines? Rebels they be still!

What is She, that so many Swains doth there guide?

None but herself hath that ability

To rule so many ways!

Her thoughts, sure grounded on Divinity;

For this sweet Nymph, each Shepherd prays!