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But no disgrace of fortune, or star most hateful,
Can blot out of my breast thy name so grateful.
For in my heart is carved

Thy lovely shape, and there thy love preserved.
Still I see thee, and still attend the morning,
To see the sun our hemisphere adorning.

O if that blissful hour may once relieve me,

Kill me forthwith, good Love; it shall not grieve me. Music by Giulio Eremita, 1580.

XLII.

Cynthia, thy song and chaunting

So strange a flame in gentle hearts awaketh; That every cold desire wanton love maketh Sounds to thy praise and vaunting

Of Syrens most commended,

That with delightful tunes for praise contended.

For when thou sweetly soundest,

Thou neither kill'st nor woundest :

But dost revive a number

Of bodies buried in perpetual slumber.

Music by Giov. Croce, 1590.

This Madrigal is quite unintelligible, and sets all the rules of common sense and grammar at defiance; and yet the music is so beautiful, and every one is so accustomed to sing it to these words, that perhaps the original version would not afford so much pleasure. Nothing can be more exquisite than the universal hush with which the conclusion dies away, at the words "buried in perpetual slumber.”

Fly, if thou wilt be flying,

XLIII.

Foe to my heart so wrathful:

Which more and more grows faithful.

Desire pursues thee crying,

To tell thee of his torment and my dying.

But if my heart's desire be not with grief confounded,
I hope by love to see thee caught or wounded.

Music by Giulio Eremita, 1580.

XLIV.

At sound of her sweet voice and words betraying,
My hope advanc'd that fair desire had founded;
But as brave Thebes was built by harps' sweet playing,
And fell by sound of warlike trump confounded;
So that despiteful tongue with rage inflamed,

Sounding th'alarm unto my heart amazed,

Of that proud hope the which to fall was framed,
Left not one rampire to the ground unrazed.

Music by L. Quintiani, 1570.

There is a story told of some one who on all occasions was very fond of relating an anecdote about a gun, which if he could not exactly introduce with reference to the current conversation, he used to preface by exclaiming, "Hark! "did not you hear the report of a gun?" He little cared, of course, what answer was made, but continued, "By the 'way, talking of a gun, I recollect a story," &c.

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In like manner, talking of the walls of brave Thebes being raised by harps' sweet playing, I beg to observe that neither the skill of Amphion, who caused the stones to follow

him, nor that of Orpheus, who not only moved inanimate nature, but even played so well that he moved Old Nick, is at all extraordinary; as will be seen by the following instances of the power of music, which the narrators without doubt, had they been now alive, would have attested before the Lord Mayor: their veracity I take to be unquestionable.

The river Eleusina (says no less a man than Aristotle) is so merrily disposed, that it will dance to a fiddle, bubbling at the sound of music, and will grow very muddy; but as soon as the music ceaseth, it ceaseth its motion, returning to its former calmness and clearness.

John Playford, the author of "An Introduction to the "Skill of Music, published in 1655," states therein, that when he was travelling near Royston, he met on the road a herd of about twenty stags following a bagpipe and a violin, which while the music played went forward, when it ceased stood still; and in this manner were they brought out of Yorkshire to Hampton Court.

Bonnet, the Editor of the French Histoire de la Musique, being in Holland in 1688, went to see a villa of Milord Portland, and was struck with the sight of a very handsome gallery in his great stable. "At first," says he, "I "concluded it was for the grooms to lie in, but the master "of the horse told me that it was to give a concert to the "horses once a week to cheer them, which they did; and "the horses seemed to be greatly delighted therewith." He also relates that in the month of May the people of Paris go to play in the gardens of the Tuileries upon lutes and guitars, and that the nightingales and linnets there perch upon the necks of the instruments, and listen with great attention and delight.

"But, (saith Playford,) the story of Ericus* the mu"sician passeth all, who being required by Bonus, King of "Denmark, to put his skill in practice, ended his excellent

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* Playford should have said "the musician of Ericus, king of Den

'mark, surnamed Bonus, or the Good," who lived A.D. 1132.

"voluntary with a choice fancy upon the Phrygian mood, "by which the King's passions were suddenly altered and "excited to that height, that he fell upon his most trusty "friends which were near him, and slew some of them with "his fist, for lack of another weapon; which the musician "perceiving, ended with the sober and solemn Doric, which "brought the King to himself, who much lamented what "he had done."

XLV.

Brown is my love, but graceful;

And each renowned whiteness

Match'd with her lovely brown, loseth its brightness.

Fair is my love, but scornful;

Yet have I seen despised

White dainty lilies, and sad flow'rs well prized.

Music by Alfonso Ferabosco, 1580.

There appear to be sundry reasons for preferring a brown love, if we may believe the following stanza of a song which Friar Bacon's man Miles sang to keep himself awake while watching the celebrated Brazen Head:

"The fair is oft inconstant,

"The black is often proud;

"I'll choose a lovely brown:

"Come, fiddler, scrape thy croud."

The famous History of Fryer Bacon and Fryer Bungay.

So also says Gascoigne in his Poems, 1570:

"Twixt fair and foul therefore, twixt great and small, "A lovely nut-brown face is best of all."

XLVI.

The wine that I so dearly got,

Sweetly sipping, mine eyes hath bleared;
And the more I'm barr'd the pot,
To thirst the more I have appeared.
But since thereby my heart is cheered,
Maugre ill luck and spiteful slanders,
Mine eyes shall not be my commanders.
For I maintain and ever shall;

Better the windows bide the dangers,

Than to spoil the house and all.

Music by A. Ferabosco, 1580.

I do not recollect any Madrigal of a Bacchanalian character save this. The praises of the Jolly God were generally confined to the inferior kinds of music called catches, roundelays, &c.

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"There is no better remedy against melancholy," quoth Burton, "than a cup of wine or strong drink if it be soberly "and opportunely used; not enforced by compulsion; but "as in that royal feast of Ahasuerus, which lasted one "hundred and eighty days, where they drank by order in golden vessels when and what they pleased. (Esther, i. 8.) “Wine measureably drunk and in time, brings gladness "and cheerfulness of mind. (Judges, ix. 13.) Seneca in "his book De Tranquillitate, goes further and recom"mends it as good sometimes to be drunk! it helps sorrow, 66 depresseth cares. Another philosopher says every man "ought to be so at least once a month for the good of his body. Paul bids Timothy drink wine for his stomach's "sake, or some such honest occasion. In short if this be "true," concludes Burton, "that wine and strong drink "have such virtue to expel fear and sorrow, and to exhila"rate the mind; ever hereafter let's drink and be merry."

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