¶ The Shepheard Delicius his Dittie. +Printed in Yong, Diana (1598), pp. 252-53. Prefaced by ‘ Delicius tooke his Rebecke, whereon he so sweetely played and sung to it, that we thought Apollo had committed some newe fault to become a Shepherde againe, and that it was euen he that made that sweete melodie. The song was of great sentence, the inuention wittie, and the forme of it curious, wherefore lend an attentiue eare to one and the other, if you desire to delight you with it’. Author: Bartholomew Yong. Structure (May/Ringler): 58: 8×7, 1×2, a10b6cdef10g6, aa10. Variant of the sestina: abcdefg rhymes correspond in each 7-line stanza: the final couplet is an f rhyme.
N Euer a greater foe did Loue disdaine, Or trode on grasse so gay, Nor Nimph greene leaues with whiter hand hath renttorn , More golden haire the wind did neuer blow, (5) Nor fairer Dame hath bound in white attire, Or hath in Lawne more gracious features tied, Then my sweete Enemie.
Beautie and chastitie one place refraine, +See Juvenal, Satires , x.297: ‘Rara est adeo concordia formae/atque pudicitiae’, ‘since beauty so rarely coincides with purity’. For a similar reference see Paradise , ’57. Temperance, Spurina and the Romaine Ladies’. *In her beare equall sway: (10) Filling the world with wonder and content. But they doe giue me paine and double woe, Since loue and beautie kindled my desire, And cruell chastitie from me denied All sence of iollitie.
(15) There is no Rose, nor Lilly after raine, Nor flower in moneth of May, Nor pleasant meade, nor greene in Sommer sent, That seeing them, my minde delighteth so, As that faire flower which all the heauens admire, (20) Spending my thoughts on her, in whom abidedwell All grace and gifts on hie.
Me thinks my heauenly Nimph I see againe Her neck and breast display: Seeing the whitest Ermine to frequent +Ermine signifies purity; see Nicholas Hilliard’s ‘Ermine Portrait’ of Elizabeth I, c. 1585, see also ‘Hobinol’s Ditty in praise of Eliza Queen of the Shepherds’, 22: ‘Ermines white’. *(25) Some plaine, or flowers that make the fairest show. O Gods, I neuer yet beheld her nier,
