The king he cal'd her back again,
And unto her he gave his chaine;
And said, "With us you shall remain
Till such time as we dye.

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

And honoured like the queene;
With thee I meane to lead my life,

As shortly shall be seene:
Our wedding day shall appointed be,
And every thing in their degree;
Come on," quoth he, "and follow me,

Thou shalt go shift thee cleane.
What is thy name?-go on," quoth he.
"Penelophon, O King!" quoth she;
With that she made a lowe courtsey;
A trim one as I weene.

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65

70

And straight againe as pale as lead,
But not a word at all she said,

She was in such amaze.

At last she spake with trembling voyce,
And said, "O King, I do rejoyce

That you will take me for your choice,

And my degree so base!"

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And when the wedding day was come,

The king commanded straight
The noblemen, both all and some,

Upon the queene to waight.
And she behavd herself that day
As if she had never walkt the way;
She had forgot her gowne of gray,
Which she did wear of late.

The proverb old is come to passe,
The priest, when he begins the masse,
Forgets that ever clarke he was;

He knowth not his estate.

Here you may read Cophetua,
Through fancie long time fed,
Compelled by the blinded boy

The beggar for to wed:

He that did lovers lookes disdaine,

To do the same was glad and fain,
Or else he would himself have slaine,

In stories as we read.

Disdaine no whit, O lady deere,
But pitty now thy servant heere,
Lest that it hap to thee this yeare,
As to the king it did.

And thus they lead a quiet life

During their princely raigne,

And in a tombe were buried both,

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30

95

100

105

110

As writers shew us plaine.

The lords they tooke it grievously,

The ladies tooke it heavily,

The commons cryed pittiously,

Their death to them was pain.
Their fame did sound so passingly,
That it did pierce the starry sky,
And throughout all the world did flye
To every princes realme.

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120

THE SPANISH LADY'S LOVE.

FROM The Garland of Good-Will, as reprinted by the Percy Society, xxx. 125. Other copies, slightly different, in A Collection of Old Ballads, ii. 191, and in Percy's Reliques, ii. 246.

Percy conjectures that this ballad "took its rise from one of those descents made on the Spanish coasts in the time of Queen Elizabeth." The weight of tradition is decidedly, perhaps entirely, in favor of the hero's having been one of Essex's comrades in the Cadiz expedition, but which of his gallant captains achieved the double conquest of the Spanish Lady is by no means satisfactorily determined. Among the candidates put forth are Sir Richard Levison of Trentham, Staffordshire, Sir John Popham of Littlecot, Wilts, Sir Urias Legh of Adlington, Cheshire, and Sir John Bolle of Thorpe Hall, Lincolnshire. The right of the last to this distinction has been recently warmly contended for, and, as is usual in similar cases, strong circumstantial evidence is urged in his favor. The reader will judge for himself of its probable authenticity.

"On Sir John Bolle's departure from Cadiz," it is said, "the Spanish Lady sent as presents to his

wife a profusion of jewels and other valuables, among which was her portrait drawn in green; plate, money, and other treasures." Some of these articles are maintained to be still in possession of the family, and also a portrait of Sir John, drawn in 1596, at the age of thirty-six, in which he wears the gold chain given him by his enamored prisoner. See The Times newspaper of April 30 and May 1, 1846, (the latter article cited in Notes and Queries, ix. 573,) and the Quarterly Review, Sept. 1846, Art. III. The literary merits of the ballad are also considered in the Edinburgh Review, of April, 1846.

Shenstone has essayed in his Moral Tale of Love and Honour to bring out "the Spanish Ladye and her Knight in less grovelling accents than the simple guise of ancient record," while Wordsworth, in a more reverential spirit, has taken this noble old romance as the model of his Armenian Lady's Love.

WILL you hear a Spanish lady,

How she woo'd an English man? Garments gay as rich as may be,

Decked with jewels, had she on ;

Of a comely countenance and grace was she,
And by birth and parentage of high degree.

As his prisoner there he kept her,

In his hands her life did lie;

Cupid's bands did tie her faster,

By the liking of an eye;

In his courteous company was all her joy,
To favour him in any thing she was not coy.