The Canterbury tales and Faerie queene &c., &c., &c., ed. for popular perusal with current illustrations and explanatory notes, by D. Laing Purves.

562 POEMS OF EDMUND SPENSER. [FEBRUARY.
Nor for fruit nor for shadow serves thy stock; Submitting me to your good suff'rance,
Seest how fresh my flowers be spread, And praying to be guarded from grievance.'
Dy'd in lily white and crimson red, "To this the Oak cast him to reply
With leaves engrained in lusty green; Well as he could; but his enemy
Colours meet to clothe a maiden queen? Had kindled such coals of displeasure,
Thy waste bigness but cumbers the ground, That the goodman n'ould 13 stay his leisure,
And dirks 1 the beauty of my blossoms round: But home him hasted with furious heat,
The mouldy moss, which thee accloyeth,2 Increasing his wrath with many a threat:
My cinnamon smell too much annoyeth: His harmful hatchet he hent 14 in hand
Wherefore soon I read 3 thee hence remove, (Alas! that it so ready should stand!)
Lest thou the price of my displeasure prove.' And to the field alone he speedeth
So spake this bold Briar with great disdain: (Ay little help to harm there needeth!)
Little him answer'd the Oak again, Anger n'ould let him speak to the tree,
But yielded, with shame and grief adaw'd,4 Enauntre 1 his rage might cooled be;
That of a weed he was overcraw'd.5 But to the root bent his sturdy stroke,
" It chanced after, upon a day, And made many wounds in the waste Oak.
The husbandman's self to come that way, The axe's edge did oft turn again,
Of custom for to surview his ground, As half unwilling to cut the grain;
And his trees of state in compass round: Seemed the senseless iron did fear,
Him when the spiteful Briar had espied, Or to wrong holy eld did forbear;
Causeless complained, and loudly cried For it had been an ancient tree,
Unto his lord, stirring up stern strife: Sacred with many a mystery,' O my liege lord! the god of my life, And often cross'd with the priestes' crew,
Pleaseth you ponder your suppliant's plaint, And often hall6w'd with holy-water dew:
Caused of wrong and cruel constraint But such fancies were foolery,
Which I your poor vassal daily endure; And brought this Oak to this misery;
And, but 6 your goodness the same recure,7 For naught mightthey quitten16 himfrom decay,
Am like for desperate dool 8 to die, For fiercely the goodman at him did lay:
Through felonous force of mine enemf. The block oft groaned under the blow,
" Greatly aghast with this piteous plea, And sigh'd to see his near overthrow.
Him rested the goodman on the lea, In fine, the steel had pierced his pith,
And bade the Briar in his plaint proceed. Then down to the earth he fell forthwith.
With painted words then gan this proud weed His wondrous weight made the ground to quake,
(As most usen ambitious folk) Th' earth shrunk under him, and seemed to
His coloured crime with craft to cloak. shake:"'Ah, my sovereign! lord of creatures all, There lieth the Oak, pitiid of none!
Thou placer of plants both humble and tall, " Now stands the Briar like a lord alone,
Was not I planted of thine own hand, Puff'd up with pride and vain pleasance;
To be the primrose 9 of all thy land; But all this glee had no continuance:
With flow'ring blossoms to furnish the prime,10 For eftsoons winter gan to approach;
And scarlet berries in summer time? The blustering Boreas did encroach,
How falls it then that this faded Oak, And beat upon the solitary Brere;
Whose body is sear, whose branches broke, For now no succour was seen him near.
Whose naked arms stretch unto the fire,1 Now gan he repent his pride too late;
Unto such tyranny doth aspire; For, naked left and disconsolate,
Hind'ring with his shade my lovely light, The biting frost nipped his stalk dead,
And robbing me of the sweet sun's sight? The watery wet weigh'd down his head,
So beat his old boughs my tender side, And heaped snow burden'd him so sore,
That oft the blood springeth from woundes That now upright he can stand no more;
wide; And, being down, is trod in the dirt
Untimely my flowers forc'd to fall, Of cattle, and bruis'd, and sorely hurt.
That be the honofr of your coronal: Such was th' end of this ambitious Brere,
And oft he lets his canker-worms light For scorning eld "Upon my branches, to work me more spite; C. Now I pray thee, shepherd, tell it not
And oft his hoary locks 12 down doth cast, forth:
Wherewith my fresh flow'rets be defac'd. Here is a long tale, and little worth.
For this, and many more such outrage, So long have I listen'd to thy speech,
Craving your goodlihead to assuage That graffed to the ground is my breech;
The rancorous rigour of his might, My heart-blood is well nigh from 17 I feel,
Naught ask I, but only to hold my right; And my galage 18 grown fast to my heel;
1 Obscures,'darkens. 13 Would not.
2 Encumbereth. 3 Counsel. 14 Seized.
4 Confounded. 5 Overcrowed. 15 ", In adventure," like "parauntre" for "peradven6 Unless. 7 Redress. ture;" in case that. 16 Deliver.
8 Grief.'9 The ehief flower. 17 Frozen; German, "gefroren."
lo Spring. 1 Are fit only for firewood. 18 E. K. explains this as "a start-up, or clownish
12 Withered leaves. shoe; " French, "galoche."