X.
Cupid's Pastime.
This beautiful poem, which possesses a classical elegance hardly to be
expected in the age of James I. is printed from the fourth edition of Davison's
Poems,[1] &c. 1621. It is also found in a later miscellany, intitled,Le Prince d'Amour,
1660, 8vo. Francis Davison, editor of the poems above referred to, was son of that
unfortunate secretary of state, who suffered so much from the affair of Mary Queen of
Scots. These poems, he tells us in his preface, were written by himself, by his brother
[Walter], who was a soldier in the wars of the Low Countries, and by some dear
friends "anonymoi." Among them are found some pieces by Sir J. Davis, the Countess
of Pembroke, Sir Philip Sidney, Spenser, and other wits of those times.
In the fourth vol. of Dryden'sMiscellanies, this poem is attributed to Sydney
Godolphin, Esq.; but erroneously, being probably written before he was born. One
edit. of Davison's book was published in 1608. Godolphin was born in 1610, and died
in 1642-3.--Ath. Ox.ii. 23.
IT chanc'd of late a shepherd swain,
That went to seek his straying sheep,
Within a thicket on a plain
Espied a dainty nymph asleep.
Her golden hair o'erspread her face;
Her careless arms abroad were cast;
Her quiver had her pillows place;
Her breast lay bare to every blast.
The shepherd stood and gaz'd his fill;
Nought durst he do; nought durst he say;
Whilst chance, or else perhaps his will,
Did guide the god of love that way.
The crafty boy that sees her sleep,
Whom if she wak'd he durst not see;
Behind her closely seeks to creep,
Before her nap should ended bee.
There come, he steals her shafts away,
And puts his own into their place;
Nor dares he any longer stay,
But, ere she wakes, hies thence apace.
Scarce was he gone, but she awakes,
And spies the shepherd standing by:
Her bended bow in haste she takes,
And at the simple swain lets flye.
Forth flew the shaft, and pierc'd his heart.
That to the ground he fell with pain:
Yet up again forthwith he start,
And to the nymph he ran amain.
Amazed to see so strange a sight,
She shot, and shot, but all in vain: