Weep no more, lady, weep no more,

Thy sorrowe is in vaine :

For violets pluckt the sweetest showers
Will ne'er make grow againe.

Our joys as winged dreams doe flye,
Why then should sorrow last?
Since grief but aggravates thy losse,
Grieve not for what is past.

O say not soe, thou holy friar;
I pray thee, say not soe:

For since my true-love dyed for mee,
'Tis meet my tears should flow.

And will he ne'er come again?

Will he ne'er come again?

Ah! no, he is dead and laid in his grave,

For ever to remain,

His cheek was redder than the rose;

The comliest youth was he!

Bút he is dead and laid in his grave:

Hadst thou been fond, he had been false,

And left thee sad and heavy ;

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For young men ever were fickle found,

Since summer trees were leafy.

Now say not so, thou holy friar,

I pray thee say not soe;

My love he had the truest heart :

O he was ever true!

And art thou dead, thou much-lov'd youth,

And didst thou dye for mee?

Then farewell home; for ever-more

A pilgrim I will bee.

But first upon my true-loves grave

My weary limbs I'll lay,

And thrice I'll kiss the green-grass turf,

That wraps his breathless clay.

Yet stay, fair lady; rest awhile

Beneath this cloyster wall:

See through the hawthorn blows the cold wind,

And drizzly rain doth fall.

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80

85

1

Yet stay, fair lady, turn again,

And dry those pearly tears;
For see beneath this gown of gray

Thy owne true-love appears.

Here forc'd by grief, and hopeless love,

These holy weeds I sought;

And here amid these lonely walls

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Once more unto my heart;

For since I have found thee, lovely youth,

We never more will part.

*The year of probation, or noviciate.

*As the foregoing song has been thought to have suggested to our late excellent Poet Dr. GOLDSMITH, the Plan of his beautiful ballad of EDWIN AND EMMA, (first printed in his "Vicar of Wakefield,") it is but justice to his memory to declare, that his Poem was written first, and that if there is any imitation in the case, they will be found both to be indebted to the beautiful old ballad GENTLE HERDSMAN, &c. printed in the second volume of this work, which the Doctor had much admired in manuscript, and has finely improved. See vol. ii. booki. song xiv. ver. 37, pag. 87, &c.

THE END OF THE SECOND BOOK.

OF

Ancient Poetry, C.

SERIES THE FIRST.

BOOK III.

I.

THE MORE MODERN BALLAD OF

CHEVY CHACE.

At the beginning of this volume we gave the old original Song of CHEVY CHACE. The reader has here the more improved edition of that fine Heroic ballad. It will afford an agreeable entertainment to the curious to compare them together, and to see how far the latter bard has excelled his predecessor, and where he has fallen short of him. For though he has every where improved the versification, and generally the sentiment and diction; yet some few passages retain more dignity in the ancient copy; at least the obsoleteness of the style serves as a veil to hide whatever might appear too familiar or vulgar in them. Thus, for instance, the catastrophe of the gallant Witherington is in the modern copy exprest in terms which never fail at present to excite ridicule : whereas in the original it is related with a plain and pathetic simplicity, that is liable to no such unlucky

effect: