XXVI. THE FAIRIES FAREWELL.

THIS humorous old song fell from the hand of the witty Dr. Corbet (afterwards Bishop of Norwich, etc.), and is printed from his Poetica Stromata, 1648, 12mo, compared with the third edition of his poems, 1672.

The departure of fairies is here attributed to the abolition of monachism. Dr. Richard Corbet, Bishop of Oxford, and afterwards Bishop of Norwich, died in 1635, ætat. 52.

FAREWELL rewards and Fairies!

Good housewives now may say; For now foule sluts in dairies,

Doe fare as well as they :

And though they sweepe their hearths no less

Than mayds were wont to doe, Yet who of late for cleaneliness

Finds sixe-pence in her shoe?

Lament, lament old Abbies,

The fairies lost command;
'They did but change priests babies,

But some have chang'd your land:
And all your children stoln from thence
Are now growne Puritanes,
Who live as changelings ever since,
For love of your demaines.

At morning and at evening both
You merry were and glad,
So little care of sleepe and sloth,

These prettie ladies had.

When Tom came home from labour,

Or Ciss to milking rose,

Then merrily went their tabour,
And nimbly went their toes.

Witness those rings and roundelayes
Of theirs, which yet remaine;
Were footed in queene Maries dayes

On many a grassy playne.
But since of late Elizabeth

And later James came in ; They never danc'd on any heath, As when the time hath bin.

By which wee note the fairies
Were of the old profession :
Their songs were Ave Maries,

Their dances were procession.
But now, alas! they all are dead,
Or gone beyond the seas,
Or farther for religion fled,
Or else they take their ease.

A tell-tale in their company
They never could endure;
And whoso kept not secretly

Their mirth, was punish'd sure:
It was a just and christian deed

To pinch such blacke and blue:
O how the common-welth doth need
Such justices as you!

Now they have left our quarters;
A Register they have,
Who can preserve their charters;
A man both wise and grave.
An hundred of their merry pranks

By one that I could name
Are kept in store; con twenty thanks
To William for the same.

To William Churne of Staffordshire
Give laud and praises due,
Who every meale can mend your cheare
With tales both old and true:
To William all give audience,
And pray yee for his noddle:
For all the fairies' evidence
Were lost, if it were addle.

THE END OF BOOK THE SECOND.

ЗА

SERIES THE THIRD.—BOOK III.

1. THE BIRTH OF ST. GEORGE.

THE incidents in this and the other ballad of St. George and the Dragon, are chiefly taken from the old story-book of the Seven Champions of Christendome, which Bishop Hall says was among the most popular stories of his time. And Warton even thinks that Spenser took hints from it for his Faery Queene.

Richard Johnson, author of the Seven Champions, lived in the reign of Elizabeth and James, and his work is probably the bringing together of the metrical romances of former ages. It seems to us that scarce justice enough has been done to him for the service he has rendered romantic literature. He has brought the whole of the series of traditions, fragments, and ballads together, making the patron saint of England the centre round which the whole revolves, in the same manner that Sir Thomas Mallony re-animated the Arthurian legends.

St. George, according to Butler, was born in Cappadocia ; thus he became a soldier under Diocletian, but resigned his commissions and posts when that Emperor waged war against the Christian religion. He became the patron saint of soldiers, because he had been a military man himself.

The Greeks are said to have given him the title of "the Great Martyr," and he is the patron saint of several Eastern nations. The English are held to have chosen him as their tutelar saint under the first Norman kings; thus the council at Oxford in 1222 commanded his feast to be kept a holiday of the lesser rank, and Edward III. under his name and ensign instituted the most noble order of knighthood in England. However, there is not much to be learned of him with certainty; but having been made the patron saint, and "St. George for England" being the national war-cry, it was naturally not long before poets began to celebrate his praises, and to clothe their hero with all the valiant deeds and romantic adventures possible. And from this beginning we have a series of metrical romances which add to our collection of ancient reliques. It cannot be denied but that the following ballad is for the most part modern; yet it embodies the account given by older writers.

LISTEN, lords, in bower and hall,

I sing the wonderous birth

Of brave St. George, whose valourous arm
Rid monsters from the earth:

Distressed ladies to relieve

He travell'd many a day;
In honour of the Christian faith,
Which shall endure for aye.
In Coventry sometime did dwell
A knight of worthy fame,
High steward of this noble realme;
Lord Albert was his name.

He had to wife a princely dame,

Whose beauty did excell.

This virtuous lady, being with child,
In sudden sadness fell:

For thirty nights no sooner sleep
Had clos'd her wakeful eyes,
But, lo! a foul and fearful dream
Her fancy would surprize :

She dreamt a dragon fierce and fell
Conceiv'd within her womb;
Whose mortal fangs her body rent
Ere he to life could come.

THE following ballad is given (with some corrections) from two ancient black-letter copies in the Pepys Collection, one of which is in 12m0, the other in folio.