If then it please you, but to doe your due, What for these windes I did, Ile doe for you; Ile wooe you then, and if that not suffice, My pen shall prooue you to haue dietyes, Ile sing your loues in verses that shall flow, And tell the storyes of your weale and woe, Ile prooue what profit to the earth you bring, And how t'is you that welcome in the spring; Ile raise vp altars to you, as to show, The time shall be kept holy, when you blow. 100 O blessed winds! your will that it may be, To send health to her, and her home to me. To my most dearely-loued friend HENERY REYNOLDS Esquire, of _Poets & Poesie_ My dearely loued friend how oft haue we, In winter evenings (meaning to be free,) To some well-chosen place vs'd to retire; And there with moderate meate, and wine, and fire, Haue past the howres contentedly with chat, Now talk of this, and then discours'd of that, Spoke our owne verses 'twixt our selves, if not Other mens lines, which we by chance had got, Or some Stage pieces famous long before, Of which your happy memory had store; 10 And I remember you much pleased were, Of those who liued long agoe to heare, As well as of those, of these latter times, Who have inricht our language with their rimes, And in succession, how still vp they grew, Which is the subiect, that I now pursue; For from my cradle, (you must know that) I, Was still inclin'd to noble Poesie, And when that once _Pueriles_ I had read, And newly had my _Cato_ construed, 20 In my small selfe I greatly marueil'd then, Amonst all other, what strange kinde of men These Poets were; And pleased with the name, To my milde Tutor merrily I came, (For I was then a proper goodly page, Much like a Pigmy, scarse ten yeares of age) Clasping my slender armes about his thigh. O my deare master! cannot you (quoth I) Make me a Poet, doe it if you can, And you shall see, Ile quickly bee a man, 30 Who me thus answered smiling, boy quoth he, If you'le not play the wag, but I may see You ply your learning, I will shortly read Some Poets to you; _Phœbus_ be my speed, Too't hard went I, when shortly he began, And first read to me honest _Mantuan_, Then _Virgils Eglogues_, being entred thus, Me thought I straight had mounted _Pegasus_, And in his full Careere could make him stop, And bound vpon _Parnassus'_ by-clift top. 40 I scornd your ballet then though it were done And had for Finis, _William Elderton_. But soft, in sporting with this childish iest, I from my subiect haue too long digrest, Then to the matter that we tooke in hand,