Sweet _Thames_ I honour thee, not for thou art The chiefest Riuer of the fairest Ile, Nor for thou dost admirers eies beguile, But for thou hold'st the keeper of my heart, For on thy waues, (thy Christal-billow'd waues,) My fairest faire, my siluer Swan is swimming: Against the sunne his pruned feathers trimming: Whilst _Neptune_ his faire feete with water laues, Neptune, I feare not thee, not yet thine eie, And yet (alas) _Apollo_ lou'd a boy, And _Cyparissus_ was _Siluanus_ ioy. No, no, I feare none but faire _Thetis_, I, For if she spie my Loue, (alas) aie me, My mirth is turn'd to extreame miserie. _SONNET. VIII._ [Illustration] Sometimes I wish that I his pillow were, So might I steale a kisse, and yet not seene, So might I gaze vpon his sleeping eine, Although I did it with a panting feare: But when I well consider how vaine my wish is, Ah foolish Bees (thinke I) that doe not sucke His lips for hony; but poore flowers doe plucke Which haue no sweet in them: when his sole kisses, Are able to reuiue a dying soule. Kisse him, but sting him not, for if you doe, His angry voice your flying will pursue: But when they heare his tongue, what can controule, Their back-returne? for then they plaine may see, How hony-combs from his lips dropping bee. _SONNET. IX._ [Illustration] _Diana_ (on a time) walking the wood, To sport herselfe, of her faire traine forlorne, Chaunc't for to pricke her foote against a thorne, And from thence issu'd out a streame of blood. No sooner shee was vanisht out of sight, But loues faire Queen came there away by chance, And hauing of this hap a glym'ring glance, She put the blood into a christall bright, When being now come vnto mount _Rhodope_, With her faire hands she formes a shape of Snow, And blends it with this blood; from whence doth grow A lonely creature, brighter than the Dey. And being christned in faire _Paphos_ shrine, She call'd him _Ganymede:_ as all diuine. _SONNET. X._ [Illustration] Thus was my loue, thus was my _Ganymed_, (Heauens ioy, worlds wonder, natures fairest work, In whose aspect Hope and Dispaire doe lurke) Made of pure blood in whitest snow yshed, And for sweete _Venus_ only form'd his face, And his each member delicately framed, And last of all faire _Ganymede_ him named, His limbs (as their Creatrix) her imbrace. But as for his pure, spotles, vertuous minde, Because it sprung of chaste _Dianaes_ blood, (Goddesse of Maides, directresse of all good,) Hit wholy is to chastity inclinde. And thus it is: as far as I can proue, He loues to be beloued, but not to loue. _SONNET XI._ [Illustration]