_Homer_, to whom the Muses did carouse A great deepe cup with heauenly nectar filld: The greatest, deepest cup in _Ioue's_ great house, (For _Ioue_ himselfe had so expresly willd) He dranke off all, ne let one drop be spilld; Since when, his braine that had before been drie, Became the well-spring of all Poetrie. 3. _Homer_ doth tell in his aboundant verse, The long laborious trauailes of the _Man_; And of his lady too he doth reherse, How shee illudes with all the art she can, Th' vngratefull loue which other lords began; For of her lord, false Fame long since had sworn, That _Neptune's_ monsters had his carkase torne. 4. All this he tells, but one thing he forgot, One thing most worthy his eternall song; But he was old, and blind, and saw it not, Or else he thought he should _Ulisses_ wrong, To mingle it his tragike acts among; Yet was there not in all the world of things, A sweeter burden for his Muse's wings. 5. The courtly loue _Antinous_ did make: _Antinous_ that fresh and iolly knight, Which of the gallants that did vndertake To win the widdow, had most wealth and might, Wit to perswade, and beautie to delight: The courtly loue he made vnto the Queene, _Homer_ forgot, as if it had not beene. 6. Sing then _Terpischore_, my light Muse sing His gentle art, and _cunning curtesie_; You lady can remember euery thing, For you are daughter of Queene Memorie; But sing a plaine and easy melodie: For the soft meane that warbleth but the ground, To my rude eare doth yeeld the sweetest sound. 7. One onely night's discourse I can report, When the great Torch-bearer of Heauen was gone Downe in a maske vnto the Ocean's Court, To reuell it with Thetis[184] all alone; Antinous disguisèd and vnknowne, Like to the Spring in gaudie ornament, Vnto the Castle of the Princesse went. 8. The soueraine Castle of the rockie Ile, Wherein _Penelope_ the Princesse lay; Shone with a thousand lamps, which did exile The shadowes darke,[185] and turn'd the night to day; Not _Ioue's_ blew tent, what time the sunny ray Behind the Bulwarke of the Earth retires, Is seene to sparkle with more twinckling fires. [Footnote 184: Misprinted 'Tethis.' G.] [Footnote 185: In 1st edition 'dim darke shades.' G.] 9. That night the Queen came forth from far within, And in the presence of her Court was seene; For the sweet singer _Ph[oe]mius_[186] did begin To praise the worthies that at _Troy_ had beene; Somewhat of her _Ulisses_ she did weene. In his graue hymne the heau'nly man would sing, Or of his warres, or of his wandering. 10.