Young I was, but now am old, But I am not yet grown cold; I can play, and I can twine 'Bout a virgin like a vine: In her lap too I can lie Melting, and in fancy die; And return to life if she Claps my cheek, or kisseth me: Thus, and thus it now appears That our love outlasts our years. 44. LOVE'S PLAY AT PUSH-PIN. Love and myself, believe me, on a day At childish push-pin, for our sport, did play; I put, he pushed, and, heedless of my skin, Love pricked my finger with a golden pin; Since which it festers so that I can prove 'Twas but a trick to poison me with love: Little the wound was, greater was the smart, The finger bled, but burnt was all my heart. _Push-pin_, a game in which pins are pushed with an endeavor to cross them. 45. THE ROSARY. One ask'd me where the roses grew: I bade him not go seek, But forthwith bade my Julia show A bud in either cheek. 46. UPON CUPID. Old wives have often told how they Saw Cupid bitten by a flea; And thereupon, in tears half drown'd, He cried aloud: Help, help the wound! He wept, he sobb'd, he call'd to some To bring him lint and balsamum, To make a tent, and put it in Where the stiletto pierced the skin; Which, being done, the fretful pain Assuaged, and he was well again. _Tent_, a roll of lint for probing wounds. 47. THE PARCÆ; OR, THREE DAINTY DESTINIES: THE ARMILLET. Three lovely sisters working were, As they were closely set, Of soft and dainty maidenhair A curious armillet. I, smiling, asked them what they did, Fair Destinies all three, Who told me they had drawn a thread Of life, and 'twas for me. They show'd me then how fine 'twas spun, And I reply'd thereto,-- "I care not now how soon 'tis done, Or cut, if cut by you". 48. SORROWS SUCCEED. When one is past, another care we have: _Thus woe succeeds a woe, as wave a wave_. 49. CHERRY-PIT. Julia and I did lately sit Playing for sport at cherry-pit: She threw; I cast; and, having thrown, I got the pit, and she the stone. _Cherry-pit_, a game in which cherry-stones were pitched into a small hole. 50. TO ROBIN REDBREAST. Laid out for dead, let thy last kindness be With leaves and moss-work for to cover me: And while the wood-nymphs my cold corpse inter, Sing thou my dirge, sweet-warbling chorister! For epitaph, in foliage, next write this: _Here, here the tomb of Robin Herrick is_. 51. DISCONTENTS IN DEVON. More discontents I never had Since I was born than here, Where I have been, and still am sad, In this dull Devonshire; Yet, justly too, I must confess I ne'er invented such Ennobled numbers for the press, Than where I loathed so much. 52. TO HIS PATERNAL COUNTRY.