I think Nature hath lost the mould Where she her shape did take; Or else I doubt if Nature could So fair a creature make. She may be well compared Unto the Phœnix kind, Whose like was never seen or heard, That any man can find. In life she is Diana chaste, In troth Penelopey; In word and eke in deed steadfast. --What will you more we say? If all the world were sought so far, Who could find such a wight? Her beauty twinkleth like a star Within the frosty night. Her rosial colour comes and goes With such a comely grace, More ruddier, too, than doth the rose, Within her lively face. At Bacchus’ feast none shall her meet, Ne at no wanton play, Nor gazing in an open street, Nor gadding as a stray. The modest mirth that she doth use Is mix’d with shamefastness; All vice she doth wholly refuse, And hateth idleness. O Lord! it is a world to see How virtue can repair, And deck in her such honesty, Whom Nature made so fair. Truly she doth so far exceed Our women nowadays, As doth the jeliflower a weed; And more a thousand ways. How might I do to get a graff Of this unspotted tree? --For all the rest are plain but chaff, Which seem good corn to be. This gift alone I shall her give; When death doth what he can, Her honest fame shall ever live Within the mouth of man. ? by _John Heywood_ _54._ _To Her Sea-faring Lover_ Tottel’s Miscellany, 1557 Shall I thus ever long, and be no whit the neare? And shall I still complain to thee, the which me will not hear? Alas! say nay! say nay! and be no more so dumb, But open thou thy manly mouth and say that thou wilt come: Whereby my heart may think, although I see not thee, That thou wilt come--thy word so sware--if thou a live man be. The roaring hugy waves they threaten my poor ghost, And toss thee up and down the seas in danger to be lost. Shall they not make me fear that they have swallowed thee? --But as thou art most sure alive, so wilt thou come to me. Whereby I shall go see thy ship ride on the strand, And think and say _Lo where he comes_ and _Sure here will he land:_ _54._ neare] nearer.