Description of the Shepherd and His Wife

It was near a thicky shade,

That broad leaves of beech had made,

Joining all their tops so nigh,

That scarce Phoebus in could pry,

To see if Lovers in the thick

Could dally with a wanton trick;

Where sat the swain and his wife,

Sporting in that pleasing life,

That Coridon commendeth so,

All other lives to overgo.

He and she did sit and keep

Flocks of kids, and folds of sheep:

He upon his pipe did play;

She tun'd voice unto his lay,

And, for you might her housewife know,

Voice did sing and fingers sew.

He was young: his coat was green,

With welts of white, seam'd between,

Turned over with a flap,

That breast and bosom in did wrap,

Skirts side and pleated free,

Seemly hanging to his knee:

A whittle with a silver chape:

Cloak was russet, and the cape

Served for a bonnet oft

To shroud him from the wet aloft:

A leather scrip of colour red,

With a button on the head.

A bottle full of country whig

By the shepherd's side did lig;

And in a little bush hard by,

There the shepherd's dog did lie,

Who, while his master 'gan to sleep,

Well could watch both kids and sheep.

The shepherd was a frolic swain;

For though his parel was but plain,

Yet do the authors soothly say,

His colour was both fresh and gay,

And in their writs plain discuss,

Fairer was not Tityrus,

Nor Menaclas, whom they call

The alderliefest swain of all.

Seeming him was his wife,

Both in line, and in life:

Fair she was as fair might be,

Like the roses in the tree;

Buxom, blithe, and young, I ween,

Beauteous, like a summer's queen,

For her cheeks were ruddy-hu'd,

As if lilies were imbrue'd

With drops of blood, to make the white

Please the eye with more delight:

Love did lie within her eyes

In ambush for some wanton prize.

A liefer lass than this had been

Coridon had never seen,

Nor was Phillis, that fair maid,

Half so gaudy or so gay.

She wore a chaplet on her head;

Her cassock was of scarlet red,

Long and large, as straight as bent:

Her middle was both small and gent;

A neck as white as whale's bone,

Compass'd with a lace of stone,

Fine she was, and fair she was,

Brighter than the brightest glass;

Such a shepherd's wife as she

Was not more in Thessaly.