The Authors verses. 
5 If courtlie change so breaketh will 
That countrie life must serue the turne : 
What profit then in striuing still, 
Against the prick to séeme to spurne ? 
6 What gaine I though I doo repent, 
My crotches! all are broke and gon: 
My woonted friends are careles bent, 
They feare no chance I chance vpon. 
7 Now if I take in woorth my lot, 
That fatall chance doth force me to, 
If ye be friends embraid* me not, 
But vse a friend as friends should do. 
eee SN es ee 
113. 
205 
If court with cart 
Must be content, 
What ease to hart, 
Though mind repent ? 
As néede doth make 
Old age to trot : 
So must I take, 
In woorth my lot. 
Behold the horse 
Must trudge for pelfe, 
And yet of forse, 
Content it selfe. 
The Authors life.s 
I OW gentle friend, if thou be kinde, 
Disdaine thou not, although the lot 
Will now with me no better be, 
than doth appere: 
Nor let it grieue, that thus I liue, 
But rather gesse, for quietnesse, 
As others do, so do I to, 
content me here. 
2 By leaue and loue, of God aboue, 
I minde to shew, in verses few, 
How through the breers, my youthfull yeeres, 
haue runne their race: 
And further say, why thus I stay, 
And minde to liue, as Bee in hiue, 
Full bent to spend my life to an end, 
in this same place.‘ 
1 chrotches. 
1577- 
3 First added to the 1573 edition.—M. 
4 «¢The author means London ; but though it is believed he died there, 
it is evident from the sequel, that he left it on account of the plague.” —M. 
2 upbraid. 1614. 
Epodium. 
