SONG. Spring. When daisies pied, and violets blue, Do paint the meadows with delight, When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men, for thus sings he, Cuckoo, cuckoo, O word of fear, III. Winter. When icicles hang by the wall, 2 And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel3 the pot. · cuckoo-buds-] Cuckoo-buds must be wrong. I believe cowslip-buds, the true reading. FARMER. IV. When all aloud the wind doth blow, And coughing drowns the parson's saw, And Marian's nose looks red and raw, Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 4 Arm. The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo. You, that way; we, this way. [Exeunt.6 4 the parson's saw,] Saw seems anciently to have meant, not as at present, a proverb, a sentence, but the whole tenor of any instructive discourse. 5 When roasted crabs, &c.] i. e. the wild apples so called. The bowl must be supposed to be filled with ale; a toast and some spice and sugar being added, what is called lamb's wool is produced. 6 In this play, which all the editors have concurred to censure, and some have rejected as unworthy of our poet, it must be confessed that there are many passages mean, childish, and vulgar; and some which ought not to have been exhibited, as we are told they were, to a maiden queen. But there are scattered through the whole many sparks of genius; nor is there any play that has more evident marks of the hand of Shakspeare. JOHNSON. END OF THE SECOND VOLUME. LONDON: Printed by A. & R. Spottiswoode, ની |