rthless  wit !  to  train  me  to  this  woe  :
il  arts  !  that  nourish  discontent :
e  the  folly  that  bewitch'd  me  so !
oughts,  adieu  !  for  now  I  will  repent, —
;  my  wants  persuade  me  to  proceed,
e  take  pity  of  a  scholar's  need.
oies  <tf  Scarce  Books,     t  Calamities  of  Authors.
Forgive  me,  God,  although  I  curse  my  birth.
And  ban  the  air  wherein  I  breathe  a  wretch.
Since  misery  hath  daunted  all  my  mirth,
And  I  am  quite  undone  through  promise  breach  ;
Ah  friends  1 — no  friends  that  then  ungentle  frown.
When  changing  fortune  casts  us  headlong  down.
Without  redress  complains  my  careless  verse.
And  Midas'  ears  relent  not  at  my  moan  ;
In  some  far  land  will  I  my  griefs  rehearse,
'Mongst  them  that  will  be  moved  when  I  shall

groan.
England,  adieu  !  the  soil  that  brought  me  forth.
Adieu  !  unkind,  where  skill  is  nothing  worth.
EDWARD  VERB,  EARL  OF  OXFORD.
[Born,  ISM.    Di«d,  ISM.]


nobleman  sat  as  Great  Chamberlain  of
td   upon    the    trial  of   Mary   Queen   of

In  the  year  of  the  Armada,  he  distin-
I  his  public  spirit  by  fitting  out  some  ships
krivate  cost.  He  had  travelled  in  Italy  in
th,  and  is  said  to  have  returned  the  most
klished  coxcomb  of  his  age.  The  story  of
urel  with  Sir  Philip  Sydney,  as  it  is  re-
r  Collins,  gives  us  a  most  unfavourable  idea
manners  and  temper,  and  shows  to  what  a
the  claims  of  aristocratical  privilege  were
time  carriedt.  Some  still  more  discredit-
Earl  of  Oxford  being  one4*y  In  the  tennis-court
'  Philip  Sydney,  on  some  offenoe  which  he  had


able  traits  of  his  character  are  to  be  found  in  the
history  of  his  life§.
