Voyage

You brave heroic minds,
Worthy your country's name,
That honour still pursue;
Go and subdue,

Whilst loitering hinds

Lurk here at home with shame.

Britons, you stay too long;
Quickly aboard bestow you,
And with a merry gale
Swell your stretched sail,
With vows as strong

As the winds that blow you.

Your course securely steer,

West and by south forth keep;
Rocks, lee-shores, nor shoals,
When Eolus scowls,

You need not fear;
So absolute the deep.

And cheerfully at sea
Success you still entice

TO THE VIRGINIAN VOYAGE

To get the pearl and gold,
And ours to hold

Virginia,

Earth's only Paradise.

When nature hath in store
Fowl, venison, and fish,
And the fruitful'st soil,
Without your toil,

Three harvests more,

All greater than you wish.

And the ambitious vine
Crowns with his purple mass
The cedar reaching high
To kiss the sky,

The cypress, pine,

And useful sassafras.

To whom the golden age

Still nature's laws doth give,
No other cares attend

But them to defend

From winter's rage,

That long there doth not live.

When as the luscious smell

Of that delicious land,

Above the seas that flows,
The clear wind throws

Your hearts to swell
Approaching the dear strand;

In kenning of the shore
(Thanks to God first given),
O you, the happiest men,
Be frolic then;

Let cannons roar,

Frighting the wide heaven.

And in regions far,

Such heroes bring ye forth,

As those from whom we came:

And plant our name

Under that star

Not known unto our North.

And as there plenty grows
Of laurel everywhere,

Apollo's sacred tree,

You it may see,

A poet's brows

To crown, that may sing there.

Thy voyages attend

Industrious Hackluit,

Whose reading shall inflame

Men to seek fame,

And much commend

To after-times thy wit.

To Cupid

Maidens, why spare ye?
Or whether not dare ye
Correct the blind shooter?
Because wanton Venus,
So oft that doth pain us,
Is her son's tutor!

Now in the Spring
He proveth his wing,

The field is his bower;

And as the small bee,

About flyeth he

From flower to flower.

And wantonly roves
Abroad in the groves,

And in the air hovers;
Which when it him deweth,
His feathers he meweth
In sighs of true lovers.

And since doomed by Fate (That well knew his hate) That he should be blind,

For very despite,

Our eyes be his white,
So wayward his kind.

If his shafts losing
(Ill his mark choosing)
Or his bow broken,
The moan Venus maketh,
And care that she taketh,
Cannot be spoken.

To Vulcan commending

Her love, and straight sending
Her doves and her sparrows,
With kisses, unto him,

And all but to woo him

To make her son arrows.

Telling what he hath done,
Saith she, " Right mine own son!"
In her arms him she closes,
Sweets on him fans,

Laid in down of her swans,

His sheets, leaves of roses.

And feeds him with kisses;
Which oft when he misses

He ever is froward:
The mother's o'erjoying
Makes by much coying
The child so untoward.