good, my favorite is "Now winter nights enlarge." Others may prefer the melodious serenade, worthy even of Shelley, "Shall I come, sweet love, to thee?" But there is one poem of Campion (printed in the collection of 1601) which, for romantic beauty, could hardly be matched outside the sonnets of Shakespeare:—
"When thou must home to shades of underground
And there arrived, a new admired guest,
The beauteous spirits do not engirt thee round,
White Iope, blithe Helen and the rest,
To hear the stories of thy finished love
From that smooth tongue whose music hell can move;
Then wilt thou speak of banqueting delights,
Of masques and revels which sweet youth did make,
Of tourneys and great challenges of knights,
And all these triumps for thy beauty's sake;
When thou hast told these honours done to thee,
Then tell, O tell, how thou didst murder me."
The mention of "white Iope" was suggested by a passage of Propertius:—
I, to whose trust and care you durst commit
Your pined health when art despaired of it?"
Mounson was examined in 1615 with reference to the
Overbury murder; the warrant for his arrest was issue in
October, 1615; he was liberated on bail in October, 1616,
and his pardon was granted in February, 1616-17.
Mr. Barclay Squire kindly pointed out these facts to me.
For more information about Campion, see my edition of
his "Works." He was buried on 1st March, 1619-20.
