74
The first Booke of
Cant. V.
All these together in one heape were throwne,Like carkases of beastes in butchers stall.And in another corner wide were strowneThe Antique ruins of the Romanes fall:Great Romulus the Grandsyre of them all,Proud Tarquin, and too lordly Lentulus,Stout Scipio, and stubborne Hanniball,Ambitious Sylla, and sterne Marius,High Cæsar, great Pompey, and fiers Antonius.
Amongst these mightie men were wemen mixt,Proud wemen, vaine, forgetfull of their yoke:The bold Semiramis, whose sides transfixtWith sonnes own blade, her fowle reproches spoke;Fayre Sthenobæa, that herselfe did chokeWith wilfull chord, for wanting of her will;High minded Cleopatra, that with strokeOf Aspes sting herselfe did stoutly kill:And thousands moe the like, that did that dongeon fill
Besides the endlesse routes of wretched thralles,Which thether were assembled day by day,From all the world after their wofull falles,Through wicked pride, and wasted welthes decay.But most of all, which in the Dongeon layFell from high Princes courtes, or Ladies bowres,Where they in ydle pomp, or wanton play,Consumed had their goods, and thriftlesse howres,And lastly thrown themselues into these heauy stowres.
Whose case whenas the carefull Dwarfe had tould,And made ensample of their mournfull sightVnto his maister, he no lenger wouldThere dwell in perill of like painefull plight,
But
