MORTIMER TO QUEENE ISABEL.
As thy Salutes my Sorrowes doe adjourne,
So backe to thee their int'rest I returne;
Though not in so great Bountie (I confesse)
As thy Heroicke Princely Lines expresse:
For how should Comfort issue from the Breath
Roger Mortimer, Lord of Wigmore, had
stood publikely condemned, for his Insurrection with Thomas
Earle of Lancaster, and Bohune Earle of Hereford,
by the space of three Moneths: and as the report went, the day
of his Execution was determined to have beene shortly, which
he prevented by his escape.
Of one condemn'd, and long lodg'd up for Death?
From Murthers Rage thou didst me once reprive;
Now in Exile, my Hopes thou do'st revive:
At what time the two Mortimers, this Roger Lord of
Wigmore, and his uncle Roger Mortimer the elder, were
apprehended in the West, the Queene, by meanes of Torlton,
Bishop of Hereford, and Becke, Bishop of Duresme, and
Patriarke of Jerusalem, being then both mightie in the State,
upon the submission of the Mortimers, somewhat pacified the
King, and now secondly shee wrought meanes for his escape.
Twice all was taken, twice thou all didst give,
And thus twice dead, thou mak'st me twice to live:
This double life of mine, your onely due,
You gave to me; I give it backe to you.
Ne'r my Escape had I adventur'd thus,
As did the Skie-attempting Dedalus;
And yet to give more safetie to my flight,
Did make a Night of Day, a Day of Night:
Nor had I backt the proud aspiring Wall,
Which held without my Hopes, within my Fall,
With strong Ladders made of Cords, provided him for the
purpose, he escaped out of the Tower; which when the same
were found fastened to the Walls, in such a desperate Attempt,
they bred astonishment in the Beholders.
Leaving the Cords to tell where I had gone,
For gazers with much feare to looke upon;
But that thy Beautie (by a power divine)
Breath'd a new Life into this Spirit of mine,
Drawne by the Sunne of thy celestiall Eyes,
With fierie Wings, which bare me through the Skies.
The Heav'ns did seeme the charge of me to take,
And Sea and Land befriend me for thy sake;
Thames stop'd his Tide, to make me way to goe,
As thou hadst charg'd him that it should be so:
The hollow murm'ring Winds their due time kept,
As they had rock'd the World, while all things slept;
One Billow bare me, and another drave me,
This strove to helpe me, and that strove to save me;
The brisling Reeds mov'd with soft Gales, did chide me,
As they would tell me, that they meant to hide me:
The pale-fac'd Night beheld thy heavie cheare,
And would not let one little Starre appeare,
But over all, her smoakie Mantle hurl'd,
And in thicke Vapours muffled up the World;
And the sad Ayre became so calme and still,
As it had beene obedient to my will;
And every thing dispos'd it to my Rest,
As on the Seas when t'Halcion builds her Nest.
When those rough Waves, which late with Furie rush'd,
Slide smoothly on, and suddenly are hush'd;
Nor Neptune lets his Surges out so long,
As Nature is in bringing forth her Yong.
The two Hugh Spensers, the Father and the Sonne, then
being so highly favoured of the King, knew that their greatest
safetie came by his Exile, whose high and turbulent Spirit could
never brooke any Corrivall in Greatnesse.
Ne'r let the Spensers glorie in my Chance,
In that I live an Exile here in France;
That I from England banished should be,
But England rather banished from me:
More were her want, France our great Bloud should beare,
Then Englands losse can be to Mortimer.
Roger Mortimer, called the great Lord Mortimer,
Grandfather to this Roger, which was afterward the first
Earle of March, erected againe the Round Table at Kenelworth,
after the ancient Order of King Arthurs Table, with
the Retinue of an hundred Knights, and an hundred Ladies
in his House, for the entertaining of such Adventurers as came
thither from all parts of Christendome.
My Grandsire was the first, since Arthurs raigne,
That the Round-Table rectified againe:
To whose great Court at Kenelworth did come,
The peerelesse Knighthood of all Christendome;
Whose Princely Order honour'd England more,
Then all the Conquests she atchiev'd before.
Never durst Scot set foot on English Ground,
Nor on his Backe did English beare a Wound,
Whilst Wigmore flourish'd in our Princely Hopes,
And whilst our Ensignes march'd with Edwards Troopes:
Edward Longshankes willed at his Death, that his Bodie
should be boyled, the Flesh from the Bones, and that the
Bones should be borne to the Warres in Scotland, which he
was perswaded unto by a Prophecie, which told, That the
English should still be fortunate in Conquest, so long as his
Bones were carried in the Field.
Whilst famous Longshanks Bones (in Fortunes scorne)
As sacred Reliques to the Field were borne:
Nor ever did the valiant English doubt,
Whilst our brave Battels guarded them about:
Nor did our Wives and wofull Mothers mourne
In the great Voyage Edward the second made against the
Scots, at the Battell at Striveling, neere unto the River of
Banocksburne in Scotland, there was in the English Campe
such Banquetting and Excesse, such Riot and Misorder, that the
Scots (who in the meane time laboured for Advantage) gave
to the English a great Overthrow.
The English Bloud that stayned Banocksbourne,
Whilst with his Minions sporting in his Tent,
Whole Dayes and Nights in Banquetting were spent,
Untill the Scots (which under Safegard stood)
Made lavish Havocke of the English Blood:
Whose batt'red Helmes lay scatt'red on the Shore,
Where they in Conquest had beene borne before.
A thousand Kingdomes will we seeke from farre,
As many Nations waste with Civill Warre,
Where the dishevel'd gastly Sea-Nymph sings,
Or well-rig'd Ships shall stretch their swelling Wings,
And drag their Anchors through the sandie Fome,
About the World in ev'ry Clime to rome,
And those unchrist'ned Countries call our owne,
Where scarce the Name of England hath been knowne:
Mortimer, so called of Mare Mortuum, and in French,
Mortimer, in English, the Dead-Sea, which is said to be
where Sodome and Gomorrha once were, before they were
destroyed with fire from Heaven.
And in the dead Sea sinke our Houses Fame,
From whose vaste Depth we first deriv'd our Name;
Before foule blacke-mouth'd Infamie shall sing,
That Mortimer ere stoop'd unto a King.
And we will turne sterne-visag'd Furie backe,
To seeke his Spoyle, who sought our utter Sacke;
And come to beard him in our Native Ile,
Ere he march forth to follow our Exile:
And after all these boyst'rous stormie Shockes,
Yet will we grapple with the chaulkie Rockes.
Nor will we steale like Pyrats, or like Theeves,
From Mountaines, Forrests, or Sea-bord'ring Cleeves;
But fright the Ayre with Terror (when we come)
Of the sterne Trumpet, and the bellowing Drum:
And in the Field advance our plumie Crest,
And march upon faire Englands flowrie Brest.
And Thames, which once we for our Life did swim,
Shaking our dewie Tresses on his Brim,
Shall beare my Navie; vaunting in her pride,
Falling from Tanet with the pow'rfull Tide:
Which fertile Essex, and faire Kent shall see,
Spreading her Flags along the pleasant Lee,
When on her stemming Poope she proudly beares
The famous Ensignes of the Belgicke Peeres.
Gaustellinus and Lucas, two Cardinals, sent into England
from Pope Clement, to appease the ancient Hate betweene
the King and Thomas Earle of Lancaster; to whose
Embassie the King seemed to yeeld, but after their departure
he went backe from his Promises, for the which he was accursed
at Rome.
And for that hatefull Sacrilegious sinne,
Which by the Pope he stands accursed in,
The Canon Text shall have a common Glosse,
Receits in Parcels, shall be paid in Grosse:
This Doctrine preach'd, Who from the Church doth take,
At least shall treble Restitution make.
For which, Rome sends her Curses out from farre,
Through the sterne Throat of Terror-breathing Warre;
Till to th'unpeopled Shores she brings Supplies,
A Colonie is a sort or number of People, that come to inhabite
a Place before not inhabited; whereby he seemes here to
prophesie of the subversion of the Land, the Pope joyning with
the Power of other Princes against Edward, for the breach of
his Promise.
Of those industrious Roman Colonies.
And for his Homage, by the which of old,
Proud Edward
Guyne and Aquitaine doth hold,
Charles the French King, moved by the Wrong done unto
his Sister, seizeth the Provinces which belonged to the King
of England into his hands, stirred the rather thereto by Mortimer,
who sollicited her cause in France, as is expressed before
in the other Epistle, in the Glosse upon this Point.
Charles by invasive Armes againe shall take,
And send the English Forces o'r the Lake.
When Edwards Fortune stands upon this Chance,
To lose in England, or to forfait France;
And all those Townes great Longshanks left his Sonne,
Now lost, which once he fortunately wonne,
Within their strong Port-culliz'd Ports shall lye,
And from their Walls his Sieges shall defie:
And by that firme and undissolved Knot,
Betwixt their neighb'ring French, and bord'ring Scot,
Bruse shall bring on his Red-shanks from the Seas,
From th'Iled Orcads, and the Eubides,
And to his Westerne Havens give free passe,
To land the Kerne and Irish Galiglasse,
Marching from Tweed to swelling Humber Sands,
Wasting along the Northerne Nether-Lands.
And wanting those which should his Power sustaine,
Consum'd with Slaughter in his Bloudie Raigne,
Our Warlike Sword shall drive him from his Throne,
Where he shall lye for us to tread upon.
After the death of Thomas Earle of Lancaster at Pomfret,
the People imagined great Miracles to be done by his Reliques;
as they did of the Body of Bohune, Earle of Hereford,
slaine at Burrough Bridge.
And those great Lords, now after their Attaints,
Canonized amongst the English Saints,
And by the superstitious People thought,
That by their Reliques, Miracles are wrought:
And thinke that Floud much vertue doth retaine,
Which tooke the Bloud of famous Bohun slaine;
Continuing the remembrance of the thing,
Shall make the People more abhorre their King.
Nor shall a Spenser (be he ne'r so great)
Possesse our Wigmore, our renowmed Seat,
To raze the ancient Trophies of our Race,
With our deserts their Monuments to grace:
Nor shall he lead our valiant Marchers forth,
To make the Spensers famous in the North;
Nor be the Guardants of the British Pales,
Defending England, and preserving Wales.
At first our Troubles easily recul'd,
But now growne head-strong, hardly to be rul'd;
“Deliberate counsell needs us to direct,
“Where not (ev'n) plainnesse frees us from suspect:
By those Mishaps our Errors that attend,
Let us our Faults ingenuously amend.
Then (Deare) represse all peremptorie Spleene,
Be more then Woman, as you are a Queene:
Smother those Sparkes, which quickly else would burne,
Till time produce what now it doth adjourne.
Till when, great Queene, I leave you (though a while)
Live you in rest, nor pittie my Exile.
FINIS.
