University of Virginia Library

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DVELLVM BRITANNICVM.

DEDICATED To the eternall memorie of that admirable Combat performed by two valorous Knights, Sir Robert Mansell appellant, and Sir Iohn Heydon Defendant; where both equally expressing fortitude and skill in giuing and receiuing wounds, scaped death, notwithstanding by the onely fauour of Prouidence.

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HOMO HOMINI DÆMON

[Great Volumes in few lines epitomiz'd]

Great Volumes in few lines epitomiz'd
Are easiest apprehended, and so priz'd.

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Large Countries in small Maps are best suruaide,
Because the sense (in these abridgments staid)
Keeps company with Reason, neuer flitting
From that firme obiect their ioynt powers fitting.
Thus the whole world is in one Man exprest,
And euery part describ'd and iudged best.
Then noble Britaine do not scorne to see
Thy owne face in this Glasse I proffer thee:
Two of thy children, whose fortune tels,
What danger and assur'd destruction dwels
In thy dis-vnion; and how fond they are,
Who with false reasons nurse thy ciuill warre.

Much more they had; so much, that hard it is
To tell what either wanted. Earths chiefe blisse,
(Their Princes fauour) like the Sunne aboue
In his hot Solstice stood, and did improue
Their blooming youth's with ripened fruit, before
Their thoughts could hope: ô what could they wish more?

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Friends sought thē, fortune blest thē; blest them so,
That which might happiest seeme was hard to know,
Neither had cause of Enuie; except thus,
As th'eies, hands, feet, which guide, guard, carry vs;
Whose selfe like shape, and equall vse admits
No warre, but fellow-feeling of such fits,
Griefes, and diseases, and each part sustaines;
So shar'd they in all pleasures, toyles, sports, paines.
Nor had these other cause of warre at all,
“And causelesse warre is most vnnaturall.
Yet (oh) that subtle Spirit incens'd rash blood
With franticke rage, that euery ill seem'd good.
They first must pray; so vndeserued gold
“Ill got, we waste, and haue no power to hold.
Then they proceed to words, from words to blowes;
“The way to ill is easie; but who knowes
The Clue that we returne by? hence proceeds
A Challenge from wrong'd Wharton: Steward needs
No such stale prouocation: Mischiefes feet
“Are swift to blood: their quicke desires soon meet,
And (met) soone fight; bold Steward falls by Fate;
Wharton by Chance: those powers each other hate.

So I haue seene from th'Indies East and West,
Two Ships well rigg'd and mann'd vpon the brest
Of Thetis dancing, spreading flags abroad
For ioy of their long-wisht-for English roade;
Past now all dangerous Rocks, Gulphs, Pyrats, Sand,
Ready t'vnlade their rich fraught on firme land,
And tell the story of their perils past,
And frolicke with glad friends in peace, at last.
When spying each other so bedeckt, adorn'd,
With outward pomp: ones pride the other scorn'd,

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And from that enuious scorn some word proceeding,
And from that word some blow, from that blow bleeding.
Then giuing way to fury, all inrag'd,
Both are in desp'rate tearmes of fight ingag'd.
The fire in water, Lead in th'ayre, their center
Doe madly seeke; and both these rudely enter
The strong ships wombe, and ransacke euery hold,
For pretious life, neglecting Indian gold.
The shot seems thunder, but the dying grones
Of slaughtered soules, shrike louder, deeper tones
Then roring Cannons, whose thicke charging rout
Lets water freely in, and poures bloud out.
In this hot fight both firmly doe defend,
Both nimbly do assault, both madly spend,
Strength, skill, and all to hurt. Conquest inclines
To neither part as partiall. Equall lines
Are drawne betwixt them both by Fate and Chance;
Till th'one his topsaile fairely doth aduance
To win the winde, and in that vantage flies
With force and fury on his foe; who plies
All meanes to salue this losse, and to regaine
Faire ods, or equall standing once againe.

So fares it with these noble Combatants
Both equally of blood and honor vaunts:

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Both enui'd and belou'd alike, both friends,
Both yong, both valiant, and their life and ends
So paralell, and twin-like like in all
That they obtain'd one graue, one funerall.

One graue, one funerall, they obtain'd, yet lost
The fame and honor their youth thirsted most.
Because their quarrell on false grounds begun,
Could not produce true praise, nor true blame shun.
The wounds thou gau'st stout Wharton had bin good
Against thy Kings or faiths foe; and thy blood
Heroicke Steward, had been nobly shed,
Against such slaues; so both had brauely bled.
And your brasse Monuments had spoke the fame
Of Whartons noble, Stewards royall name.
Then the fierce challenger for his quicke charge,
And stout assault with wounds giuen deepe and large;
His apt command of euery part soone shunning,
All wounds saue one, giuen more by chance then cunning
And the Defendant, who so long time stood
Drownd (yet vndanted) in his owne life blood;
And deadly wounded, past all hope of liuing,
Death in his death to his haile fooeman giuing;
Had filld the largest leaues of Fames faire story,
And both worne wreath of triumph, conquest, glory:
And then like patterns to both Realms, set out
By vertue for example; the wise and stout
Had been your schollers, and their lessons read,
In those greene fields, where both so boldly bled.
But now (aye me!) as rocks, bars, sands, at sea,
Or marks set vp to shew ships where they bee,
Or rather as some wrack'd ships selfe, whose mast
Ore-looks the waues, and yet still sticking fast

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In th'eating silt, bids the wise Pilot flye
The tracklesse path, where such hid dangers lye.
So stand these two, the signes of woe, and ruth,
Of shipwrackt honor, fortune, valour, youth;
And by their deaths confirme this speech for good,
“Vertue hath greater priuiledge then blood.
“Our soules are Gods, our bodies are the Kings,
“And he that in his priuate quarrell brings
“Either of these in question doth betray
“The Kings part, and giues Gods part cleane away.

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DUELLI FINIS

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Epitaphium Georgii Whartoni Milit.

Epitaphium Iacobi Stewardi Armigeri.